Call to boycott IE7 too little, too late

Windows Guru Paul Thurrott called yesterday for a boycott of IE7 after the [sarcasm]startling revelation[/sarcasm] by Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) Lead Program Manager Chris Wilson in his blog that IE7 would most certainly fail the ACID2 test. Paul, Paul, Paul! Where were you three years ago when I spoke harshly on the subject of IE and standards and vulnerabilities? IE has never been standards compliant and has always embraced Microsoft's vision of a one-browser Internet. Between proprietary technologies such as ActiveX and VBScript and its non-compliance with standards, web developers have always had to either modify code to handle the idiosyncracies of IE in order to support multiple browsers or simply settle for support of only IE.

A boycott of IE7 is a nice gesture, but it's about effective as trying to treat gangrene once your leg has turned black. By allowing IE to propagate its proprietariness throughout Internet sites like some kind of worm, its inability to comply with standards has permeated just about every aspect of the Web. Whether it's application front ends or entertainment, IE has become the browser most web developers write code to and a boycott now is not going to change that.

I vehemently oppose the use of IE and when I develop sites I don't even test in IE. And guess what, it comes back to bite me every time. Users still use IE despite the fact that it doesn't comply with standards and it's nearly impossible to explain to them the technical reasons behind the decision to not support IE. So you end up doing it anyway, because the majority of users have IE, that's what they know and that's what they want to use, despite myriad reasons not to use it.

A boycott years ago may have had an impact and even gotten the attention of Microsoft but now? It's a token rebellion against an entrenched vision that while certainly myopic has still managed to make its way to the forefront of the race.You get an "A" for finally seeing the light, but an "F" for execution.