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Former Google engineer reveals the secret YouTube plot to kill Internet Explorer 6
Nearly 10 years ago, YouTube started displaying a banner to Internet Explorer 6 users, warning that support for Microsoft's browser would be "phasing out" soon. It was a message that appeared on all YouTube pages, at a time when IE6 users represented around 18 percent of all YouTube traffic. Frustrated by supporting the aging browser, a group of YouTube engineers had hatched a plan to kill Internet Explorer 6.
"We began collectively fantasizing about how we could exact our revenge on IE6," reveals Chris Zacharias, a former Google and YouTube engineer. "The plan was very simple. We would put a small banner above the video player that would only show up for IE6 users." A group of engineers implemented this banner, knowing that most YouTube employees using the company's staging environment wouldn't even see it. At the time, Google had acquired YouTube a few years prior to the IE6 banner and the video sharing site hadn't really fully adapted to Google's infrastructure and policies.
YouTube engineers had created a special set of permissions called "OldTuber," so they could bypass Google's code enforcement policies and make changes directly to the YouTube codebase with limited code reviews. Zacharias and some other engineers were granted OldTuber permissions, allowing them to put the banner in place with very little oversight. "We saw an opportunity in front of us to permanently cripple IE6 that we might never get again," admits Zacharias.
[...] YouTube engineering management eventually realized what had happened, but it was too late and they "begrudgingly arrived at the conclusion that the ends had justified the means." The rebel YouTube engineers succeeded with their secret plan to kill Internet Explorer 6, and by April 2012 IE6 usage had dropped below one percent in the US. Even Microsoft was celebrating IE6's death.
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(Score: 1, Insightful) by ikanreed on Monday May 06 2019, @05:53PM (8 children)
But also to be fair, that's textbook anti-competitive monopoly behavior, even if the monopoly happens to be serving public interest of all web developers everywhere.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday May 06 2019, @05:58PM (2 children)
*cough*
Near the end of it's life, even Microsoft was actively trying to kill IE6. Or, maybe even in it's midlife. The screenshot in TFA does link to three newer browsers, one of which is IE8.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Monday May 06 2019, @06:03PM (1 child)
Yeah, but see, I've gotta hate the Google that exists now, so every action in the past has to be recast as secretly malevolent, and any narrative showing them to be anything but an evil monster must be wrong. It must!
(Score: 4, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Monday May 06 2019, @06:15PM
/me backs away from the frothing patient, slowly, while signaling the guard to let me out . . .
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @06:29PM (2 children)
If I have the chronology correct, it was before Google had their own browser. I assume it is not required by law for a site to be functional in all browsers.
I think this is a funny story and it is being made into more of a vigilante story than it really is, but again I'm the guy who liked the Devuan April fools joke.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Monday May 06 2019, @06:36PM (1 child)
"nearly 10 years ago" is at earliest, 2009, chrome beta was 2008.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @06:45PM
Damn, I'm getting old. I would have thought it closer to a week ago than 11 years. Wait then it's even longer since we all donated to that Firefox advertising to kill Internet Explorer!?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Monday May 06 2019, @07:08PM
> that's textbook anti-competitive monopoly behavior
No.
They rejected one browser which was causing compatibility issues and had been superseded by newer version from its own editor. Those newer versions were not hindered in any way.
That is nowhere near "textbook anti-competitive monopoly behavior". Not the same ballpark, not even the same state, and the continent is questionable.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by edIII on Monday May 06 2019, @11:25PM
Bullshit. "textbook anti-competitive monopoly behavior" is what gave us IE6 in the first place. A web browser made by people who don't really give a shit about working well with others.
They didn't put up a banner saying "Internet Explorer isn't supported", but instead, "Your version of Internet Explorer needs to be upgraded". IE7 is still supported by the devs. We all know IE6 sucked major, major, MAJOR ass and needed to be replaced. Those guys are fucking heroes if they reduced IE6 to single digit usage. They're the reason why I could justify NOT supporting IE6 for a few development projects (yet still support Microsoft web browsers).
I think you're slightly confused here.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.