Netscape Communications Corporation (originally Mosaic Communications Corporation) was an American independent computer services company with headquarters in Mountain View, California, and then Dulles, Virginia.Swartz, Jon. " Company takes browser war to Netscape's lawn ." San Francisco Chronicle. Thursday October 2, 1997. Retrieved on December 29, 2009. Its Netscape web browser was once dominant but lost to Internet Explorer and other competitors in the so-called first browser war, with its market share falling from more than 90 percent in the mid-1990s
Netscape stock traded from 1995 until 1999 when the company was acquired by AOL in a pooling-of-interests transaction ultimately worth US$10 billion. "America Online Inc. Completes Acquisition of Netscape Communications Corp." . Business Wire. March 17, 1999. Retrieved July 1, 2012. "What's $10 Billion to AOL?" . Morningstar. April 5, 1999. Retrieved July 1, 2012. In February 1998, approximately one year prior to its acquisition by AOL, Netscape released the source code for its browser and created the Mozilla Organization to coordinate future development of its product. The Mozilla Organization rewrote the entire browser's source code based on the Gecko rendering engine, and all future Netscape releases were based on this rewritten code. When AOL scaled back its involvement with Mozilla Organization in the early 2000s, the Organization proceeded to establish the Mozilla Foundation in July 2003 to ensure its continued independence with financial and other assistance from AOL. The Gecko engine is used to power the Mozilla Foundation's Firefox browser.
In addition to browsers, Netscape developed a suite of award-winning server software, known as SuiteSpot, to power enterprise Internet and Intranet websites, forums, and email; e-commerce software; and a consumer web portal named Netcenter. Netscape's browser development continued until December 2007, when AOL announced that the company would stop supporting it by early 2008. As of 2024, AOL continued to use the Netscape brand to market a discount Internet service provider. Netscape ISP home page of 2014 with link to Netscape ISP Terms of Service update of 15 September 2014.
The company's first product was the web browser, called Mosaic Netscape 0.9, released on October 13, 1994. Within four months of its release, it had already taken three-quarters of the browser market. It became the main browser for Internet users in such a short time due to its superiority over other competition, like Mosaic. This browser was subsequently renamed Netscape Navigator, and the company took the "Netscape" name (coined by employee Greg Sands, although it was also a trademark of Cisco Systems "Cisco tablet not an iPad knock-off: Chambers" . Network World. June 30, 2010. Retrieved July 1, 2012.) on November 14, 1994, to avoid trademark ownership problems with NCSA, where the initial Netscape employees had previously created the NCSA Mosaic web browser. The Mosaic Netscape web browser did not use any NCSA Mosaic code. The internal codename for the company's browser was Mozilla, which stood for "Mosaic killer", as the company's goal was to displace NCSA Mosaic as the world's number one web browser. A cartoon Godzilla-like lizard mascot was drawn by artist-employee Dave Titus, which went well with the theme of crushing the competition. The Mozilla mascot featured prominently on Netscape's website in the company's early years. However, the need to project a more "professional" image (especially towards corporate clients) led to this being removed.
It is alleged that several Microsoft executives visited the Netscape campus in June 1995 to propose dividing the market (an allegation denied by Microsoft and, if true, would have breached antitrust laws), which would have allowed Microsoft to produce web browser software for Windows while leaving all other operating systems to Netscape. Netscape refused the proposition. Microsoft released version 1.0 of Internet Explorer as a part of the Windows 95 Plus Pack add-on. According to former Spyglass developer Eric Sink, Internet Explorer was based not on NCSA Mosaic as commonly believed, but on a version of Mosaic developed at Spyglass (which itself was based upon NCSA Mosaic).
This period of time would become known as the browser wars. Netscape Navigator was not free to the general public until January 1998, while Internet Explorer and Internet Information Server have always been free or came bundled with an operating system and/or other applications. Meanwhile, Netscape faced increasing criticism for "featuritis" – putting a higher priority on adding new features than on making their products work properly. Netscape experienced its first bad quarter at the end of 1997 and underwent a large round of layoffs in January 1998. Former Netscape executives Mike Homer and Peter Currie have described this period as "hectic and crazy" and that the company was undone by factors both internal and external. In January 1998, Netscape started the open source Mozilla project.. Netscape publicly released the source code of Netscape Communicator 5.0 under the Netscape Public License, which was similar to the GNU General Public License but allowed Netscape to continue to publish proprietary work containing the publicly released code.
The United States Department of Justice filed an antitrust case against Microsoft in May 1998. Netscape was not a plaintiff in the case, though its executives were subpoenaed and it contributed much material to the case, including the entire contents of the 'Bad Attitude' internal discussion forum.
On July 15, 2003, Time Warner (formerly AOL Time Warner) disbanded Netscape. Most of the programmers were laid-off, and the Netscape logo was removed from the building. However, the Netscape 7.2 web browser (developed in-house rather than with Netscape staff, with some work outsourced to Sun Microsystems Beijing development center "Sun Micro To Double Beijing Software Center" . HPCwire. August 8, 2003. Retrieved July 1, 2012.) was released by AOL on August 18, 2004.
After the Sun acquisition by Oracle in January 2010, Oracle continued to sell iPlanet branded applications, which originated from Netscape. Oracle Web Tier" . Oracle. Retrieved July 7, 2012
A new version of the Netscape browser, Netscape Navigator 9, based on Firefox 2, was released in October 2007. It featured a green and grey interface. In November 2007, IE had 77.4% of the browser market, Firefox 16.0%, and Netscape 0.6%, according to Net Applications, an Internet metrics firm. On December 28, 2007, AOL announced that it would drop support for the Netscape web browser and would no longer develop new releases on February 1, 2008. The date was later extended to March 1 to allow a major security update and to add a tool to assist users in migrating to other browsers. These additional features were included in the final version of Netscape Navigator 9 (version 9.0.0.6), released on February 20, 2008.
The browser was easily the most advanced available and so was an instant success, becoming a market leader while still in beta. Netscape's feature-count and market share continued to grow rapidly after version 1.0 was released. Version 2.0 added a full email reader called Netscape Mail, thus transforming Netscape from a single-purpose web browser to an Internet suite. The email client's main distinguishing feature was its ability to display HTML email. During this period, the entire suite was called Netscape Navigator.
Version 3.0 of Netscape (the first beta was codenamed "Atlas") was the first to face any serious competition in the form of Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0. But Netscape remained the most popular browser at that time.
Netscape also released a Gold version of Navigator 3.0 that incorporated WYSIWYG editing with drag and drop between web editor and email components.
On January 22, 1998, Netscape Communications Corporation announced that all future versions of its software would be available free of charge and developed by an open source community, Mozilla. Netscape Communicator 5.0 was announced (codenamed "Gromit"). However, its release was greatly delayed, and meanwhile, there were newer versions of Internet Explorer, starting with version 4. These had more features than the old Netscape version, including better support of HTML 4, CSS, DOM, and ECMAScript; eventually, the more advanced Internet Explorer 5.0 became the market leader.
In October 1998, Netscape Communicator 4.5 was released. It featured various functionality improvements, especially in the Mail and Newsgroups component, but did not update the browser core, whose functionality was essentially identical to that of version 4.08. One month later, Netscape Communications Corporation was bought by AOL. In November, work on Netscape 5.0 was canceled in favor of developing a completely new program from scratch.
In 2003, AOL closed down its Netscape division and laid-off or reassigned all of Netscape's employees. Mozilla.org continued, however, as the independent Mozilla Foundation, taking on many of Netscape's ex-employees. AOL continued to develop Netscape in-house (with help from Sun Microsystems Beijing development center), but, due to there being no staff committed to it, improvements were minimal. One year later, in August 2004, the last version based on Mozilla was released: Netscape 7.2, based on Mozilla 1.7.2.
After an official poll posted on Netscape's community support board in late 2006, speculation arose of the Netscape 7 series of suites being fully supported and updated by Netscape's in-house development team. Netscape Community Announcement – Netscape 7.2 Retrieved on February 8, 2007 Netscape Community poll – Should Netscape continue to update 7.2? Retrieved on February 8, 2007 Mozillazine – Netscape 9 announced Retrieved on February 8, 2007
Other controversial decisions include the browser only being released for Microsoft Windows and featuring both the Gecko rendering engine of previous releases and the Trident engine used in Internet Explorer, and switching between them based on a "compatibility list" that came with the browser. This effectively exposed users to the security vulnerabilities in both and resulted in a completely different user experience based on which site they were on. Examples are handling of right-to-left or bi-directional text, user interface widgets, bugs and web standards violations in Trident, etc. On top of this, Netscape Browser 8 even broke Internet Explorer's ability to open XML files by damaging a Windows Registry key, and would do so every time it was opened, even if the user fixed it manually.
AOL's acquisition of Netscape Communications in November 1998 PC World Article Nov 24, 1998 12am made it less of a surprise when the company laid off the Netscape team and outsourced development to Mercurial Communications. Netscape Browser 8.1.3 was released on April 2, 2007, and included general bug fixes identified in versions 8.0–8.1.2 Netscape Community – Netscape 8.1.3 Retrieved on February 8, 2007 Netscape Community – Netscape 8.1.3 released Retrieved on April 2, 2007
The decision met mixed reactions from communities, with many arguing that the termination of product support is significantly belated. Internet security site Security Watch stated that a trend of infrequent security updates for AOL's Netscape caused the browser to become a "security liability", specifically the 2005–2007 versions, Netscape Browser. Asa Dotzler, one of Mozilla Firefox original bug testers, greeted the news with "good riddance" in his blog post, but praised the various members of the Netscape team over the years for enabling the creation of Mozilla in 1998. Others protested and petitioned AOL to continue providing vital security fixes to unknowing or loyal users of its software, as well as protection of a well-known brand.
The Netscape Blog was written by Netscape employees discussing the latest on Netscape products and services. Netscape NewsQuake (formerly Netscape Reports) is Netscape's news and opinion blog, including video clips and discussions. , no new posts have been made on either of these blogs since August 2008.
Netscape was notable for its cross-platform efforts. Its client software continued to be made available for Windows (3.1, 95, 98, Windows NT), Macintosh, Linux, OS/2, BeOS, and many versions of Unix including DEC, Sun Solaris, BSDI, IRIX, IBM AIX, and HP-UX. Its server software generally was only available for Unix and Windows NT, though some of its servers were made available on Linux, and a version of Netscape FastTrack Server was made available for Windows 95/98. Today, most of Netscape's server offerings live on as the Sun Java System, formerly under the Sun ONE branding. Although Netscape Browser 8 was Windows only, multi-platform support exists in the Netscape Navigator 9 series of browsers.
Netscape's exclusive features, such as the Netscape Blog, Netscape NewsQuake, Netscape Navigator, My Netscape and Netscape Community pages, are less accessible from the AOL Netscape designed portal and in some countries not accessible at all without providing a full URL or completing an Internet search. Netscape Community responses . Retrieved on September 20, 2007 The new AOL Netscape site was originally previewed in August 2007 before moving the existing site in September 2007. New Netscape Portal – Netscape Community Retrieved on August 14, 2007
Netscape.com now redirects to AOL's website, with no Netscape branding at all. Meanwhile, Netscape.co.uk now redirects to AOL Search, also with no Netscape branding at all.
Initial public offering (IPO)
Acquisition by America Online
Disbanding
Final release of the browser
Software
Classic releases
Netscape Navigator (versions 0.9–4.08)
Netscape Communicator (versions 4.0–4.8)
Mozilla-based releases
Netscape 6 (versions 6.0–6.2.3)
Netscape 7 (versions 7.0–7.2)
Mozilla Firefox-based releases
Netscape Browser (version 8.0–8.1.3)
Netscape Navigator (version 9.0)
End of development and support
Mozilla Thunderbird-based releases
Netscape Messenger 9
Product list
Initial product line
Later Netscape products
Propeller
Netscape Search
Other sites
Netscape technologies
Current services
Netscape Internet Service
Netscape.com
DMOZ
See also
Further reading
External links
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