As I had mentioned in my article 3 days ago,Opera became free from today.No more ads.As expected premium support won’t be available for the free version.If you want premium support then you need to register your browser for 29$.This would entitle you to recieve premium support for 1 year.If you want you can still buy Opera from here
I think this is a smart decision as it would increase the popularity of Opera manifolds.Many people would be wondering how would Opera be able to fund itself.It is well known that Mobile market is a major source of revenue for Opera.As far as I can see there are several other sources of revenue too.Some of them are
a)The search bar.Everytime someone searches in Google using Opera’s search toolbar Opera makes money.Recently they have revised their contract with Google.The extended contract with Google
includes a search revenue deal, marketing support and
technical cooperation. Opera expects this contract to
increase the revenue per user.
b) Opera is reselling slipstream.
c) You can still buy Opera for 29$ in order to get premium support.
d) I believe recently they have entered into a partnership with about.com.This may be a source of some revenue too.
e) The already have an partnership with Adobe.

During the first half of 2005, 30% of Opera`s desktop
revenue was generated by selling advertising displayed in the integrated ad banner, 25% by licensing sales and 45% by Google search and other affiliate partners. Users have had the option of removing the ad banner and receiving support for a fee of US$39.

Also people who have purchased Opera less than 30 days ago would probably get a refund.

Opera v8.50 has also been released.You can view the changelog here.The major changes in the browser itself are

• Security issue in Secunia Advisory 16645 has been fixed.

• Browser Javascript is now enabled by default

Also Opera has made a noticable improvement in ACID2 test.This version of Opera identifies itself as IE by default.Opera employee Tarquin commented on this matter that

As we demonstrated with the 8.10 preview, we are evaluating the possibility of a change to IDing as Opera by default. Obviously, we must do that without breaking Web sites for our users. We have a few methods at our disposal, mainly ua.ini and browserjs.
Obviously we have a lot of pride in our products, and we want to ID as ourselves, but doing so will break a few sites. We must make sure we have a solution to these problems before we can change to IDing as Opera by default, so that our users get a seamless experience.

Opera is probably going to identify itself as Opera in Merlin.

Opera is available for download here
Learn why Opera became free
Read Opera Software’s announcement on the Oslo Stock Exchange.
http://www.opera.com

Yes.A big announcement is expected from Opera on 20th of September, as a highly placed source put it.According to him Opera is going to become a Freeware. This is not the first time that this idea has been raised.Ealier when this was discussed Jax an Opera emplyee has commented that
“The desktop Opera is crucial to what we do (and profitable, incidentally), there is no benefit
in leaving it. We were not, are not, will not merely be a phone browser. Don’t worry about it,
no point in suggesting it either”.
This seemed to me a clear hint that Opera isn’t considering the possibility of becoming completely free on Desktop.Hence this information does come as a surprise to me.I can’t confirm it from anyone else.So,it may be totally wrong.But,I am keeping my fingers crossed.

#Updated on 18th Sept.

Yahoo is upgrading it’s web-mail interface and it has been made available to a lucky few beta testers.It is supposed to be much faster than any other existing web-mail services.

According to ZDnet Yahoo Mail is currently looking more like Outlook.Softpedia has hailed it as a Glimpse into the Future of Web E-Mail.However at the same time there is a major cause of concern for Opera users.This interface currently does not support Opera,allthough I have been told that it works fine with Firefox.

Here is the error message that appears in Opera

I think it is time for Opera to wake up.Only sticking to standards won’t do.With time the web would evolve and with that we shall see new and more complex technologies being used.If Opera has to stay in this competitive market then it would have to move ahead with time.I am afraid most users wont buy their explanation that “it doesnt follow the W3C standards”.Opera is progressing,but I am afraid not fast enough.For eg. more than a year ago Gmail was released.At that time Opera didn’t support Xhttp.But due to large no. of complaints and huge popularity of Gmail it was forced to add Xhttp support.However, it still doesn’t support Gmail completely (Rich text formatting),which is dissapointing.

When Opera had provided the oppertunity to chat with it’s CTO H?kon Wium Lie I had specifically asked him about this.His reply was

Gmail and other advanced applications are pushing the limits of what browsers can do. That’s great, and we will make sure we can run them. Also, we’ll work hard to make the applications run on mobile devices. Finally, we have to make sure the techniques are documented somewhere and WHAT WG is an effort to do so.

Another such example is the newly released Microsoft Vista website.Again my question is if Firefox can support it why not Opera?And no,this time it isn’t Microsoft sniffing Opera and sending it bad code as even editing the ua.ini file didn’t help.

It’s time for Opera to wake up.Till then we can only use some other browser to view these websites and hope that Opera keeps it’s promise so that soon we would be able to browse these sites on Opera also.

And in case you want to enroll yourself for beta testing you may do so here,but dont be too hopefull about getting an invite soon.

Thanks to AquaDex from Neowin for the image

As mentioned in my earlier post the Opera party has been rocking.Especially the IRC.I am posting the Transcript of that with Opera’s CEO Jon von Tetzchner.I would post the transcripts of the chat with H?kon Wium Lie,Opera’s CTO and Trond,Opera developer.

Here is the transcript (My name is featured 3 times)

Jon = Opera’s CEO Jon von Tetzchner.

Destrado asks: Jon, may I have your autograph? Opera is just that awesome.
Jon Sure, Brianj. You just need to come to Oslo. Thanks for your support!
Jon Sorry, Destrado….

ThePast asks: Mr. von Tetzchner I have two questions, most importantly, I am ready to take a screenshot, so can you write your name here for my autograph collection? Second and more seriously. Despite being such a fantastic browser Opera have remained a small player on the market. What do you think is the biggest obstacles that Opera ASA have to overcome to gain popularity?

wow171 asks: are you using firefox on private pc’s ?
Jon wow171… although Firefox is a good browser, I use Opera for all my tasks. I use Opera for browser, mail, chat, everything.
Jon I do believe Opera is a better choice.

vinnie asks: Best wishes for all of Opera Software ASA. Q: What about that action with free reg. codes? is it for real?
Jon Vinnie… The registration codes are for real. This is our thanks to the community!

Lawmune asks: Has the launch of Opera Mini met your expecations?
Jon Lawmune, Yes, Opera Mini has been a great success! I have a lot of fun reading all the positive feedback on forums all around the world… even though the launch was only in Norway…

Joshtek asks: Do you often look at firefox extensions for inspiration on future Opera features?
Jon Joshtek, no. We try to innovate our selves.

relix aks - What’s your favorite, vanilla or chocolate ice cream? Or are you one of those rebellious warriors who like strawberry ice cream best?
Jon Relix, I guess I am kind of flexible on this. I like a lot of different kinds. I would have to rate cocunut as the top one.

Rickie asks: Will opera have rich text support anytime soon?
Jon Rickie, we are continuously looking at ways to improve Opera and rich text is a natural addition.

manxstar asks: How would you describe in one sentence you feeling about Opera Browser after 10 years in the business?
Jon Manxstar; that is a big question. I am delightet to be working with so many talented people. I am also thrilled about the support in the community. Nothin g is more fun than getting positive feedback on your work.

Several people ask: What do you think about IE7?
Jon I think it is great that MS is finally doing some work on IE. Hopefully they will be taking standards more seriously. That will move the web forward.

krijn asks: What’s your idea about browser statistics and Opera’s percentages? Imho there are more Opera users than all those sites actually say, because Opera has such nice caching features
Jon krijn; you are right. Opera has a more aggressive caching mechanism and that obviously leads to less page hits. We believe the user experience is more important than browser stats.

dohz asks - Since you mentioned standards, will we see full compliance with Acid2 in upcoming Opera releases?

19:47 joenp Typhix asks: What vision of the web’s future do you have? Where will be Opera’s place in that vision?
Jon Typhix, I believe the web will be becoming an even more important part of our lives. Our goal here at Opera is to be a central player in this future. We want to make sure that everybody gets Internet access on their terms. This is the reason why we make Opera run on older computers, add a lot of language support, add accessability features and innovate with new products such as Opera Mini. This is very important to us.

brianj dohz asks - Opera has always been known for producing browsers for various platforms, are there plans to diversify into other software?
Jon dohz, no we have no such plans. We focus on making a great browser… and things that go

TERRAZI asks: In Japan , when you break a promise, it is common to shave your hair. Why didn’t you shave, Jon?
Jon TERRAZI… Although I was unable to finish the swim to the US, we did make a nice effort… I am sure Eskil is happy that I selected to save him instead of continuing the swim.

yikes asks: What abt expanding to provide services that assist opera’s features- mail, newgroups, irc
Jon yikes; Sure. We do have, for example, the Opera accellerator. We will obviously strive to do things that make your browsing and mail experience better. We also aim to provide a very good community infrastructure.

TheMajor asks: How important is the Opera-setup file-size to Opera Software when adding new features? Do you sometimes decide to not include a feature cause it could increase the file-size?
Jon TheMajor; File size is important. We aim to provide a small and fast solution. We will do what is necessary to achive that goal. Adding features that add to the size is not done lightly.

Indyan asks: Sir,may i ask.How old are you?
Jon Indyan, I am 38. yesterday.

ThePast asks: Q. Jon, do you take an active part in the coding of Opera or does your duties as CEO prevent you from doing so even if you would like to?
Jon ThePast… I used to code myself. Then I got thrown out, because I introduced too many bugs… I still engage in discussions, though, and I am a very active beta tester.

alibaba asks: why is your development centre not located in silicon valley like other software players ?
Jon alibaba, we are located in Oslo. Luckily, a lot of the most talented programmers in the world are either based here or are willing to move here to work on Opera. I

relix asks: Do you program yourself? If yes, what languages do you love to work with most? What language would you not touch with a 5km long stick?
Jon Relix, I like to program, although I have not done so much of it lately. I like C++, Simula, Perl, … I am not found of the MFC libraries. I do like to code more direct.

Indyan asks - Sir,do you visit the myOpera community?
Jon Indyan, I am there every day. I want to hear what the community has to say about us. It is important for me to get the feedback.

Today my favorite browser Opera celebrates it’s 10th Birthday ONLINE! In 1994, two engineers at Telenor (the Norwegian phone company) developed the Opera browser for the company’s intranet.The following year, two members of the team — Jon Stephenson von Tetzchner and Geir Ivars?y — left Telenor to establish Opera Software to develop the browser commercially.Opera was founded on 19th August 1995.Opera v 2.1 final was released in December of 1996.Click here to see the timeline.
There is gonna be an open for all virtual party at http://my.opera.com/community/party/ .The
party starts at 13:00 GMT or 18:30 IST.The IRC channel is already online at irc://irc.opera.com/OperaParty ,go ahead and start chatting.Brianj the community manager has confirmed me that Jon and Wium Lie will be available for chat.Jon is scheduled to join around 16:00 CET and Wium Lie around 17:00 CET.It’s gonna get crazy! According to Opera watch it will also feature music, games, prizes, photos and a HUGE surprise!

There has been a lot of speculation as to what the BIG SURPRISE MAY BE.One of them is that Opera
for Desktop is going to become completely free.This speculation was triggered off by Heise
Newsticker’s report that Opera is considering an alternative new business model for the
Desktop.Daniel Gold of Opera-watch added fuel to this.
He wrote

Until version 5, Opera didn’t have a free version of its desktop browser. In the year 2000, however, it introduced the free version with ads.Here is what Opera said at that time: “Before this release [version 5], between 1 and 1.5 million people worldwide used Opera. A sizeable number, but we were dwarfed in comparison to our competitors. Finding one’s niche and prospering can be good for many companies, but for us it posed a particular problem. A lot of sites were
being constructed just to work with one browser, in effect shutting Opera users out. Therefore we felt the time had come to let Opera out in a free version, so that millions more could enjoy Opera’s Internet experience. Opera 5.0 for Windows was ’set free’ in December of 2000, and during the first month 2 million users downloaded the browser.”Removing the ads would have an even greater effect on the number of Opera users. The rest of the Opera products would also
benefit from such a change.

As expected there hasnt been any response yet from Opera but Jax - Opera’s Core technology developer said “The desktop Opera is crucial to what we do (and profitable, incidentally), there is no benefit
in leaving it. We were not, are not, will not merely be a phone browser. Don’t worry about it,
no point in suggesting it either.”

To me that seems like a strong suggetion that an ad-free version of Opera isnt in the cards.

Another possibily is the announcement of Opera v9!Dan1el an Opera forum member has recieved at his sites with the browser useragent identifying as Opera v9!Another member of myOpera forums AutisticCuckoo has got hits from opera.com domain, with an UA string of ‘Opera/9.0!
Operawatch had earlier reported that “Opera is currently working on a major upgrade for the rendering engine of the
Opera browser”.The only thing that is known about this core is that it would have better results
with ACID2(would probably pass it by the time it gets relased).So it is a possibility that Opera
v9 is being internally tested and a beta release may be made today.

A new revamped Opera community site is also a possibility.
But these are all speculations.The actual announcement may not be related to any of these.But,there is no harm in guessing :>> .
And before i forget, you can get an ad-free version of Opera,if you act now! Click here for instructions.This offer is valid from 12
a.m. Tuesday, August 30 to 12 a.m. Wednesday, August 31 2005 (PDT).

That’s all for now.

Three Cheers for Opera!

Update:Opera has finally revealed what the surprise is.They are not going completely free,but are giving away a free key to everyone.Grab them from while they last

About a month after it’s release Opera v8 has crossed the 4 million download mark,thus prooving that it has created quite a bit of interest among netizens.Offcourse Firefox fan would perhaps grinn sarcastically at this figure as in about the same time Firefox had grossed twice the number of downloads.However that doesnt make any difference to me as download number entirely reflect quality,but what it reflects is popularity.And yes,Firefox is definitely much more popular thanks to it’s FREE and OPEN SOURCE tag.Offcourse Opera is a “Commercial software” which requires you to pay 39$.However a free ad-supported version of it is available for download free of cost.Sadly due to bad experience with other crippled sharewares people flinch to download anything which isnt absolutely free.
But TRUST ME even the add-supported version of Opera is worth it.The google ads are just like the ones you would see in websites.As you can see from the screenshot the viewing area is almost same as Firefox.

Anyway vertical scrolling isnt very concerning(as long as you mouse is equipped with a mouse wheel).However what is irritating is Horizontal scrolling,and that is where Opera does excellently.Opera can reallign and rezise the page to remove horizontal scrolling.It works very nicely in most cases.However Opera screws up when it tries to resize pages with large flash files.You can also zoom in and out of pages easily.
Opera is packed with features.It would take me pages to describe them in detail.So I am touching upon them briefly below.

It has RSS feed manger,IRC client,NNTP newsgroups and an email client(with spam filter).Opera was among the first to arrange mails according to views.Offcourse it was gmail who made this concept popular.
Another innovative feature is the ability to save notes while browsing.The magic wand manages your passwords with ease and style.
Opera was the probably the first browser with pop-up blocking and handy search bar.It is also the first browser to have voice recognition feature.Yes!YOu can fully controll opera with your voice.Not only that Opera can read out webpages and your emails aloud using high quality voice libraries from IBM.
Opera’s security track record is worth envying.It is a standard compliant browser with support for Jacascript and CSS.Features like ability to continue browsing from where you left last time to re-opening acceidentaly closed pages,searchable history,editing web pages on the fly make your life easier.
A very less known feature of Opera is Opera show.Opera Show is a presentation tool that can turn your web pages into presentations. Taking regular HTML, and adding a little magic CSS, the web page is transformed to look more like a PowerPoint document.The presentations will appear as a full presentation in Opera with a simple press of the F11 key.
For more info on Opera show and it’s advantages over Power point visit howtocreate.co.uk
And finally a fully customisable interface is the icing on the cake.Several beautifull skins are available on the net.

And all this is available in a tiny 3.6mb setup,which is much less than Firefox in spite of having lots of more features.If you feel worried that it may be bloated,well it is not!It is lighter than most browsers(Firefox included.)

Get the latest version from
URL http://snapshot.opera.com/windows/

Opera is also available for other platforms.

N.B:This was written quite a few months ago for my previous blog.I have just copied it here.