Will Microsoft Ever Support Google's Version of WebRTC?Will Microsoft Ever Support Google's Version of WebRTC?

In this week's WebRTC point-counterpoint, the discussion turns to whether IE support is likely--or, for that matter, necessary--for WebRTC to succeed.

As we all know, one of the major selling points of WebRTC is the ability to use the browser of your choice to communicate with anyone you'd like (similar to how the PSTN has operated for 100 years). There's been quite a bit of discussion around Microsoft's support of WebRTC and the implications if they don't support a "standard" version in Internet Explorer. This posting of our point/counterpoint series explores this issue.

Point
By Chris Vitek
As of May 2013, in an analysis compiled by W3School, 80.6% of browser use was from Chrome (52.9%) and Firefox (27.7%). Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) was 12.6%. This looks lopsided, however, it is not necessarily indicative of enterprise use. I believe that enterprise use of IE is much higher than stated in this analysis. So, while these numbers look compelling, enterprise managers may disagree, especially if they mandate the use of Internet Explorer for access to enterprise applications.

Microsoft and Google have two approaches to WebRTC. Technically, there are some substantial differences in the two approaches. Specifically, Microsoft's initiative is focused on moving the programmatic supervision of "state" out of the browser and into an entity (service) that will manage "state" in the network. From a programming-complexity perspective this is a good idea; however, it comes at the expense of needing to purchase more servers. As an additional benefit, it will give enterprises more control. So, it has its merits.

Technical issues aside, there is more to the 80.6% market share that will drive Microsoft to reconsider their decisions. Specifically, if enterprise use of IE is higher than the 12.6% figure cited by W3School, then consumer use of alternative browsers must also be higher than even the 80.6% figure.

A few years ago, the word "consumerization" did not exist in the enterprise IT lexicon. Then came the iPhone and iPad. In that case, Apple created a market that they dominated for almost three years. Apple started from zero; Google and Mozilla are already in a position that could easily be referred to as an oligopoly. So, if you work for an enterprise that has to deal with large groups of consumers, then you may want to consider the behavior of your customers before you make any decisions to isolate your future communications to a company (MSFT) that is becoming less relevant to the browser market every day.

Counterpoint
By Dave Stein
There has been some recent discussion on No Jitter about what the actual market share numbers are, but suffice it to say, there is still a lot of IE required as the mandated corporate browser. I agree with Chris that Chrome and Firefox are on lots of desktops. However, I'll share three recent experiences that I had where there were no viable alternatives to IE.

The first was when I tried to print out my airplane boarding pass in a hotel lobby (large chain). Not only was IE the only browser present on the PC, it was version 6! This version was not officially supported by the airline I was flying, but I did get a boarding pass to print correctly.

The second occurrence was when I was presenting in a webinar. The platform that was being used only supported IE officially (a recent version). We were later told by the platforms tech support that Firefox was "unofficially supported", though it was not documented. We used IE, to be safe.

The third and most recent occurrence was in responding to a request-for-proposal that required us to use the SAP Sourcing application. This instance only supports IE (I tried Chrome with gruesome results).

So based on my personal experience, my takeaway is that it will take quite a while for IE to "go away" in many corporate environments. The WebRTC crowd will have to deal with this reality.

I think Chris is correct in that consumer-to-business communications applications will be a driver for browsers other than IE. However, I think corporate IT will require significant reasons (e.g. TCO, functionality, deployment time, etc) to change the environment. There are too many other pressing Issues.

Dave Stein is principal of Stein Technology Group, an independent consultancy based in Orange County, CA. Chris Vitek is president at WebRTC Strategies, based in Baltimore.

The Society of Telecommunications Consultants is an international organization of independent information and communication technology (ICT) professionals serving clients in all business sectors and government worldwide.

The Society of Telecommunications Consultants is an international organization of independent information and communication technology (ICT) professionals serving clients in all business sectors and government worldwide.