In the past day, both Google and Yahoo have launched new browser plugins that enhance the functionality of the browser. Google in fact has two plugins - Gears (renamed from Google Gears), and a new plugin for Google Earth. Yahoo launched a new plugin called Yahoo BrowserPlus, which will one day allow developers to enhance the functionality of browser based applications by supporting things like drag and drop, desktop notifications etc.. BrowserPlus has a list of plugins or services that it currently enables.
While these companies certainly have the right intentions of improving the user experience, I see end users being the real losers here. The great thing about the web is that when you go to a webpage, you can view the content on it immediately. Remember how frustrating it was when Microsoft introduced HTML specific tags to IE? The same thing is happening again, except this time with plugins from various companies. Want to use this offline application from Google? Need to install the Gears plugin. Want to drag and drop a photo to Flickr? You need the Yahoo plugin. Want to see this 3D map? You need the Google Earth plugin, and you need to be on Windows.
I appreciate the intent of these companies that want to improve the user experience, but forcing users to install new pieces of software is not making things better. Its switching one problem (user experience) for another (installing and managing plugins).
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