Firefox reaches 1 billion mark

Who would’ve thought that the Firefox open-source browser would actually be a major player these days after its launch in 2004, having reached more than a billion downloads over the last 5 years. This 1 billion figure includes users downloading multiple copies for different computers in addition to manual downloads for upgrading purposes, although automatic updates are not counted. Firefox more or less holds 31% of the market share, second only to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer who is seeing their 60% grip loosening by the day. Other browsers – Opera, Chrome and Safari have a lot of work to do if they were to catch up. Too bad this is a zero sum game, so a winner would mean someone else relinquishing his crown at the top.