Firefox Browser Adoption Rates Slow

Open-source Web browser Firefox is continuing its spread across Europe, although the pace of adoption has slowed somewhat, according to a recently released report. French Web metrics company XiTi noted that Firefox now accounts for about 14 percent of browsers in Europe, up from 13 percent in April and 11 percent in March. The numbers fall in line with U.S. usage, which is approximately 13 percent. Finland shows the largest Firefox use, with over 30 percent of Web users employing the browser. The country is followed by Germany, with over 24 percent, and Hungary, with about 22 percent. At the bottom of the adoption list were Luxembourg, with 10 percent, Lithuania, at 7 percent, and Monaco, with 6 percent.

Slow Down

Mirroring a trend seen in the U.S., Europe's Firefox adoption rate appears to be slowing. Analysts point to several possible factors for the trend, including recent security flaws involving cross-site scripting and remote system access vulnerabilities. The flaws were rated as "extremely critical" by security company Secunia .A more likely explanation for the adoption slowdown, though, simply might be saturation. The browser's expected adopters have downloaded Firefox already, making new growth dependent on slower-adoption strategies like word of mouth and advertising. Despite the lower growth rates, the Mozilla Foundation is emphasizing the strength of Firefox in Europe as well as other parts of the world. Currently, the browser has been downloaded over 62 million times.

Steady Growth

Now that Firefox has gotten off to a blazing start, many analysts have predicted that it will grow steadily but more slowly in the future. In Europe, where Linux is being employed in several high-profile projects and government offices, Firefox should continue to have momentum for some time to come, said AMR Research analyst Paul Kirby.

"Europe has shown that it embraces open source," he said. "So it wouldn't be surprising to see Firefox be popular in many countries where open source has taken hold."

-- source : http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=36132