Everyone know the answer to that question, right? Surprisingly, no. In fact, the majority of people I ask this question to don’t know. At best the answer is something like;

“Ummm. .. I have Outlook Express?”

Those who do know nine out of ten times say that a browser is Internet Explorer, rather than Internet Explorer is the browser I use. Terrific branding Microsoft!

For those who don’t know what an internet browser is, it is a piece of software that enables you to “browse” the internet and all the sites and pages it offers. Internet Explorer is a browser, but it is not your only choice, and many would argue that it is not your best option, myself included.

The main browsers available to you (for free) are Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Safari (Apple’s browser), Chrome (Google’s browser) and Opera. While there are heaps more, these are the main ones. If you are interested in seeing which browsers are the most widely used you go to http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp.

If you followed the above link you will see that there are three versions of IE, or Internet Explorer, listed and soon there will probably be a fourth, Internet Explorer 9. The three versions are listed firstly because nearly 40% of internet users are on IE, so it is an important browser. But the reason the three latest releases are listed for IE, and not the three latest versions of the others, is because IE’s browsers differ so wildly and are often the bain of the web designer’s life.

I won’t take this opportunity to vent about Internet Explorer and their terrible record of being compliant with the rest of the internet, but I will explain why you, as the user and owner of a website, should know and care about the difference between browsers.

Every browser is slightly different in the way it interprets a website and in turn displays the content. I’m sure many of you have called your web design company wanting to know why an image is suddenly a lot higher or why something funky is going on with the text. As a website designer, the first question I ask the client is what browser they are using and what version of the browser is it.

Note: To find out what browser you are using and the version of that browser, in most cases you can go to the “Help” menu, when browsing the internet, and there will be an option entitled “About Internet Explorer” or “About Firefox” etc, depending on the browser you are using.

Browsers are gradually falling in line with one another in terms of how they display content, Internet Explorer included; however there are still often significant differences in display.  You as the client have to then make the decision on whether this is a big problem or not.  If the display error only occurs in Safari or Opera you may choose to let it go because only 6% of internet users may see the glitch. However, if the error occurs in Firefox which serves nearly 50% of internet users then you may want to do something about it.

If you do want to do something what are your options? Well the first and cheapest is to fix the problem in the browser which is displaying the error, but this doesn’t always mean that the error is fixed in the other browsers. So then your option is to get you web design company to produce a style sheet for each browser. A style sheet is a set of rules which determines how your website will look. Having multiple style sheets is your best option here, but will add to the development costs. So again it comes down to a decision at your end. Is the display error a big enough problem to warrant the extra spend?

Browsers can be a right royal pain if you fall fowl of their inconsistencies, but it all comes with the territory of having a website. Hopefully now you will be a little better armed when it comes to knowing your website and the way people view it. Send us an email if you have any questions about your website or the way browsers are displaying it.

They say that they have done their research and found that you are the holder of the trademark, which they are currently protecting on your behalf. At first this seems legit and a number of my clients have been concerned. One particular case we had just purchased a .ASIA domain for a client, then they receive an email telling them that they do not own this and it is being blocked. Then the company kindly offered to secure the domain on our client’s behalf.

Now what would have happened if our client had not asked us to sort it out and had instead consented? First, the Asian company would have contacted us ordering that we transfer the domain to them based on OUR client’s request. Then they would charge our client roughly ten times the going rate for domains, and they would sell it to them on a ten year contract, when the minimum or usual term is one year.

Now, since our client asked us to investigate these emails for them, we replied to the emails kindly declining the offer. We also noted that our client already has the domain and that there is no need for them to ‘buy it again’. This didn’t phase the Asian company. Instead they kept emailing our client, and now us too, notifying that we would lose the address unless we bought it through them.

As you can imagine our client was getting rather worried. We finally managed to make this company ‘go away’ by telling them if they sent one more email the next person they would be hearing from would be our lawyers. Of course, we heard nothing more.

Our client’s domain remained in our possession, their website kept running and we heard nothing more from this specific company.

There are many companies doing this and the best way to handle this situation is to delete the email immediately. If you are at all concerned, forward the email to you webmaster and ask for their opinion.

But remember, if someone is emailing you saying that they have possession of something which you have bought, they are almost definitely dodgy and should be ignored.