A new way for Android users to get around the Web should debut this year.  Jay Sullivan, Vice President of Mobile at Mozilla, has indicated that Firefox Mobile for Android will land sometime in 2010.

The nonexistence of this product might have troubled some fans of Mozilla and Google.  It’s no secret that the two companies have been growing apart as Chrome came out and Mozilla’s director of community development endorsed Bing over Google.  Also, the search deal between them is set to expire in 2011.

Sullivan, who’s worked at Mozilla for about two and a half years, told Gareth Beavers that the main obstacle to developing Firefox Mobile for Android was the rift between C and C++ code and Java, however.

Indeed, he sounded quite upbeat about Android and about what Mozilla has in the works.  "It’s a modern OS, and it’s a great fit with us," Sullivan said.  "It’s the type of platform that has a high affinity with the early adopter, and it’s seen a lot of uptake."

So we can expect to see Firefox Mobile for Android "late this year."

Thanks to Google, PayPal, and Mozilla, the anti-malware organization borne out of Harvard’s Berkman center has become an independent entity.  StopBadware.org is now a non-profit known simply as StopBadware.

This change should be viewed as more evolutionary than revolutionary; like before, StopBadware will work to minimize the threat of malware, and at the moment, nothing more significant than some colors, logos, and site content has been changed.

Urs Gasser, executive director of the Berkman Center, also explained in a statement that StopBadware is just following a path taken by previous Berkman Center ventures like Creative Commons and Global Voices.

And as mentioned earlier, it’s doing so with the support of a lot of important companies.  Google, PayPal, and Mozilla all provided funding for StopBadware’s launch, and one person from each group will now sit on its board of directors.  Notably, "father of the Internet" Vint Cerf is Google’s representative.

Anyway, a hat tip goes to Elinor Mills, and we’ll see what happens.  In a blog post, Maxim Weinstein, StopBadware’s executive director, did encourage onlookers to "watch for more changes, both aesthetic and substantive, as we embark on this new adventure."
Related Articles:
> Google Announces Another Android Device Giveaway
> Mozilla Says New Firefox 20% Faster Than Last Version
> Avast Software Added To Google Pack

According to data released by the AT Internet Institute, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has fallen to under 60% of visits in Europe. The firm suggests that with widely publicized news of a major security flaw and moves being made by competing browsers, IE’s fall may not be reversed in the very near future.

"Out of the 23 countries that were studied, Internet Explorer experienced the largest decline in visit shares for websites in Ireland, United Kingdom, Greece and Czech Republic," the firm notes.

Additional findings from the AT Internet Institute include: 

- Google Chrome exceeded 4% of visit shares with a gain of 2 points in 6 months

- attained 29.4% of traffic to a website in a European country in December 2009

- gained almost 1 point and exceeded 5% of visit shares

- On average 2.3% of visits to a European website through Opera in December 2009 compared to 2.2% in June 2009.

"It is interesting to note that the growth of Safari coincided with the growth of Google Chrome," says the firm. "Based on the same engine Webkit, would Google Chrome indirectly encourage the use of Safari?"

Last week, Mozilla launched the latest version of Firefox, and Google has just released the latest version of Chrome for Windows, complete with extensions and Bookmark Sync.

Related Articles:

> Chrome Cruises By Safari

> Chrome Ad Campaign Nets Positive Results

> Digg Launches New Extensions for Firefox and Chrome

Mozilla has launched the latest version of its popular Firefox web browser – version 3.6. They say this version is a whopping 20% faster than version 3.5. New features in Firefox 3.6  include:

• Personas: Personalize the look of your Firefox by selecting new themes called Personas in a single click and without a restart

• Plugin Updater: To keep you safe from potential security vulnerabilities, Firefox will now detect out of date plugins

• Stability improvements: Firefox 3.6 significantly decreased crashes caused by third party software – all without sacrificing our extensibility in any way

• Form Complete: When filling out an online form, Firefox suggests information for fields based on your common answers in similar field

• Performance: Improved JavaScript performance, overall browser responsiveness, and startup time

• Open Video and Audio: With the world’s best implementation of HTML 5 audio and video support, now video can be displayed full screen and supports poster frames

Here’s a video from Mike Beltzner, Director of Firefox Development, who gives an overview of the new features.

For developers, Firefox 3.6 supports the latest HTML5 specification, including the file API for local file handling, font support (in addition to OpenType and TrueType fonts, it supports the new Web Open Font Format), CSS gradients (linear and radical), and device orientation – it exposes the orientation of the laptop or device to web pages.

The browser is available for download for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux in over 70 languages, which Mozilla claims is more platforms and languages than any other browser. It can be found here.
 

Related Articles:

> Firefox 3.5 Currently Most Popular Browser in the World

> 8 Firefox Add-Ons to Boost Productivity

> Firefox Nears 1 Billion Downloads

A while back, Google launched an extensions gallery for its Chrome web browser. Ad-blocking add-ons are among the most popular for Mozilla’s Firefox, so it stands to reason that they will be for Chrome as well. With Google’s primary source of revenue being its ads, a lot of talk has surfaced about Google letting people block its own ads with its own product.

Is Google was smart to allow ad-blocking extensions for Chrome? Discuss here.

A recent article from the New York Times has elevated the discussion, calling the allowance of ad blockers a "test" for Google.

Google wants people to use Chrome. For that to happen, it has to give people what they want. One point of view would be that the people who are most likely to block ads would just as use another browser that allowed them to do so if Chrome didn’t.

Google doesn’t think that ad blockers will have much of an impact on advertising anyway. In December, Google Engineering Director Linus Upson participated in a panel discussion about the subject. He, Charles McCathieNevile of Opera, and Mike Shaver of Mozilla discuss it in the following clip:

Upson says it’s "unlikely ad blockers are going to get to the level where they imperil the advertising market, because if advertising is so annoying that a large segment of the population wants to block it, then advertising should get less annoying." He thinks the market will sort it out. The others appear to take similar stances.

The real question is how many people are really going to make the effort to block ads? As Wladimir Palant, who runs Adblock Plus on Firefox, told the NYT, ad blockers are still used by a "tiny proportion of the Internet population, and these aren’t the kind of people susceptible to ads anyway."

Based on what Upton had to say in the panel discussion, Google is pretty confident that it can deliver ads people actually want, and that people (for the most part) will not want to block them if they see that relevance.

What could hurt Google more is if Microsoft or Firefox implemented their own ad blocking capabilities by default. This would lead to average users browsing an ad-less web, because just as most people don’t go out of their way to download ad-blocking add-ons, they are unlikely to go out of their way to allow ads in such a scenario. However, it is pretty unlikely that this will happen, particularly on Microsoft’s end. They of course have their own ads to worry about.

If ad-blocking from the browser actually did become a big problem for Google, one would have to wonder if the company woulnd’t find some kind of work-around. For example, what would stop them from serving ads directly in the Chrome Browser itself (in a toolbar area for example)? One could envision sponsored link-style ads like those served via Gmail. With Google’s interest-based advertising, relevance would still be at the forefront. But it probably won’t come to that anytime soon (at least not as a solution to the perceived issue).

Wondering how many people actually use Chrome anyway? Ad-blocking from the browser does after all only matter if people are using that browser. Well, the latest numbers from Net Applications have Chrome’s market share surpassing that of Apple’s Safari browser. It’s worth noting that Google just released Chrome for Mac last month as well.

As Doug Caverly  mentioned, "Chrome’s only been around for about 16 months, after all, and Safari’s had something like six years to make friends."

Google’s Chrome OS is set to make things interesting later this year, as well. Chrome use is growing and will continue to do. Ad campaigns from Google may ease that growth along.

Google made a bold move when it opened up its extensions gallery, allowing for ad-blocking extensions. Could this turn out to be a huge mistake on the company’s part or is Google’s confidence completely justified? Only time will tell for certain, but Google has long stood behind the promise of trying to deliver the best user experience. If users want to block ads, Google is going to let them. Share your thoughts here.

Related Articles:

> Chrome Cruises By Safari

> Chrome Ad Campaign Nets Positive Results

> Google Pushes Chrome With Newspaper Ads

Mozilla’s next salvos in the browser wars won’t come quite as soon as the company previously promised.  Firefox 3.6, which was supposed to ship this month, now isn’t scheduled to be finished until sometime during the first quarter of 2010, and the release of Firefox 4.0 has been pushed back, as well.

Given how heated the browser rivalry has become in recent months, the delays represent an interesting choice (and/or failure) on Mozilla’s part.  After all, Chrome’s continuing to make gains, and Internet Explorer may be about to sacrifice some ground in Europe.  This doesn’t look like an ideal time to take things slow.

Still, some interesting things are on the menu in terms of the next versions of Firefox.  Stephen Shankland pointed out this morning, "The big new feature in version 3.6 is incorporation of the Personas plug-in that lets people easily customize the browser’s appearance, though behind the scenes there’s also been work to speed up the browser’s launch time, improve security, and make some other changes."

Version 4.0, which is supposed to arrive in late 2010 or early 2011 (look for a beta this summer), should introduce "significant user interface changes," too.

It’ll be interesting to see what Google and Microsoft can accomplish with Chrome and IE by then.

Related Articles:

> Mozilla Exec: Mobile Version Of Firefox Almost Here

> Chrome Ad Campaign Nets Positive Results

> Microsoft Throws IE Rivals A Bone In Europe

The mobile version of Firefox – also known as Fennec – is almost ready to launch.  Indeed, a Mozilla exec was recently quoted as saying that a release could be "days away," so it’s possible that the new mobile browser will appear in time for some tech-inclined individuals to play with it on New Year’s Eve or even Christmas.

Word of this short-term goal comes via the BBC from Jay Sullivan, who’s Mozilla’s vice president of mobile.  Apparently Fennec’s going through a last phase of testing, and, barring any "showstoppers," will be available quite soon.

The catch relates to compatibility, meaning this rollout won’t put Fennec in everyone’s hands.  Owners of Nokia’s N900 phones will be the first to get their hands on the mobile version of Firefox.  Then, as the BBC reported, "The organisation is also developing versions for Microsoft’s Windows mobile and Google’s Android operating system."

Something for the iPhone might follow, but not in the near future.

Still, given how long Fennec’s been in development (well over a year), any release will still count as a major step forward.  And this (probable) launch is especially interesting given that Firefox 3.5 recently topped all other desktop browser versions on a global basis.

Related Articles:

> Chrome Ad Campaign Nets Positive Results

> Firefox 3.5 Currently Most Popular Browser In The World

> Opera Turbo Sees 60% User Growth In One Month

Mozilla’s director of community development is not at all happy with Google.  Following an eyebrow-raising comment from CEO Eric Schmidt on the subject of privacy, Asa Dotzler has, in fact, pretty much suggested that everyone use Bing instead.

Here’s what set Dotzler (along with a whole lot of other people) off: on the subject of whether or not folks can trust Google, Schmidt told Maria Bartiromo, "If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place."

Schmidt also said, "We are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act and it is possible that all that information could be made available to the authorities."

That represents a fairly significant departure from the spirit of past statements (and new tools) out of Mountain View.  It may (or may not) indicate that Google’s becoming more likely to turn over users’ search histories upon request.

So Dotzler wrote, "That was Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google, telling you exactly what he thinks about your privacy.  There is no ambiguity, no ‘out of context’ here. . . .  And here’s how you can easily switch Firefox’s search from Google to Bing.  (Yes, Bing does have a better privacy policy than Google.)"

Firefox controls a 24.72 percent share of the browser market, by the way, according to Net Applications.

Related Articles:

> Google Seeking Not To Cross The Creepy Line

> Mozilla Celebrates The Fifth Birthday Of Firefox

> Internet Explorer Losing Market Share In Europe

Update 3: Mozilla has now released Weave Sync Version 1.0 Beta 2.

Update 2: Mozilla has now announced the release of Weave Sync Version 1.0 Beta 1.

Update: Mozilla has now released Weave Version 0.6.

Original Article: A couple years ago, Mozilla launched Weave, which is a Mozilla Labs project aimed at letting Firefox users sync their personal preferences with Firefox browsers on other computers or on their phones. Now, Mozilla has announced a new version of Weave Sync in Weave 0.5.

What Can You Do with It?

- Get the same results on the Smart Location Bar on each of your Firefox browsers.

- Open any tab that is open in any of your other FF browsers

- Keep the same list of bookmarks throughout multiple FF browsers

- Easily sign in to all of your favorites sites using saved passwords

- It is all secure as Weave Sync encrypts user data before uploading it to Mozilla’s servers

The new version includes additional improvements including a major upgrade in performance when uploading and downloading. Sync waits until you’re not actively using the browser, and support for bookmark tags and smart folders has been improved.

Support has also been added for changing passwords, and there is better error handling and reporting. Weave Sync now supports Fennec on Windows Mobile and Firefox on x86 OpenSolaris now as well.

More information is available about Weave here, and it can be downloaded here. It requires Firefox 3.5 or higher.

Mozilla has introduced a new inbox program called Raindrop. They refer to it as an "exploration in messaging innovation" to "explore new ways to use Open Web technologies to create useful, compelling messaging experiences." Sounds kind of like  what Google’s trying to do with Google Wave from that description doesn’t it? There is already talk that this may compete with it.

"When a friend’s link from YouTube or Flickr arrives, your messaging client should be able to show the video or photos near or as part of the message, rather than rudely kicking you over to a separate browser tab," says Mozilla. "Notifications from computers and mailing lists should be organized for you, not clutter your Inbox or require tedious manual filter setup. It should be easy to smoothly integrate new web services into your conversation viewer entirely using open web technologies."

Mozilla hopes to end this with Raindrop, which is aimed at spurring the development of applications that help users easily manage their conversations, notifications, and messages across a variety of online services. Right now, however, Raindrop is in a very early stage – version 0.1. Mozilla calls it a prototype, but one they hope will become both a customizable product and a platform for a variety of innovative messaging apps. Right now, it is not ready for everyday use.

"In today’s world people use a combination of Twitter, IM, Skype, Facebook, Google Docs, Email, etc. to communicate," says the Raindrop development team. "For many of us this means that we have to keep an eye on an ever-growing number of places we might get new messages. As a result, we never know that we’ve actually processed all the important messages, because our email has been by noise which obscures the real messages from real people."

"Raindrop is an effort that starts by trying to understand today’s web of conversations, and aims to design an interface that helps people get a handle on their digital world," the team adds.

Mozilla has posted a set of guiding principles for Raindrop, which it says is an effort in promoting the values of the Mozilla Manifesto. These can be read here.

Mozilla says one of its first priorities is to make downloadable installers or setup a hosted installation that anyone can use to try out Raindrop. This would make it easier for non-developers to check it out.

Mozilla has introduced a new inbox program called Raindrop. They refer to it as an "exploration in messaging innovation" to "explore new ways to use Open Web technologies to create useful, compelling messaging experiences." Sounds kind of like  what Google’s trying to do with Google Wave from that description doesn’t it? There is already talk that this may compete with it.

"When a friend’s link from YouTube or Flickr arrives, your messaging client should be able to show the video or photos near or as part of the message, rather than rudely kicking you over to a separate browser tab," says Mozilla. "Notifications from computers and mailing lists should be organized for you, not clutter your Inbox or require tedious manual filter setup. It should be easy to smoothly integrate new web services into your conversation viewer entirely using open web technologies."

Mozilla hopes to end this with Raindrop, which is aimed at spurring the development of applications that help users easily manage their conversations, notifications, and messages across a variety of online services. Right now, however, Raindrop is in a very early stage – version 0.1. Mozilla calls it a prototype, but one they hope will become both a customizable product and a platform for a variety of innovative messaging apps. Right now, it is not ready for everyday use.

"In today’s world people use a combination of Twitter, IM, Skype, Facebook, Google Docs, Email, etc. to communicate," says the Raindrop development team. "For many of us this means that we have to keep an eye on an ever-growing number of places we might get new messages. As a result, we never know that we’ve actually processed all the important messages, because our email has been by noise which obscures the real messages from real people."

"Raindrop is an effort that starts by trying to understand today’s web of conversations, and aims to design an interface that helps people get a handle on their digital world," the team adds.

Mozilla has posted a set of guiding principles for Raindrop, which it says is an effort in promoting the values of the Mozilla Manifesto. These can be read here.

Mozilla says one of its first priorities is to make downloadable installers or setup a hosted installation that anyone can use to try out Raindrop. This would make it easier for non-developers to check it out.

If you use Firefox, you are no doubt aware that there are many add-ons that can enhance your browsing experience. Many of these can make your online life a whole lot easier and save you time. Following are some that I have found particularly useful. Which do you like? Tell us.

1. Fire Gestures

The Fire Gestures add-on allows you to perform different Firefox operations with a simple gesture of the mouse. For example, you can open a new tab by holding a right click and moving left and right from anywhere in the window.

You can perform a lot of functions with different gestures, which are completely customizable via the add-on’s options. You cans set up which gestures you want to perform each operation.

The add-on is similar to other mouse gestures add-ons, but this one is compatible with Firefox 3.5.

2. Add to Search Bar

The Add to Search Bar add-on is incredibly useful if you do a lot of searching in your day-to-day tasks. Instead of having only the few default search engines to choose from, you can right click on any search box on the web and add that to the list of search engines in your search bar.

3. Drag & DropZones

The Drag & DropZones add-on makes the previous add-on even more useful. With this, you can highlight any text on a page and simply drag it to bring up a series of windows – one for each search engine from your search bar. This is also fully customizable. It can be more convenient than going up to the search bar, finding the correct search engine from the pull-down menu, and then searching.

4. Workaround Bug 489729

Ever since I downloaded version 3.5 of FireFox, I have encountered an extremely annoying issue where something I was doing was somehow taking the tab I was in and sending it to a different window. The problem was, I could not figure out what I was doing to cause this.

Eventually, I was directed to this Workaround Bug add-on, which took care of the problem. It turned out to be that clicking a tab once and then moving your mouse in a downward motion caused a new window to open – something I apparently, inadvertently do a lot.

This add-on allows you to disable this function.

5. IE Tab

The IE tab function allows you to convert the page you’re on to Internet Explorer view. This can be helpful for checking pages to make sure they look ok in both browsers.

Also, when you happen to come across a page with some issues, you can switch over to IE with the click of a button, and see if it works better there.

6. Shareaholic

The Shareaholic button is convenient for those who like to share a lot of content. Basically, you can send any page to any social network of your choosing by right clicking and choosing the one you want to use from the menu. There is also a button that is added to the top of your browser. It is customizable so you can choose your preferred networks.

7. Smart Bookmarks Bar

The Smart Bookmarks Bar is one of my favorites. It eliminates the text from the bookmarks in your bookmarks bar, and leaves only the favicons. This means it frees up a whole lot of space, and you can fit a lot more bookmarks on that bar.

This way, all of your most-frequented sites can always be no more than a single click away. Just make sure you know your favicons.

8. TooManyTabs

Finally, the TooManyTabs add-on allows you to create multiple rows of tabs. If you frequently have a lot of tabs open, and would prefer to be able to see what they all are, this add-on will be of particular use to you. You can always send specific tabs to different rows, which can also be useful.

Wrapping Up

There are many add-ons available, and I’m sure I have barely scratched the surface of ones that can contribute to your productivity. What are your favorite add-ons? Share them here.

Google has added a bookmark sync feature to its Chrome browser. Essentially, this lets users sync their bookmarks between their Chrome browser on different machines.

"This new feature makes it easy to keep the same set of bookmarks on all your machines, and stores them alongside your Google Docs for easy web access," says Google’s Tim Steele.

To use the bookmark sync feature in Chrome, launch Chrome with the –enable-sync command-line flag. After you set up sync from the Tools menu, Chrome will upload and store your bookmarks to your Google account.

When a user wants to change or add a bookmark, the changes will be stored in the cloud and synced on all of the machines being used where the bookmark sync feature is activated.

Mozilla has a similar feature in its Weave product, which allows users of the Firefox browser to sync their preferences on multiple machines. Last month, they announced a new version of it.

This week, Mozilla has shared more details about what they’re working on to improve Weave. These include improvements in performance, usability, bugs, and things beyond just syncing. More details about that here.

Last week we told you about Mozilla reaching a monumentus milestone, 1 billion total downloads. In celebration of the achievement they’ve launched a new site, One Billion + You.

What do you think of the new site? Let us know.

The site features an opening paragraph where Mozilla tells how they’re awed and amazed:

"…to be celebrating one billion Firefox downloads. That’s one billion times in the last five years that you and the rest of the Mozilla community have made the choice to make the Web better.

But it’s not just about Firefox. We are the world. We are the billions. We are the ones who make the Web a better place to be. As we all start towards the second billion, let’s take a moment to reflect on the wonders of the Web that you’ve helped nurture and grow."

The site also has some interesting "how much is one billion" facts, which can be posted to your Twitter stream:

Truthfully, I was thinking the site was going to feature some download statistics and things of that nature. Personally, the site, as it stands now, feels a little unnecessary. Am I alone in thinking this? Let us know what you think.

Update: Firefox has now passed 1 billion total downloads.

Original Article: Lookout Microsoft! Mozilla’s Firefox is closing the gap a bit, as they’re about to pass 1 billion total downloads, and some think they might even pass the mark as early as Friday.

When do you think Firefox will pass the 1 billion mark? Tell us.

Mozilla is prepping for the occasion with a new site, OneBillionPlusYou.com. Little is currently known about the site, but we assume it will feature information about Firefox’s success along with various download statistics.

At the beginning of the month Chris Crum wrote about how Firefox’s newest release, version 3.5, had more than 1 million downloads in its first day of launch. Instead of just sitting around revealing in their success, Mozilla is currently hard at work on version 4.0.

It should be noted that the one billion total downloads is in reference to ALL versions of Firefox, which dates back to 2002.