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“The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”
By Joseph Janes
American Libraries Columnist
Assistant Professor, Information School, University of Washington.
intlib@ischool.washington.edu
Column for January 2005
I walked away from Omelas today.
The fateful moment came after a few days of experimentation and several months of unconscious yet growing dissatisfaction. When I finally clicked the little button, I felt somehow liberated, free, and now food tastes better, the sky is bluer, and I haven’t looked back.
What I’m talking about is switching browsers. I was a Netscape user long ago, back when I got to use Macs (Mosaic before that, and even Lynx when the web was young), but I gave over to the Internet Explorer (IE) hegemony when I moved to a Windows-oriented organization. I wasn’t happy about it, but it seemed easier somehow, and all the other kids were doing it. Netscape kinda faded into the background, and I wound up as a default Explorer user for several years.
There were other browsers on my machine, so it wasn’t for lack of opportunity: Opera, Mozilla, even Netscape for that matter. But somehow it seemed too much trouble to use anything else, so I just didn’t.
Then, while sitting at a Starbucks in Cincinnati, my friends Mark Beatty and Deb Shapiro turned me onto Firefox, the newest browser from Mozilla. They both said they were having terrific experiences with it and gave me numerous reasons why it was better: ease of use and customizability, security, superior Java implementation, etc.
So I tried it. It downloaded easily and quickly. It asked me whether I wanted it to be my default browser, and I repeatedly said no. I began to use it, and to see some of its really fine features, and to see how stable and useful it is. The more I saw, the more I liked.
I had developed an appreciation for tabbed browsing when I tried it in my previous experimentation with Opera, and the function was well supported in Firefox. I also liked the bookmark handling, the find-within-page function, and the ability to compose an e-mail message with a simple keystroke sequence without having to switch to Outlook. Then I downloaded an extension that quickly searches for any page in the Wayback Machine, finding previous page versions from archive.org.
Rebuffing hugeware
Just today I added imdb.com to the list of search tools in the toolbar, and that did it. First, I liked that this was even possible, not to mention easy; and second, I appreciated that all those extra features weren’t already embedded in the program. Enabling us to pick the features that we want keeps the basic code and interface simple for users and clean to download. Such a refreshing change from the usual hugeware, with so many features I don’t even understand, let alone use. So today I clicked yes and made Firefox my default.
Use of browsers other than IE is reportedly only in the single digits; Scott Barker, our library’s head of IT (hey, as long as I’m exploiting friends this month) tells me that Firefox accounts for a little over a tenth of the use in our computer labs, without any promotion or encouragement.
Scott also says that Firefox has work to do if it wants to be more attractive to organizations as their default browser: Many custom applications have been designed specifically for IE; some sites require ActiveX controls that Firefox does not support; Microsoft-specific applications such as Outlook Web Access and SharePoint are not as functional; and Firefox lacks the automatic deployment, updating, and configuration capabilities that IT groups frequently rely on for large-scale deployments.
He added, “The best thing to me is that the growing popularity of Firefox is pushing Microsoft to make improvements in its browser. With the exception of some good security improvements made in Windows XP SP2, Microsoft has basically sat on IE for a couple of years due to lack of competition. Firefox has got their attention, and that will be a good thing for everyone long-term.”
The worlds of software and operating systems have seen an increasing number and variety of options, largely due to the open source movement. There’s a growing interest in them, but their use and visibility remain low due to unfamiliarity, inertia, and caution. They hold great potential and promise; libraries could easily benefit from looking a little at open source and alternative software.
And Omelas? That’s the title of one of my favorite short stories, written by Ursula K. Le Guin. Without spoiling it for you, it concerns people who discover a hard truth about their world and decide to leave rather than be a party to it. Worth a read . . . but that, to coin a phrase, is another story.
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