I can see how this is creating a monoculture on the web which could have some really negative implications going forward. However, chromium is open source; so I don't really think this is comparable to the IE days.
Also, as a web dev who is trying to push the limits of what is possible given current web APIs, being shackled by edge's lack of compatibility is really a hindrance and makes really cutting-edge stuff impossible. So, it will be nice to not have to worry about that as much.
It didn't seem like microsoft was ever serious about advancing the development of the web with edge; they were just always trying to catch up (and doing so poorly). Microsoft is probably gauging the state of their browser now and coming to the conclusion that they're too far behind to make a realistic comeback without totally revamping their approach; lots of firings/organizational reshuffling, etc.
At least google is serious about the web APIs, even if its' only because it aligns with their financial interests—at least it does end up being a good user experience; i think that's what matters.
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edit:
Also, not trying to belabor the point, but this subject on the whole is especially important to me. Chrome has allowed me to do crazy-amazing things with SVGs for my dev agency (1) since, well, they actually follow most of the SVG spec. I think most browser vendors see the SVG spec as superfluous and don't follow the spec verbatim, and that stops people like me from doing more awesome things with it; I'll literally have clients pitch me awesome ideas and my response is; sorry, we can do that but it just won't work in safari! So it becomes a no-go for all.
If other vendors really were able to dedicate serious resources towards their browser implementations then yeah, I would also be unhappy about microsoft's decision here. Optimally they would shell out more resources to their Edge division; but since they don't care about web experience the way google does—I agree that deferring to the experts is the best case scenario for everyone (i.e. developers like me and then users). At least, until microsoft redefines their priorities.
>I can see how this is creating a monoculture on the web
It's already here, sad to see so many engineers I work with lately complaining so much at having to support anything other than Chrome and they're certainly not doing cutting edge work.
Find it pretty sad when really cross browser development is the easiest it has ever been in many ways, we're certainly not in the IE 5.5 days anymore yet there is less desire than ever to support anything outside their comfort zone and when real customers bring up something doesn't work in Safari their response it "Can't they just use Chrome?".
My first job in the industry was HTML/CSS for sites that needed to work in IE 5.5/6/7, Firefox, Safari and Crome had only just been released so maybe this bothers me more than it bothers most.
wouldn't you expect though; if the experience got so bad, that you'd have a sort of 'hard-fork' like we see happening all the time in the crypto space; with devs moving to whatever platform is best? That would have just been nigh impossible with close sourced software; at least there's a potential path should we ever have to confront that situation with chromium.
Practically, I wouldn't guess that we'd see that, since chromium ends up being the closest implementation to true web standards; well, since they define the standards practically, anyways.
"Hard fork" à la blockchains is a very good analogy. It's also a chilling one, considering that no hard fork of Bitcoin has ever seriously challenged it for dominance of the cryptocurrency space, and that the web has orders of magnitude more inertia than the Bitcoin blockchain.
Also, as a web dev who is trying to push the limits of what is possible given current web APIs, being shackled by edge's lack of compatibility is really a hindrance and makes really cutting-edge stuff impossible. So, it will be nice to not have to worry about that as much.
It didn't seem like microsoft was ever serious about advancing the development of the web with edge; they were just always trying to catch up (and doing so poorly). Microsoft is probably gauging the state of their browser now and coming to the conclusion that they're too far behind to make a realistic comeback without totally revamping their approach; lots of firings/organizational reshuffling, etc.
At least google is serious about the web APIs, even if its' only because it aligns with their financial interests—at least it does end up being a good user experience; i think that's what matters.
--
edit: Also, not trying to belabor the point, but this subject on the whole is especially important to me. Chrome has allowed me to do crazy-amazing things with SVGs for my dev agency (1) since, well, they actually follow most of the SVG spec. I think most browser vendors see the SVG spec as superfluous and don't follow the spec verbatim, and that stops people like me from doing more awesome things with it; I'll literally have clients pitch me awesome ideas and my response is; sorry, we can do that but it just won't work in safari! So it becomes a no-go for all.
If other vendors really were able to dedicate serious resources towards their browser implementations then yeah, I would also be unhappy about microsoft's decision here. Optimally they would shell out more resources to their Edge division; but since they don't care about web experience the way google does—I agree that deferring to the experts is the best case scenario for everyone (i.e. developers like me and then users). At least, until microsoft redefines their priorities.
[1] www.beaver.digital