AOL Pulls Plug on Netscape Browser

AOL today announced that it will discontinue support and development of its Netscape Navigator browser, a program that first introduced many to the Internet when it launched 13 years ago. But, CNET's Stephen Shankland writes, Microsoft's Internet Explorer ate into market share for Netscape, which was bought by AOL—which in turn spun off the Mozilla Foundation and its popular Firefox browser.

Official support for Netscape Navigator will end Feb. 1. "While internal groups within AOL have invested a great deal of time and energy in attempting to revive Netscape Navigator, these efforts have not been successful in gaining market share from Microsoft's Internet Explorer,” Netscape's Tom Drapeau explained in a blog entry today. (More Firefox stories.)