Today is IE6’s big day — it turns ten years old today. So happy birthday IE6. You’re now a tween.
Setting aside the fact that software ages a bit more quickly than people (and one could make the case that IE6 is actually 300 years old in “software years”), let’s look at one expects of a tween (or pre-teen).
If your experience is anything like ours, 10-year-olds stop listening to their parents. Yep. Microsoft is telling IE6 to get off the computer and go to bed, but it still hanging in there at nearly 10% usage share.
10-year-olds want to hang out with their friends instead of their families, and sometimes those friends don’t meet the parents approval. Check. IE6 is often seen hanging out with old, insecure versions of Java. (See how UniBrows puts IE in with the right crowd.)
When kids turn 10, some parents start thinking about sending them away to boarding school. But with a pre-teen like IE6, perhaps locking it in its room is a better choice.
So happy birthday IE6. Enjoy your big day, but please clean your room first.
