14 June 06
Flock, a browser based on the open sourced Firefox code has been released in beta. I tried Flock a while back when it was in “developer” mode, and back then I was quite disappointed. It seemed like a skinned Firefox with some averagely nice extensions. Seeing as it was a few months since I last used it, I thought I’d give it another go. It might have impressed me this time. But sadly not.
Maybe I’m missing something. I don’t quite get the point of it. I blog, take photos, have a del.icio.us account, read lots of newsfeeds – technically I should be a Flock fanboy. The browser is aimed for people just like me. But I don’t see the point of it.
I do really like the way Flock looks, especially on a Mac. The main thing I don’t like about the Mac Firefox is the way it looks. Firefox never seems to fit in with all the other programs. I’m not a massive Safari fan either, mainly due to the power that Firefox extensions give you. Flock combines the looks of Safari and eventually should be able to convert Firefox extensions to Flock ones.
But the in-built extensions that Flock already has seem like a novelty to me. I would never use the blog tool for instance, not only at the moment it doesn’t support Textpattern, but it seems to add a “Blogged by Flock” message at the end of your post, which I find incredibly rude. If I wanted a message on my post about my browser choice, I’d write it myself. I wouldn’t use the feed reader because my Mac feed reader is perfectly fine. I wouldn’t use the photo uploader because the Flickr uploader tool is perfectly fine.
Now, Flock could say that they don’t want users to be just fine with their current set-up, but the users that Flock is aimed at is highly technical web-2.0 users who already know how to optimize their web time.
The most surprising thing for me is that there’s a for-profit company behind Flock who have just raised $10 million in capital for this browser. That’s a lot of money for a browser like this, considering how it’s currently aimed at a small subset of Firefox users. Personally I’d much rather be generating money (through browser searches) for an open source project like Firefox than a for-profit company like Flock.
I know some people use Flock and love it, but I’m sorry to say I’m not one of them, and can’t see me using it for quite some time yet. It’s a bit too novelty for my liking. Perhaps, I’ll try it again when it’s fully released.
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My problem with Flock is that it seems to be an out-of-the-box Firefox with a nice skin and some extensions. If regular people don’t know about extensions, why would they be interested in Flock? Most ‘regular people’ don’t even care (or know) about Firefox. They’re quite happy with IE at the moment.
How is Flock meant to make profit for the company? Surely, the $2-3 per year that Firefox gets per user through searches won’t cover the reported $10 million invested plus business costs?
I also think you’re missing out on a massive market by not including web communities like MySpace and Facebook.
This is exactly what’s been keeping me from trying out Flock.
Altough I don’t have a Mac, it seems like Camino is the browser for you. Is it, or it there something wrong with that too?
I like Camino – it’s very nicely built – but I miss the power of Firefox extensions. I actually prefer the look and feel of Camino over Firefox, but it doesn’t support extensions like the Web Dev Toolbar or Adblock. For now, I’m sticking to Firefox!
I’ve been using Flock for a while now and i have to say i couldn’t be happier with it (well maybe if used a little less RAM). I look at it as Firefox on steroids. Sure it doesn’t use text pattern but wordpress and blogger compatibility is not bad for out of the box. Plus i am sure as the developer community around Flock is built, extension to include text pattern will be built.
On the latter point of supporting a non-profit versus a for-profit corporation, i don’t have any issue with either and quite frankly don’t really care as long as the software being “sold” works.
I hope flock continues to integrate web2.0 features with the more traditional web browsing interface (chat feature integrating all the big 3 would be nice)
My main problem with Flock is the fact that it’s a for-profit company built on the back of a non-profit company. It feels, to me anyway, like other people are doing the hard work in building and promoting Firefox, and Flock can see a way to make money out of it by adding a feature or two. Features that are already available to Firefox power users as extensions. And let’s face it – people who know about Flock are going to know about Firefox extensions.
But, hey ho, if they’re successful with it, I’ll hold my hands up and say well done!
Comment by Jesse Andrews on 14 June 2006, 18:10
If flock is automatically adding the “blogged with flock” it is a bug. It is an option that SHOULD be off by default. We have spent months working non-stop on this release, automatically adding that “badge” would do nothing to showcase our product, only detract from it!
Regarding target audience, while flock originally was targeting web2.0 consumers, that isn’t quite true anymore. Our primary target is regular people who want to share pictures and other content with friends. I think we have succeeded in the photos realm (friends and family use flock to share photos who had never done so before). We have a ways to go in other media/community aspects, but we will get there.
Thanks for taking a look!