Chrome beat Safari in December

Here's an interesting fact that dropped over the weekend: Google Chrome, the browser by the search company with a silly name, actually beat Apple's Safari browser in overall usage during the last month of 2009 (Chrome first beat Safari midway through the month, but new month-long data shows that Chrome is here to stay). Internet Explorer continues to lose users, but Chrome has been taking over the ranks pretty quickly, moving in above Safari as the number three browser of choice (after IE and Firefox, of course).

Bad news for Apple -- after their release of Safari for Windows in 2009, you'd think they'd have hoped for a little more in terms of browser share at the end of the year. But it looks like they're going to have to do something even bigger than that to fight the current on this one -- that is, if they want to do so at all. With a relative newcomer topping Safari so quickly, it's possible Apple could back off of promoting and upgrading their proprietary browser entirely. Still, with Chrome using Webkit, the fact is that for the average user, things are getting better all the time.