Microsoft Internet Explorer: The Cancer of the Web

Originally posted December 17, 2008

My mission today is simple. As a web programmer, I am here to beg you all to please, please, PLEASE stop using Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE)! It is a web programmer and developer’s worst nightmare of a browser!

We are the nice people who give you things like YouTube and internet porn. All we as in return is that you stop using IE.

What prompted this sudden geek spasm, you ask? This article from Yahoo! explains it all. There is yet ANOTHER ginormous security hole the size of Kanye West’s ego in IE that is being exploited.

Going down with the ship

Unfortunately, since Windows comes with IE preinstalled, many people do not even know that they’ve been using is a crap (to put it nicely). Do bug eating people from the jungles of Idaho know what prime rib taste like? Hell no.

If you want to give your computer a health boost , start by cutting its junk food intake. There is an unthinkable about of custom code written out there just to work around IE’s bugs and deviations from standards. This particular security hole is just the latest in a long history of such happenings. Sure enough, Microsoft will patch this hole and sit back waiting for the next leak to spring. Hell, everyone chained to IE is practically riding in a quilt boat.

Yes... I'd rather web browse with poo than IE.

Let me put it this way: if IE were to disappear forever, the internet as a whole would fast forward about 5 years in technology and security. It’s kinda hard to explain the reasons why unless you’re a programmer as well, but here are two other browsers that if you try, I PROMISE you’ll love. They are faster, more stable, less of a security risk, and will extend the good health of web developers everywhere by 10 years.

Real quality browsing for zero cost

Take a look at these two browsers: Mozilla Firefox and my personal favorite Google Chrome.

Firefox has been around for quite a while. It was what popularize the whole tabbed browsing thing WAY before IE 7 (the one that you are probably using if you are an IE user). This one has a crap load of freakin’ sweet plug-ins that let you do neat things like download videos from sites like YouTube and god only knows what else. Developers love it for the Firebug plug in. This is the swiss army knife of browsers.

If you don’t care too much about extras, the Chrome is definitely the one for you. Chrome just came out of beta recently. It is to IE what a Ferrari is to a shopping cart. The performance of this thing is amazing and it has an awesome, low profile interface.

A final plea

Please everyone…do the WORLD a favor, and use any browser but IE. If you like either of the ones above (and I KNOW you will), use it at work. If your computer is locked down, pester the hell out of your office network admins until you can bitch-slap some sense into them. Then, start a chain and get everyone else you know to drop IE….PLEEEEASE!!!!

Ok….i’m done. Back to work using Chrome and Firefox!