Internet Explorer Story Was Fabricated

You may have heard us discussing it on the podcast this week, and you can read the article in the show notes. We were giddy with laughter over an article that suggested that IE users were of a below average intelligence level. Well, it turns out that it was all a lie.

ApTiquant, a Canadian research firm that was credited for the research has been uncovered as a fake company. They launched their website only a few days before publishing their IE story, and most of their content and images were stolen from a legitimate company in Paris, France. It was all an elaborate stunt. ApTiquant claimed to have given IQ tests 100,000 internet users, and then matched their results with the browser they were using. Which if you ask me, is a pretty loosely scientific way to make the correlation, but I digress. Their “research” found that IE users were basically idiots.

Now, let me step out of my reporter shoes, and put on my speculation hat here.

First of all, just because this story was outed as a hoax, that doesn’t mean that IE users are smart.

And second, my guess is that this is the act of an angry web-developer. Think about it. It’s pretty common knowledge that just about every Web-dev worth his salt loathes Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer 6 is the most troublesome browser to ever hit the Internet world, and sadly it still plagues us to this day. So think about it. What’s the best way to get IE users to stop using IE? Fabricate a story that says IE users are idiots. Then, when IE users find out about the story, they say “I’m not an idiot” and then they switch browsers. Problem solved.

That’s just my guess though.

Source: BBC