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THE OPEN SOURCE WEB BROWSER Firefox has been given the thumbs up by the former typewriter and punch-card machine maker IBM.

Biggish Blue executive Bob Suter wrote in his blog that the change will mean 400,000 IBM employees around the world will be viewing the world wide web through Firebadger.

Sutor said that IBM already has thousands of employees using Firefox on Linux, Mac, and Windows laptops and desktops, but the policy change would add thousands more users to the rolls.

He said IBM likes Mozilla’s web browser because it is “stunningly standards compliant” and interoperability through open standards is key to IBM’s strategy.

Firefox is open source and its development schedule is managed by a community that’s not beholden to any one commercial entity. It is also secure and has an international group of experts that continues to develop and maintain it.

Sutor noted that Firefox has steadily improved, and he expects this to continue as it adds even more support for HTML5. µ