Dear Mom/Mom-In-Law/Grandma/Other,

Please stop using Internet Explorer 6.0.  Just...  Stop.

I know you're comfortable with it.  I know that's what came installed on your computer, and you're not even aware that it sucks.  But trust me, it does.

"But Cam," you ask, "If it isn't broken, why should I fix it?"  Ah, but that's the point.  It is ridiculously broken.  It's the Yugo of web browsers.  Aside from being ridden with security vulnerabilities, and lacking innovations such as tabbed browsing, its CSS standards support is horribly broken and will never be fixed.

My point about security and tabs should be self-explanatory.  The CSS problem, in layman's terms, means that, just this week, a simple web page which should have taken me about four hours to design and develop took me over two days because I had to work around Internet Explorer 6.0's CSS flaws.  That's just...  obscene.  It wastes Corillian's time.  And worse yet, it wastes my time, which I could be using to post videos of your grandkids.

So what can you do to help me?  Convert to a different browser.  A more modern, more standards-compliant browser.  Just about all of them will automatically convert your favorites or bookmarks, history, cookies, and saved passwords.   They're all free.  All you have to do is download them and install them.  And then get your friends and relatives to do the same.  Here are a few suggestions.

• Internet Explorer 7.0.  Microsoft fixed a lot of the problems Internet Explorer 6.0 had, as well as adding some useful user interface enhancements.  I know it looks a little different, but if you try it, you might just like it.  Pros: Microsoft was aware of all the issues with IE 6.0 and fixed most of them.  Cons:  Slight learning curve with the new user interface.
  
  
• Mozilla Firefox.  This is the second-most popular browser right now.  It's very fast, reliable, and secure.  It has a really neat feature called extensions, which allow you download free add-ons for the browser that perform any number of useful functions.  For example, I run an extension called Ad Block Plus, which filters out banner ads from my web pages.  In many cases, I never even realize they were there.  Pros: Insanely active open-source community backing, which means frequent security updates, new features, and extensions.  Cons:  There are still a few web pages (very few) that were designed specifically with non-standard features of Internet Explorer in mind.  These sites don't deserve your traffic anyway and whoever told them they should design their site like that should be fired.
  
  
• Opera.  I honestly don't know a whole lot about Opera, but its users are very vocal about how much they like it, so maybe you will, too.  Pros:  I've heard it's really quite good.  Cons:  Same as Firefox.
  
  
• Safari.  This is Apple's browser that comes pre-installed on Mac computers.  They make a Windows version now.  I wasn't overly impressed, but again, this letter is about giving you options.  Pros:  Um...  it's free?  Cons:  Nothing overly compelling about it.
  

With just five minutes of effort, you can take a step toward a better browsing experience for you, and, as others follow your lead, a better development experience for me.  Thank you.