No.
The only reason that Firefox, Opera, and Chrome are getting popular is because their main feature is basically:
-not Internet Explorer!
People have started to- for whatever reason- associate Internet Explorer with "bad security" even though FF, Chrome, and Opera have just as many shortcomings in that area, if not more. The Browsers are functionally equivalent, and come down to preference. People like to assume "oh, they just don't KNOW about other browsers" as if there simply being an alternative browser is somehow justification for a switch. It isn't.
Having to of course google for the source, Since geek-pm likes to completely ignore the fact that sources ought to be quoted for easy reference, it seems they only tested IE6 users, and from what I can tell, completely ignored users of IE7,8 and 9. This is called a "bias" and after revealing that there is one, the motives of the "study" become quite clear. It's a bunch of people using other browsers that want to make themselves look smart.
IE isn't part of the 'browser cabal'. The W3C only has two real implementers: IE, and everybody else. Everybody else, when they're confused about a spec, will look at whichever browser (other than IE) has already implemented it and copy it. Sometimes literally copy the code. The fact that IE has an independent implementation is a GOOD thing, and I don't see how anybody can claim otherwise.
What (for example) Chrome should do when confused about an aspect of the spec is go to the W3C and force them to make an official decision on the behavior required and update the spec. They don't do this; instead they just look at what Firefox did and copy it exactly. They also make no effort to get Firefox's behavior codified by the W3C and updated in the spec. Thus: the spec remains vague. Thus: it's fully possible for IE to implement the spec word-for-word and yet show a different result, or fail the "acid test" because the acid test isn't actually testing the standard but rather how close the implementation is to "everybody else". Thus: web developers *censored* at IE being different because they have the gall to actually implement based on the spec, when all the other browsers are not.
The reason "web developers", at least the whiny ones, are frustrated with IE are:
1) Most of them have the Slashdot-esque generic Microsoft hatred, where Microsoft is a scapegoat for everything wrong with computers ever
2) Most of them are lazy, and (not realizing how easy the task is compared to most) don't want to have to QA their products in more than one browser
3) Most of them value some abstract academic bullcrap like "style separate from content" "semantical purity" "HTML needs to be XML-compatible" over getting their job done.
Anybody griping about IE being "behind" other browsers simply hasn't used IE. The real fact of the matter is:
-The 'standards' often do things in the most illogical, confusing way possible (getComputedStyle vs. currentStyle, textContent vs. innerText)
-The IE developers frequently (and rightly, IMO) call these confusing standards out and make their own version as well, which makes 50 times more sense
-The fact that the W3C ignores IE's innovations (99% of the time; there's always xmlHttpRequest) is a crime against all web developers everywhere. Note: Microsoft is a member/sponsor of the W3C, and they get treated like crap by them.
Oh, and look at the W3C standard for figuring which mouse button was pressed on a mouse event. It's so retarded, your brain will explode out your ears-- nobody at the W3C ever heard of holding down TWO mouse buttons simultaneously? IE, once again, implements it in a easy, rational fashion.
Which makes more sense:
element.innerText="hi I am text in an element";
or this:
document.getElementById('element').firstChild.data = "hi I am text in an element";
The former is only possible in IE. the latter is what the W3C recommends in place of innerText.
Compare IE's currentStyle property with the W3C's retardly inefficient "getComputedStyle" function-- what is a 12-character property in IE becomes 40 characters and two function calls in "everybody else". (IE supports the standard way, as well, I think, but the "standard way" is stupid and the fact that the IE-specific implementation is so much cleaner is a failing on the part of the standards body. They should be choosing the most obvious, simplest approach, not forcing web developers to use a 40 character properly and two function calls for no reason at all. Another, more conspiratorial theory is that the W3C ignores things like "innerText" and "currentStyle" specifically to spite Microsoft.
