Microsoft will be disabling IE and directing Windows users to its modern Edge web browser in coming months. The news inspired jokes, memes and even some fond memories.
It was Aug. 16, 1995. “Waterfalls” by TLC was the No. 1 song in the country. Bill Clinton was in the White House. And Microsoft introduced a new way to surf the web: Internet Explorer. It was buggy and slow, many said. But it was always there. Until it wasn’t. On Wednesday, the web browser, loved and loathed by a generation, was officially retired, swept into the dustbin of internet history. The occasion stirred surprisingly strong feelings of nostalgia for the 1990s, an era when many first came to know the online world through stuttering dial-up connections, chat rooms and long-gone social media sites like Friendster. Now that Internet Explorer is no more, many pined for a time when the little blue icon with the lowercase “e” was their escape route out of childhood bedrooms, college dorm rooms and office cubicles.
“Even though I don’t use it anymore, I’m still going to miss the idea of it,” said Brett Babino, 27, an Amazon worker from Port Arthur, Texas, who was 11 when he started using Internet Explorer to do schoolwork and play online games like Club Penguin.
“It was slow,” Mr. Babino said, “but it got me through a lot of things.”
He was among many who were greeting the passing of Internet Explorer on Wednesday by fondly recalling how essential it once was, despite its many faults.
