IE Sends Cake to Firefox 2 Team

GDI Lord writes "The Microsoft Internet Explorer Team sent the Firefox team a cake for the release of Firefox 2! "P.S.: No, it was not poisoned" " That they know of anyway.

You have to admit

[captnitro]

That was pretty classy. (Even if ultimately it was intended as a bit of good-natured competitive ribbing, which it doesn't look like.)

I have to say, often times we're prone to think that large organizations such as Microsoft are just a big, faceless entity. As a whole, this may or may not be true, but either way, they're only made up of people. The IE team only wants to ship the best software possible given their resources, as does Mozilla.

The best to both teams -- let the competition continue!

The link

[Klaidas]

Shouldn't it be http://fredericiana.com/2006/10/24/from-redmond-wi th-love/ [fredericiana.com] ?

Happy to have a job again!

[EggyToast]

Remember, Microsoft disbanded the IE team shortly after 6 was released. The IE team sends a cake not just for a "birthday," but as thanks for giving them jobs!

Give Me A Break...

[beringreenbear]

For a change, Microsoft's IE team was showing a bit of class and acknowledging that without the competition and innovation from Mozilla Firefox, there (probably) wouldn't have been an IE 7 project. It also hints that there might be some subtle changes in Microsoft's old Cult of Bill approach. At the end of the day, software developers are just people, and political football aside, there really is no reason for animosity. Kudos to Microsoft's IE 7 team for being good sports.

Maybe It's Just a Gift?

[Secret Agent Man]

Maybe while us users squabble in our own browser war, the development teams actually don't care all that much. Maybe they truly are just glad of how everyone is advancing (as opposed to just trying to one-up each other). I'm not saying that everyone in both companies feel that way, but instead of reading stuff into this surprise present, maybe it was just a good gesture.

Re:You have to admit

[waif69]

This is awesome! It shows that at least some of the team members of the IE development team have some self-respect and can appreciate quality work. This shows that just because a group of developers work for the giant doesn't mean that they are disrespectful and bad sports.

Re:You have to admit

[CastrTroy]

I got modded troll, but I'm being serious. After 6 years of IE6, they finally release a new version. What they gave us a bunch of copied features from other browsers(firefox,opera) that have been available for years, and from what i've heard, nothing that really makes it better than the competition. And they have worse standards support than everybody else. You would think that in 6 years that they could produce something at least on par with the competition, if not many times better.

Re:Yum, Cake

[StevoJ]

and it only worked with one particular fork

It's only right. . .

[Iridium_Hack]

After all, Firefox has probably caused more updates and work on IE than anything else. Those IE developers are probably quite thankful seeing as their budget increased quite a bit, partially because there is now some decent competition on the field.

Of Course They Sent A Cake

[fuzznutz]

They are grateful to the Firefox team for doing all their R&D for them.

Well why not? Rivalry makes life more fun!

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to work for Major Cell Phone Company 1. Our competitor, MCPC2, was based in the same town as we were. The best lunch hours where when "my guys" and "their guys" wound up at the same place. We'd taunt each other mercilessly, but we'd also share information as well. "You guys planning any expansion south of Richview? Good, we could use the roaming when our new site goes online in June. Oops, did I say that out loud?"

Sure they were "the enemy" but because of their competition we always had job security. And the fact is that they were just people who did the same job as us. We had a lot in common, and knowing what their jobs consisted of, a LOT of mutual respect. Just don't tell any of them that I said so, I'd hate for their heads to get too big to fit into the door of that crappy old shed they call a MTSO...

Re:Happy to have a job again!

[onion2k]

They still had jobs, just not working on IE. You don't get rid of developers just because the project finishes. Similarly, you don't keep a team together when they've got nothing to do. That would be a waste of some valuable assets. They'd just gone to other parts of Microsoft.

Re:You have to admit

[cnettel]

Well, the previous IE team was basically disbanded, with people going to work on Office, Visual Studio and WPF/Avalon/XAML. Two of these are very popular and can, in their own way, surely be considered on par or superior to the competition. (Visual Studio is a nice IDE even for non-Windows development.) It's not a matter of trying for six years and failing, but rather starting quite late, with a team that's still smaller than it was when Trident was first developed. This of course only shifts the blame within MS, from developer incompetence to management incompetence, or arrogance.

Microsoft Strikes Again

[dahwang]

Just as they did with the Nintendo Wii and Xbox360, Microsoft is getting free publicity.

With Firefox just releasing their new version, it has eclipsed the launch of IE7. By sending a cake, which is sure to getting bloggers and slashdot to post, Microsoft directs the attention back on them. Also, it's good publicity. But we all know, no publicity is bad publicity.

SLASHDOTTERS YOU TOOK THE BAIT!

Re:You have to admit

[PenguinGuy]

And why did it take 6 years to get a new version of IE? Because MS had "won" the browser war so they didn't have to upgrade anything..

The joys of Microsoft and the campaign to control all of computing.

Perhaps this is common.

[LoudMusic]

Lots of comments about how the IE team is happy to be empoyed, a friendly gesture, poking fun, etc etc. But I think this sort of thing is more common place than most of us imagine. Big companies that spend a lot of their time working on similar products follow eachother's progress very closely and are aware of the same difficulties they're both having. They may not be on the same team, but they're fighting the same battle. Even physical wartime battles have been known to halt to celebrate a common holiday, together.

I know that Terminix (a client of my company) congratulated Orkin (the evil competitor) on one of their recent anniversaries. It's a way of saying "We know what you're up against, and we know it kinda sucks. Hang in there."

My wife and I watched an episode of Dharma & Greg last night (TiVo, don't know the air date) where they're entering a dancing competition. Dharma's parents were against it claiming competition makes people mean and greedy. I see that a lot in society, and it doesn't have to be that way. Competition is to make us better individuals. Without competition we'd never progress to the next level. And because of that we should thank our competitors for putting up a good measure of excellence.

Even in sports like track and cross country where you can effectively compete against yourself, where's the push to keep getting a faster mile time, higher polevault, or longer long jump if you have nothing to compare it against? At the end of high school track meets I remember walking around and shaking the hands of everyone I competed with. If it weren't for them I wouldn't have been "in the top three" regularly. I'd have just been a dude running crappy lap times on the weekend.

Here's to competition! The evolver of our modern society. Thank your competitors, for they are what bring us a better life.

Re:Icing on the cake...

[darkuni]

They should have sent the cake to Team Opera then. Credit where credit is due.

Re:You have to admit

[EggyToast]

Yeah, exactly. A good programmer will be able to write whatever code they're told to write. To them, it's not a question of whether it presents good UI guidelines or doesn't conform to the OS; they make it work with the guidelines provided. If they're not hearing any problems, they're going to assume they're doing a good job.

It's the managers and designers who are deciding what things will look like and how functionality will work. The managers for Word will say "We need to have this integrated into IE." The programmers aren't the ones to say "That's stupid; no one's going to use that." That's the manager's responsibility to understand what projects are important and which ones should go back to the drawing board.

And when you hear conflicting things from management, it just makes you want to do what you're told, rather than try to figure out "which way is right" on such a subjective decision.

Re:You have to admit

[Anonymous Coward]

why in the world would they want to do that?

To make a living.

I hope this message reaches you all the way up in your tower.

Re:You have to admit

[Miseph]

Indeed. It often strikes me that many of our colleagues in geekdom have a tendncy to get quite wrapped up in what employees of certain companies (Microsoft, Symantec, SCO, etc.) are or aren't doing, and the relative ethicality of those actions and inactions. So wrapped up, in fact, that they seemingly forget that those employee's are people too, real ones, with bills, and lives, and stomachs, and that given the choice between doing something we dislike and eviction, most people are going to suck it up and put food on their tables. When you're ready to give full employment with equal pay and benefits to what they make now, then go ahead and tell us that they should all quit working for Microsoft because you don't like their business practices... until then, you're just blowing smoke. Too bad the parent felt he had to post AC. Good thing I'm so damned apathetic.

Re:CARBOS FTW

[mikek3332002]

I think the IE team just appreciates the competition.Having a browser war really does drive innovation.

Probably they sent it as thanks because they could code something other then security holes/fixes.