Opera is now freeware. Opera is a web browser, which is far older than Mozilla, and has a decent sized user-base. It has similar features to Firefox: tabs, RSS, securer than IE (okay, technically Firefox has 13 flaws than IE, but how cares?). Opera is probably more like Seamonkey though, as it’s an internet suite with email, USENET, IRC and web-browsing.

Opera has lost popularity since Firefox was released, partly as it served adverts and partly as it was too heavy. However Opera seem to be wanting to regain a market and are hence releasing their software entirely free. Of course Opera will still be offering paid services such as premium support and various Opera services for mobile phones (cells for all you Americans).

Opera released it’s software for free a while back, to celebrate it’s tenth birthday. We all thought it was a one off, but we were wrong.

It’s a shame that the product is still staying slightly commercial, but every step to freedom is a good one. What worries me though are the effects it will have on Mozilla. Some people like Ben, only switched to Firefox as Opera had ads.

Is Firefox going to fail? Bad press, a new browser (Flock).