Google should not be making Mac and Linux users wait for Chrome.
I know:
- There’s a significant guerrilla-marketing campaign in action – the officially unstated competition with Microsoft for ‘world domination’. First Apple (with Safari), and now Google (with Chrome), is besting Microsoft Internet Explorer on Windows platforms. In revisiting the browser wars of the late nineties, it’s crucial for Google Chrome to go toe-to-toe with the competition. And whether we like to admit it or not, that competition is Microsoft Internet Explorer on the Microsoft Windows platform.
- The Mac and Linux ports will come from the Open Source’ing of Chrome … and we need to wait for this … Optimistically, that’s short-term pain, long-term gain.
BUT:
- Google is risking alienating its Mac and Linux faithful … and this is philosophically at odds with all-things Google.
- It’s 2008, not 1998. In the past, as an acknowledged fringe community, Mac users were accustomed to the 6-18 month lag in software availability. Linux users, on the other hand, were often satiated by me-too feature/functionality made available by the Open Source community. In 2008, however, we have come to expect support to appear simultaneously on Mac, Linux and Windows platforms. For example, Open Source Mozilla releases their flagship Firefox browser (as well as their Thunderbird email application) simultaneously on Mac and Linux as well as Windows platforms. Why not Chrome?
So, what should Google do in the interim:
- Provide progress updates on a regular basis. Google requested email addresses from those Mac and Linux users interested in Chrome … Now they need to use them!
- Continue to engage Mac/Linux users. The Chromium Blog, Chromium-Announce, Chromium-discuss, Chromium – Google Code, etc., comprise an excellent start. Alpha and beta programs, along the lines of Mozilla’s, might also be a good idea …
- Commence work on ‘Browser War’ commercials. Apple’s purposefully understated commercials exploit weaknesses inherent in Microsoft-based PCs to promote their Macs. Microsoft’s fired back with (The Real) Bill Gates and comedian Jerry Seinfeld to … well … confuse us??? Shift to browsers. Enter Google. Enter Mozilla. Just think how much fun we’d all have! Surely Google can afford a few million to air an ad during Super Bowl XLII! Excessive? Fine. I’ll take the YouTube viral version at a fraction of the cost then … Just do it!
For now, the Pareto (80-20) principle remains in play. And although this drives a laser-sharp focus on Microsoft Internet Explorer on the Microsoft Windows platform at the outset, Google has to shift swiftly to Mac and Linux to really close on the disruptiveness of Chrome’s competitive volley.
And I, for one, can’t wait!
Ian Lumb's Blog 
Pingback: Chrome Today the Stainless Way « Ian Lumb’s Blog
You must also consider that it is unfair, especially given the large proportion of WIndows’ market share, to make one group wait to recieve a finished product because it isn’t complete for every group. I don’t use Windows anymore, I use PCLinuxOS, but you can’t let your perspective blind you of your rational thought. Not that your ideas are invalid or completely nonobjective. In fact you are correct in most if not all of what you have said.
I would personally be mad if it had happened as you had wished, because it would have been a marketing strategy at the expense of the consumer. (Not to mention that it helps to have some of the minor bugs, kinks, and flaws hashed out a bit more so that our experience is more satisfactory. While I understand that development could have happened in a more parallel manner, that idea can only go so far. Linux and Windows are two different beasts, with major sociological, financial, and industrial implications.