In a bit of an Android browser shake-up, Skyfire -- best known for its Windows Mobile browser -- has purchased kolbysoft, which produces the popular Webkit-based Steel browser. For the time being, Steel will remain in production until Skyfire tools up its own Android product.
The main difference in the current Skyfire browser is that all of the heavy lifting -- as in the actual rendering of a Web page -- is done on Skyfire's servers and then beamed out to your phone. That results in much quicker load times, means you're able to load just about any content you can think of -- including Flash -- and really just not worry about things. Well, except for you tinfoil hat security types out there. [via MocoNews]
7 Comments
I'm sure it will be at least 2 years before you see anything. They've been working on a browser for blackberry for over a year, and still nothing...
How so?? I had Skyfire on my Curve a loooong time ago. Granted it was an Alpha software but there was nothing "Alpha" about watching Hulu on my Curve.
Not to worried, as commented above they take awhile to get things done...plenty of time to make a couple extra hats for you guys here. Seriously though never leave home without mine and neither should you.
Yeah...was great on WM, but waited over a year for a BB version, now on to Android. I'll believe it when I see it...
Switching from a WM device to an Android device last December, the one app I missed most was Skyfire. Glad to see this interesting bit of news.
Well, I *love* Steel and think it's the best browser on Android. It might lack a few features, but it's solid and fast, and ultimately that is what's most important to me and most people. What good is a browser if it has a lot of features but is slow and crappy?
Having said all that, if Steel changes to send all my data through their servers for "performance" purposes, I will not ever use it again. Opera already does something like this and it's the sole reason I won't even try it.
I had high hopes for Steel, but apparently those hopes have been dashed. Maybe someone else will realize the value in a solid, stable, fast browser that doesn't try to profit from your browsing actions or fills the browser full of bloat.
Well aren't you all happy they purchased it and released a video friendly browser at version 4 now?