Opera to become ad-free

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2005-09-20 01:05pm

Opera to give away browser in bid to boost market share
Norwegian firm chases Firefox

By Hiawatha Bray, Globe Staff | September 20, 2005

A Norwegian maker of Internet browsing software hopes to imitate the success of the Firefox browser by using the same business tactic: giving the software away.

Opera Software ASA in Oslo already distributes a free version of its Opera browser. But this free software contains embedded advertisements that run along the top of the screen. An ad-free version of the program used to cost $39.

But Opera chief executive Jon von Tetzchner decided that the price tag was preventing Opera from reaching a larger audience.

''I think a lot of people have been wanting to use Opera, but they've been held back by that," he said.

Meanwhile, the free Firefox browser, released last year, developed a large following among people who had grown tired of security problems in Microsoft Corp.'s industry-leading browser, Internet Explorer. As of July, Firefox had about 8 percent of the global market for browsers, less than a year after its release, according to the Internet monitoring firm NetApplications.com. By contrast, von Tetzchner estimates that only 1 to 2 percent of the world's Internet users run Opera.

Opera now aims to catch up with Firefox by making its browser totally free, with no purchase price or embedded advertising.

''Our goal is to become on the desktop the number-two browser," said von Tetzchner.

The company expects to recoup its revenue losses through the Internet search window built into each browser. Opera has deals with search giant Google Inc. and other online search companies. If an Opera user runs a Google search and is directed to Google advertising, Opera will get a cut of the ad revenues. Von Tetzchner said this advertising revenue could generate more than enough income to compensate for giving away Opera, if the company can persuade millions more Internet users to adopt the browser.

Roger Kay, president of Endpoint Technologies Associates Inc., a technology consultancy in Wayland, said Opera's plan has a fighting chance.

''There is potentially a business there, even though it's odd at first blush to consider that there's any room for a browser," said Kay. Because Opera's two chief rivals are also available free of charge, Kay said Opera will need a strong marketing campaign and a clearly superior product to persuade users to switch.

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2005-09-20 02:01pm

About time, though they're catching on a little late. Firefox and Mozilla have been free for. . .like. . .ever.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2005-09-20 02:17pm

Except that they arn't out there to make money.

Anyway, just takes away alot of peoples objection to Opera.

*goes out to show this to people*

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2005-09-20 02:19pm

Ace Pace wrote:Except that they arn't out there to make money.

Anyway, just takes away alot of peoples objection to Opera.

*goes out to show this to people*

Except their download manager still sucks.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2005-09-20 02:20pm

Hmn? What more can you want from it? Good all around information, resume, etc.

The Grim Squeaker · Post by **The Grim Squeaker** » 2005-09-20 02:54pm

So what are the benefits of having a registered version now? Just better tech support?

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2005-09-20 02:57pm

Probebly, but its not as if we lack codes

Post by **haas mark** » 2005-09-20 03:04pm

SWEET. And I prefer Opera's download manager over Firefox', heh.

Manus Celer Dei · Post by **Manus Celer Dei** » 2005-09-20 03:35pm

I preferred Opera over Firefox even before I snarked a registration code during their birthday giveaway. IMO it's just a better browser, and I would like to see it become more widespread.

The Grim Squeaker · Post by **The Grim Squeaker** » 2005-09-20 03:41pm

Manus Celer Dei wrote:I preferred Opera over Firefox even before I snarked a registration code during their birthday giveaway. IMO it's just a better browser, and I would like to see it become more widespread.

The problem is that some aspects of the UI while prettier are less convenient, the tabs are more annoying to use (they dont close and switch in a logical order) and opening a bookmark tab also opens up a wasteful tab that eats up a tenth of the screen, full screen is also annoying to use although it is better that the Firefox version due to the greater screen space freed up.

darthdavid · Post by **darthdavid** » 2005-09-20 03:41pm

I might consider switching now. Though it's still a tough choice. I mean Firefox just rocks and all. Plus I like my theme. Also, does opera have tool bar bookmarks or an rss feed reader?

The Grim Squeaker · Post by **The Grim Squeaker** » 2005-09-20 03:43pm

darthdavid wrote:. Also, does opera have tool bar bookmarks or an rss feed reader?

It has built in RSS (not live bookmarks), and top 10 links by the address bar.
I've decided to switch back to F 1.5 as soon as Greasemonkey and my other extensions work with the new fast version.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2005-09-20 03:45pm

DEATH wrote:
Manus Celer Dei wrote:I preferred Opera over Firefox even before I snarked a registration code during their birthday giveaway. IMO it's just a better browser, and I would like to see it become more widespread.
The problem is that some aspects of the UI while prettier are less convenient, the tabs are more annoying to use (they dont close and switch in a logical order) and opening a bookmark tab also opens up a wasteful tab that eats up a tenth of the screen, full screen is also annoying to use although it is better that the Firefox version due to the greater screen space freed up.

Close and switch, check preferances, advance, windows, unmark Open new windows...

Darth Fanboy · Post by **Darth Fanboy** » 2005-09-20 04:06pm

Oh god it even runs better! Hooray!

Edit: It SEEMS like it to me anyway

Post by **haas mark** » 2005-09-20 05:02pm

DEATH wrote:
Manus Celer Dei wrote:I preferred Opera over Firefox even before I snarked a registration code during their birthday giveaway. IMO it's just a better browser, and I would like to see it become more widespread.
The problem is that some aspects of the UI while prettier are less convenient, the tabs are more annoying to use (they dont close and switch in a logical order) and opening a bookmark tab also opens up a wasteful tab that eats up a tenth of the screen, full screen is also annoying to use although it is better that the Firefox version due to the greater screen space freed up.

On the tabs: You actually can set it so that they close the way you want them to, whether it be by going to the next tab over or to the tab that you viewed prior to that.

Plus, the skins can also determine the size of your tabs, too.

The only thing I have found I DON'T like about Opera is Firefox' ability to whitelist sites for popups (i.e., forums).

bilateralrope · Post by **bilateralrope** » 2005-09-20 05:23pm

I have never touched opera, and I doubt I will simply because firefox is open source and works more than well enough for my needs.

As for the download manager, I use getright instead of firefox's inbuilt one (not that I use ftp or http downloads much). Can the opera download manager resume a download if your computer suddenly reboots ?

Datana · Post by **Datana** » 2005-09-20 06:07pm

bilateralrope wrote:As for the download manager, I use getright instead of firefox's inbuilt one (not that I use ftp or http downloads much). Can the opera download manager resume a download if your computer suddenly reboots ?

Yes, and it could do that since back in 6.0. It effectively rendered Getright redundant for me since I got broadband around the same time (thus my need for queueing up downloads was much reduced).

I've always found Opera's default tab behaviour and gestures to work a lot better than Firefox's, but it seems to be a matter of which implementation you used first. I can't get focus on last selected tab behaviour in Firefox without an extension (and that doesn't even work right half the time!), and dragging tabs around to rearrange them doesn't work nearly as intuitively as it does in Opera. Mouse gestures are less clunky, and you can also incorporate clicks into a gesture sequence (such as double-click on an empty tab to return to your homepage).

On the other hand, I need an external proxy program (Proxomitron) to get ad and popup filtering to match Firefox + Adblock + Filterset.G. That arrangement works acceptably, but with Proxomitron no longer being updated, I can't rely on it indefinitely (though filters are still being made for it). Also, CSS still is somewhat borked in Opera and simply doesn't work quite right on many pages. As it is, I now usually use Opera for most browsing and Firefox for ad-ridden sites (most news pages, for instance).

Post by **haas mark** » 2005-09-20 07:00pm

bilateralrope wrote:As for the download manager, I use getright instead of firefox's inbuilt one (not that I use ftp or http downloads much). Can the opera download manager resume a download if your computer suddenly reboots ?

As Datana said, yes, and it's a lovely thing.

However, yes, popups still tend to get through Opera more than Firefox, for which I will gladly use Firefox to surf newsboards and whatnot.

Though, one thing I can't figure out about Opera is that it suddenly stopped viewing JPG/JPEG images in the browser, rather than using another program to view them. I uninstalled and reinstalled Opera through Add/Remove several times, but eh. No big deal.

nickolay1 · Post by **nickolay1** » 2005-09-20 10:12pm

I think it's time for me to switch from the bloated piece of shit that Firefox has recently become. I just had to restart it after it was eating up 377 MB of memory, along with nearly all of my CPU cycles.

nickolay1 · Post by **nickolay1** » 2005-09-20 10:48pm

Posting this from Opera. It definitely seems much more responsive and faster. I did a quick test by opening up a quantity of identical tabs in each browser, then closing and reopening both (with the Firefox session saver extension). Opera took approximately two to three seconds to load itself and my tabs completely, whereas Foxfox took nearly ten. I was unsurpised to discover that Firefox was also using almost exactly twice as much memory (44 MB vs 22 MB). I think I'll be sticking to Opera this time.

Rogue 9 · Post by **Rogue 9** » 2005-09-20 11:17pm

Bah. FIREFOX FOREVER!

Still, good show for all you Opera pukes. I'm sticking with Firefox, though.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2005-09-20 11:36pm

I have no reason to swith over from Mozilla to what to me is just some unknown.

The Grim Squeaker · Post by **The Grim Squeaker** » 2005-09-20 11:53pm

nickolay1 wrote:Posting this from Opera. It definitely seems much more responsive and faster. I did a quick test by opening up a quantity of identical tabs in each browser, then closing and reopening both (with the Firefox session saver extension). Opera took approximately two to three seconds to load itself and my tabs completely, whereas Foxfox took nearly ten. I was unsurpised to discover that Firefox was also using almost exactly twice as much memory (44 MB vs 22 MB). I think I'll be sticking to Opera this time.

Because quite simply O is optimized for Windows, Firefoc works best on Linux, it's an all-round browser.
I can dig up an article about this if you want.

nickolay1 · Post by **nickolay1** » 2005-09-21 12:10am

I don't dispute your statements. Firefox clearly was intended to be portable; however, that doesn't fit my needs.

Zadius · Post by **Zadius** » 2005-09-21 12:14am

haas mark wrote:Though, one thing I can't figure out about Opera is that it suddenly stopped viewing JPG/JPEG images in the browser, rather than using another program to view them. I uninstalled and reinstalled Opera through Add/Remove several times, but eh. No big deal.

It sound like a file association problem.

In Windows XP, right-click on a .jpg file and select "Open With... > Choose Program". In the window that comes up, find and select Opera. If it's not there click "Browse" and find it manually. Before clicking OK, check the box that says "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file." Do the same for a .jpeg file. Done.