Internet Explorer

Netscape briefly looked like it could own the browser layer.

Microsoft crushed it by giving Internet Explorer away for free.

Then Netscape open sourced Mozilla out of desperation.

Two decades later, the dominant browser engine on the planet is Chromium.

I have never seen a technology boom where most people are basically, like they're knowledgeable or whatever, but they're also pretty apathetic onto it.

Like think about the internet boom, right? When Windows 95 came out, Netscape Navigator, then Internet Explorer, right? That fundamentally changed our lives in the blink of an eye.

You know, I'm informed.

They keep informing me that AI has changed my life.

So the business started sells a product that has been built on the technology.

And Netscape got absolutely fucking destroyed by Microsoft when Microsoft decided to basically install Internet Explorer, their web browser, for free into Windows 95, right? And so that's the thing.

html https all of that that's all good solid nobody's going to argue about that the product netscape navigator was a good product the business netscape got hammered simply because their competition was microsoft and microsoft's gonna do what microsoft's gonna do you know what i'm saying And that's where I look at this.

Again, when we look at neural networks, when we look at all the stuff that goes in the AI stack, right, that's incredibly useful, right? The products coming out, right? The models themselves and the other things that get built on the models, right? Those are the products that are being offered, right? Chat GPT, that type of thing.

So think about this, right? You know, you had Netscape.

So Netscape was the web browser and they were under a business.

And then you had Microsoft and Microsoft came out with Internet Explorer.

They fucking killed Netscape, right? But then after a while, then you had Firefox and Firefox did really good.

I'd like to welcome Joe Beta, who is a technologist with a history of working across many parts of our industry, from web browsers to real-time communication systems to cloud computing to AI.

He started his career at Microsoft working on Internet Explorer as well as client platforms before moving on to Google.

During his tenure at Google, he started Google Compute Engine and helped start Kubernetes.

He then co-founded Heptio and after two years sold it to VMware.

But where I typically like to start is just tell us a bit of your origin story.

Tell us how you got into tech.

Would love to hear a bit about the early years of Internet Explorer.

So just take us from there.

All right.

Now, I used the Internet Explorer browser this morning.

I'm going to use Netscape tonight just to show you that we work on all the browsers.

But we like the Internet Explorer very much.

So this was an app.

that we built, say March 15th.

So it's a lot of things in here.

The web, Internet Explorer, what they bitchin' changin'.

so they've been using this same program since tonight it's very amazing in this conversation all the windows a will be wiped out with windows ever has been implemented in windows nxt project see our virtual tour window through history let's take a look at the virtual tour let's see if they have okay let's look at this is one for the windows of the ages okay so this is where we're gonna look at this now okay so this is this is the first one in 1985. they celebrated their um their 40th year last year last year So it's very much, this is very interesting.

I want to get back to showing you this.

It introduced the now-famous Tab Run Start menu, including dozens of improvements.

Strongest set and sentiment Microsoft has done to the desktop OS market.

This is before using any Microsoft Windows made the Internet Explorer browser intractable part of the window line web page to render in Internet Explorer window or on the desktop.

It adds quick launch toolbar and native USB amount on a feature it would put FTP problem up there on stables.

You're making me open another app.

It's like when you accidentally open like Internet Explorer.

Whatever.

No.

In the full-text team, I was in love with building mobile apps back then.

And back then means when Internet Explorer 6 was the main browser.

Before

iPhones.

In nineteen ninety-five, fewer than one percent of the world had internet access.

Microsoft's innovations, including the Windows OS and Internet Explorer, played a pivotal role in making computing and the internet synonymous with modern life.

Uh, the AI goes on to say, "In an era marked by skepticism towards billionaires, Gates emerges as an enigma driven by a belief in making the world better." End quote.

Uh, one to ten, what rating would you give that AI work?