The End of an Era! AOL Retires Netscape!

Wow! I remember way back in the “olden” days of the web… when Netscape was king! Now, as 2007 closes… AOL (which acquired Netscape) is killing it off!

The end of an era as AOL officially retires Netscape

“As we bid adieu to 2007 and prepare to enter the new year, AOL is also saying goodbye to memories: the company has finally killed off the Netscape Web browser – or what was left of it, anyway. March 31, 2008 will mark 10 years since the Netscape development team opened up the source code to the browser that ushered in the Internet era. With its acquisition of Netscape in 1999, AOL continued that effort and helped launch the Mozilla Foundation into an organization that has taken on Microsoft and shaped the Web as we know it today. But Netscape’s time has long since passed due to the arrival of Firefox and AOL’s struggles to stay relevant in an increasingly broadband-connected decade. Netscape 6, the first browser based upon the Mozilla source code, debuted in 2000 and was succeeded two years later by Netscape 7, also a rebranded version of Mozilla. Meanwhile, Internet Explorer quickly took over Windows desktops and Netscape’s market share dwindled to single digits. The demise of Netscape wasn’t a big surprise to most. When the Internet bubble burst, there was little money to fund development of a product that could compete with something Microsoft gave away for free. Even the Mozilla foundation barely limped along with help from AOL until Google laid its golden egg: advertising in search results.”