eWEEK Readers Prefer Firefox And Chrome (But Use IE)

eWEEK readers overwhelmingly prefer to use Firefox and Chrome, according to a poll – but the site statistics show a clear majority use Microsoft Internet Explorer.

We asked readers which browser they prefer, in a live poll on eWEEK Europe. Firefox and Google’s Chrome dominated, with about 40 percent for each, leaving all the other browsers to scrabble for crumbs. However, this clearly doesn’t tell the whole story, as live data from our site’s analytics tells a different story, with around two thirds of actual visitors using Internet Explorer, with Firefox on 17 percent and Chrome on less than ten percent.

Are eWEEK users forced to use IE?

Market share figures suggest that Chrome is gaining market share, and Internet Explorer is clawing back some of the share it lost to Firefox. In the world of eWEEK readers, however, hardly anyone clicked to say they preferred Microsoft’s browser, with six percent liking Internet Explorer 8, and about one percent preferring any other IE version in the live poll.

Firefox and Chrome were nearly level pegging, on 42 percent, and 38 percent respectively. Safari and Opera, despite strong and vocal supporters, only got six percent and four percent.

Other browsers mentioned – with a couple of votes each – included Samonkey and Lunarscape, while one voter wished to emphasise his dislike for Explorer, voting for “anything but IE”.

A very clear vote against Microsoft browsers, it might seem, but the live traffic statistics tell a very different story. Here, Microsoft dominated very clearly, and Firefox took a respectable second place.

For the most recent 100,000 hits on eWEEK. Internet Explorer delivered two thirds of the pages (66 percent) while Firefox was on 17 percent and Chrome got ten percent. Safari and Opera also went a little down in readers’ stated preferences, on five percent and less than one percent.

The reason behind this is almost certainly a combination of two things.

Firstly, only enthusiasts vote, so we’d expect a proportionally higher turn-out for browsers where users have had to make a conscious decision to use them.

Secondly, it may well be that some voters may prefer Firefox or Chrome, while actually being forced to use Internet Explorer, either for corporate policy, or for reasons of compatibility with particular sites such as company extranets.

For us, the bottom line is that usage may not reveal a preference, and preferences may not show through in usage.  We have resolved not to put a huge amount of trust in polls in future.

However, polls are too much fun to stop, so next we have a Green IT question for you….

Next up – are you ready for CRC?

The end of September is the deadline for registration in the Energy Efficiency Scheme for the government’s Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC). It is feared that thousands of companies will miss this deadline and incur fines of up to £45,000.

The scheme is a carbon credit system, designed to reward companies that reduce their carbon footprint by cutting the amount of energy they use. Despite a certain amount of publicity for the scheme, we have been told by vendors and analysts that many organisations are likely to miss the deadline.

Is this true, we wondered? Or is it hype designed to drum up business for companies with energy budgeting software? There’s only one way to find out the level of awareness of CRC, we thought… and that is to ask you, eWEEK Europe’s readers.

A poll on the CRC should be on the left hand side of the site, ready for your answer. Tell us if you know what the CRC is all about, and whether it applies to you.