Google wants to pay you cold hard cash to switch browsers...if you use IE.

Google's gunning for Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Their weapon of choice? Why, FireFox, of course.

It's pretty common knowledge at this point that the freely available Mozilla FireFox has become a fairly serious competitor in the web browser market. There have been many other browser options throughout the years, from Netscape to Opera, Mosaic to Safari, and even lynx for those text based folks, and there still are many options. When it comes down to numbers, though, it's pretty clear at this point that the two front runners are the ever present Internet Explorer, and the increasingly popular FireFox.

FireFox has garnered a number of fans, which isn't surprising in and of itself. Of slightly more interest is that Google has taken to promoting the Mozilla based browser, packaged with the Big G's toolbar, of course. Being in what many would call a pretty clear competition with Microsoft on many fronts, Google hasn't exactly been a proponent of Internet Explorer, so that's not horribly shocking either, though interesting at least. What is a little bit surprising, is that thanks to Google some of the more outspoken of those fans of Mozilla's FireFox are able to advocate more loudly for its proliferation, and are rewarded in cold, hard cash for doing so.

The discussion is quickly being spun up about this interesting series of events. The media surrounding the apparently escalating movement to convert the net from FireFox, away from IE seems to be unsure whether or not this is "polite" or "fair". It seems that there are many people out there that are taking a personal stake, and doing what they can to spread the word. I suppose if Google wants to put some greenbacks on the line to support that, then that's their prerogative.

I'll certainly be interested to see how things progress. ;)

Code hard,
#CWout