Just what we need… another browser!
Google launched their new browser to great fanfare the other day.
How fast is it?
Immediately after the Google Chrome release conflicting stories about both speed and security started flowing out of the web. Part of the confusion comes from Google’s release of test results done on their own benchmarks.
Xlr8YourMac.com published test results yesterday, using several operating systems (OS X 10.5.4, Parallels/WinXP, Bootcamp/WinXP. In a nutshell, it seems that Chrome is awsome.
Further down the page, though, it seems that the real-world results are a bit different. Reloading and restarting Chrome (in Parallels) produces quite random results.
Further down, a poster who is beta testing Safari 4 used the V8 tests (he says “I have to say that it doesn’t seem like it’s a beta at all… it never crashes”) and agrees that Chrome tests produce impressive results.
CNET News has graphs of JavaScript benchmark component scores that look awesome indeed. They have another page with Firefox countering the overall speeds versus FF. They point to a post by John Resig with a broader group of benchmarks.
What’s the reality?
Personal experience is important. Computerworld’s John Brandon wrote on Sept. 3:
The Google Chrome beta is a powerful new browser that loads Web pages quickly and accurately. As some bloggers have noted, it’s not perfect and can break sites (for example, by using alt tags). CNET says Chrome is faster than all other browsers, and my experience matches these claims. It reveals that Google intends to break a Microsoft stranglehold on the desktop, but the user experience on Chrome feels a bit like walking on a sheet of ice in your slippers: a bit temporal and shaky.
Security issues will be coming in quickly, no doubt. More troubling to me is Google’s legal requirements.
Read the EULA!
One of the biggest concerns I’ve seen, and have personally, is the wording in Chrome’s EULA.
http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html
“1.1 Your use of Google’s products, software, services and web sites (referred to collectively as the “Services” in this document and excluding any services provided to you by Google under a separate written agreement) is subject to the terms of a legal agreement between you and Google. “Google” means Google Inc.”
OK. Chrome belongs to Google. No worries.
9.4 Other than the limited license set forth in Section 11, Google acknowledges and agrees that it obtains no right, title or interest from you (or your licensors) under these Terms in or to any Content that you submit, post, transmit or display on, or through, the Services, including any intellectual property rights which subsist in that Content (whether those rights happen to be registered or not, and wherever in the world those rights may exist). Unless you have agreed otherwise in writing with Google, you agree that you are responsible for protecting and enforcing those rights and that Google has no obligation to do so on your behalf.
This looks OK, but check Section 11:
11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services.
I’m not an attorney. I don’t speak Legalese, but this looks like Google can do whatever it likes with anything you do with their browser, including what you may post on a blog, webmail, ANYTHING! By using the Google Chrome browser, you yield permission to Google to “reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute”.
Microsoft, anyone? Except that Chrome is open source. I think that further developments will prove Chrome’s usefulness (or not). It’s only just been released, after all. Try it yourself, and see what you think. Just don’t use it for anything you don’t want Google to use!
