Filed under: Internet, Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Mozilla, Browser Tips
Download Day: The perils of shooting for a world record
by Brad Linder Jun 17th 2008 at 2:00PM
This probably shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone, but if you encourage millions of users to download your software on the same day, your servers are going to take a hammering. But it appears that even Mozilla had no idea how many people would be trying to download Firefox 3 today.
There's a good chance that you may get through if you keep hitting refresh. And there's a good chance that the company will manage to break the world record if it ever gets the servers back up. But you know what? If you don't really care about setting a world record, Firefox 3 RC 3 is pretty much identical to Firefox 3 final. So if you're already running RC2 or RC3, there's no need to kill yourself trying to update your browser today. Tomorrow, next week, or even next month will probably be soon enough.
In the meantime, if you've got your heart set on downloading a next-generation browser, you can always take Opera 9.5 for a spin. That company's servers are holding up just fine.
Update: Some users are reporting success with these download links. Windows, Mac, Linux
Update 2: It looks like the site is back up, but incredibly slow. Like dialup slow.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
jayhawk said 9:29PM on 6-17-2008
I'm a bit upset about this. Mozilla crews should have consider about the network traffic problem before setting the record thing.
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PRC. said 2:07PM on 6-17-2008
LOL
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jimmy said 2:10PM on 6-17-2008
have they ever heard of mirrors? what a cluster f
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Grant Robertson said 2:11PM on 6-17-2008
Oh Brad.. You might as well have said, "I'd like to take this opportunity to point, laugh, and recommend a real browser."
Remind me not to take ill immediately after a moment of hubiris; at least while you're around. :)
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Brad Linder said 2:12PM on 6-17-2008
Of course, the only reason Opera's servers are holding up is because there hasn't been a mad rush to download the program.
Ernie Tedeschi said 2:18PM on 6-17-2008
Oh, come on. This was planned all along. It's just another way to build buzz. "Ooooo! SO many people were trying to download FF3 that it crashed their servers!" I'm not even convinced the setup file is even on their servers yet. When I went to "http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-3.0&os=win&lang=en-US", I ended up with RC3.
Just a digital version of planned shortages, if you ask me.
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PrimitiveWallflower said 2:33PM on 6-17-2008
Horray! No longer RC3!
Tool said 2:19PM on 6-17-2008
Here is the direct DL:
http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-3.0&os=win&lang=en-US
or use this:
http://ftp.twaren.net/Unix/Mozilla//firefox/releases/3.0/win32/en-US/Firefox%20Setup%203.0.exe
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robotrock said 2:42PM on 6-17-2008
FTP connections don't count towards the total...or so I've read.
mike said 2:19PM on 6-17-2008
finally got onto http://www.spreadfirefox.com/ and the link on there is directing me to firefox 2 lol
the shame!
also it says its been downloaded 578345066 times which is..? er
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mike said 2:19PM on 6-17-2008
got onto the site http://www.spreadfirefox.com/
the download button is linking me to firefox 2... nice
oh and the pages says ff3 has been downloaded
578345066
times....
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mike said 2:23PM on 6-17-2008
finially they changed the link, all is good now
Jonas said 2:27PM on 6-17-2008
download works great now
(no, it's no longer RC3 on the page)
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friko said 2:42PM on 6-17-2008
Not working for Mac OS yet still linking to FF2
friko said 2:42PM on 6-17-2008
...and now is working!
mugczar said 2:43PM on 6-17-2008
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10700/firefox
door0122 said 2:30PM on 6-17-2008
so is an official from Guiness scanning their log files or something to verify the credibility of this record attempt? lol
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robotrock said 2:42PM on 6-17-2008
I switched language to English (British) and it came right up!
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Paul said 2:43PM on 6-17-2008
It's back to linking to firefox 2.0.0.14. 2:39 EST
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Paul said 2:45PM on 6-17-2008
2:42 EST
Fixed. Linking to 3.0