AOL will no longer support Netscape Navigator

Netscape AOL

Netscape Navigator, now owned by AOL, will no longer be supported after 1 March 2008, the company has said.

In the mid-1990s, as the commercial web began to take off, the browser was used by more than 90% of people online.

Its market share has since slipped to just 0.6% as other browsers such as Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) and Firefox have eroded its user base.

The company recommends that users upgrade their browser to either Firefox or Flock, which are both built on the same underlying technologies as Navigator.

“I think we represent the hope that was of Netscape,” Mitchell Baker, chair of the Mozilla Foundation which coordinates development of Firefox

source:BBC News

AOL’s New Open Mobile Platform

aol

At the GSMA congress in Barcelona they’ve announced their own open mobile platform, which will enable developers to build RIAs for mobile devices.

“The platform will consist of three components: an XML-based, next-generation markup language; an ultra-lightweight mobile device client; and an application server. A dynamic presentation layer will allow for rapid deployment of new features and easy optimization for a wide variety of mobile devices, allowing developers to build and update applications once, and then distribute them across all supported devices and platforms.”

The platform will become available to developers sometime in the summer and the applications built on the platform will work across most major mobile device platforms – BREW, Java, Linux, RIM, Symbian and Windows Mobile – but interestingly enough, Android is nowhere to be seen.

Furthermore, developers will be able to integrate applications build on the platform with third party APIs, AOL’s other open APIs (AIM, AOL Mail, AOL Video, MapQuest, Userplane, Truveo, Winamp, and others), as well as monetize their mobile apps through AOL’s Platform-A advertising platform.

source:reuters