A Denver design firm is holding a funeral for Internet Explorer 6.  The late browser is survived by son Internet Explorer Seven, and grand-daughter Internet Explorer Eight. Basic black is encouraged.

Sure looks like it.  Microsoft must not notice that Chrome and Firefox are eroding their market share.  Because they’ve decided to do yet another version of Internet Explorer.  This one is IE9, and by golly they’re gonna demo it at an upcoming Las Vegas confab.  More here. (Market share for IE was 85% in December 2005.  Now it’s at 62%.  Just FYI.)

Google is sending the outdated browser closer to its deathbed by pulling IE6 support for two of its Google Apps programs, Sites and Docs. TechCrunch reports that Gmail and Calendar support may be pulled before too long, as well.  

Microsoft says they are testing out a patch for IE6..to counter the Chinese hacker mess with Gmail.  Microsoft’s George Stathakopoulos says they won’t know a release date until Wednesday at the earliest.  In an entirely magnanimous gesture, it appears they will have it out prior to the next regularly-scheduled patch date of February 9. (Um, dude- don’t bother; everyone’s switching to Firefox or Chrome.) Bonus- here’s what the whole thing looks like, and good luck to you if you can make sense of it.

The “Aurora” IE Exploit in Action from The Crew of Praetorian Prefect on Vimeo.

Big old corporations have IE6 all over their computers.  Two versions behind. Firefox? Opera? Chrome?  Safari? Forget it.  Overworked and undermanned IT departments buried in outdated requests from suits that don’t know any better will never get IE6 off those boxes. As a result, Ars Technica believes the one in real trouble isn’t Microsoft…it’s Mozilla’s Firefox.

The little browser that could is at a crossroads.  Chrome is getting a lot of pub.  We have the browser, and soon we’ll get the OS. Meanwhile, Mozilla’s deal with Google is up this year. On one hand, Google’s deal funds a lot of Mozilla. Google has long maintained that the open-standard thing is good for everyone, and that’s true. Closed browser ecosystems lead to stagnation. (Hello, Internet Explorer.) What you now have is Google supporting Firefox at the same time they are competing with it with Chrome. But Google is all about contradictions, so it makes sense.  Like Larry and Sergey once said, “Google is not a conventional company. We do not intend to become one.”

Firefox rewrote the browser rules.  Now it’s time to see what they have up their sleeve. Opera is making some noise, but those crazy Norwegians will never have enough market share to move the dial.  It’s a European thing.  Safari?  It’s default with the Mac of course, but the current Mac market share makes world domination problematic. Nope, the browser battle is IE-Firefox-Chrome.  Microsoft and Google money versus Mozilla’s spunky innovation.