Browser Wars - Mosaic VS Microsoft

• In the early days of the Internet, the world wide web was accessed and used almost exclusively by academics and Researchers, but then Marc Andreessen had the idea of a future where everyone would use the web as part of their daily lives.


• Marc Andreessen's browser Mosaic was the world's first graphical web browser. Mosaic was considered a standard for web browsers after its release. It was later improved and named Netscape Navigator.


• Netscape's success was such that it was impossible to ignore and Microsoft which at that time enjoyed a great monopoly in PCs saw Netscape as a threat.


• Silicon Valley was developing such that it envisioned all future computing needs to be handled online, thus making Microsoft obsolete. Microsoft thus started working on its own browser


• Microsoft later developed Internet Explorer 1.0 based on the earlier mosaic which they licensed. Both Netscape and IE went head to head releasing newer versions of their browsers in the coming years. This led to what we call the BROWSER WARS


• It was common to see the team behind Mosaic adn the People of Microsoft as bitter rivals who would do anything to one up each other.


• The main advantage that Microsoft had was its vast financial reserves which allowed them to make the browser free with its Windows OS. Microsoft through the years was able to chip away at Netscape’s market share one percent at a time.


• This Browser war between netscape and Microsoft was such that it led to an investigation into Microsoft and Bill gates by the US Department of justice, which was almost the downfall of Microsoft.