# 2001, a browser's Odyssey: IE6 turns seven

2001, the year of 911 – Twin Towers, and IE 6.

IE 6 is seven years old today. Amazing how time flies. “2001, a browser's Odyssey”. Where were you on August 27, 2001?

IE 6 is still the base-line browser I need to develop against, unfortunatly. When will we get rid of it? People (developers) have been trying though:

- Google [promoting Firefox](http://adsense.blogspot.com/2005/11/firefox-referrals-now-available.html).
- [Explorer Destroyer](http://www.explorerdestroyer.com/).
- [Stop IE6](http://www.stopie6.org/).
- [End 6!](http://www.end6.org/).
- [WordPress](http://wordpress.org/) with [Browse Happy](http://browsehappy.com/).
- [SaveTheDevelopers.org](http://savethedevelopers.org/).
- [PushUpTheWeb](http://www.pushuptheweb.com/ "PushUpTheWeb")
- [IE Death March](http://iedeathmarch.org/ "IE Death March")

But you can't deny the facts, it's still a popular browser.

But the biggest concern shouldn't be that it's a bad browser development wise, but its lack of security for the every day user.

Update:

- 37Signals is [phasing out IE6 support](http://37signals.blogs.com/products/2008/07/basecamp-phasin.html "37Signals") all together.
- Microsoft [patches IE6 for a better GMail experience](http://www.webmonkey.com/blog/Google_Teams_With_Microsoft_On_IE6_Gmail). WTF? Can't they patch IE6 for a better experience across the board?