Why Port Safari to Windows?

Last Monday at the WWDC, Steve Jobs announced Safari 3.0 was to be ported onto Windows XP and Vista with the hope of gaining further market share in the web browser department. Now everyone across the world who is even slightly interested in all this is questioning why Apple has done such a thing.

Jobs showed us that Safari 3.0 beats Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox hands down with regards to speed; he also claimed that the browser is the most innovative yet seen on the web, with Google and Yahoo search engines built right in. Apple’s aim is to gain further market share with its rather beautiful web browser, but in what way will the fruity technology giant benefit from this?

After all, Safari 3.0 is free, much like iTunes, so there is no direct revenue coming in from the people that use it. There are a number of possible reasons why Apple has decided to spend the time to port over Safari to Windows:

1. Simply put, they want to gain further market share and win over a few bragging rights. To be quite honest though, I don’t think Steve Jobs and his chums are that petty-minded, so perhaps reason 2 is a little more valid.

2. Apple wants Windows users to see a little more through the eyes of a Mac user by offering another piece of software, along with iTunes, for them to play about with. Hopefully by seeing how easy it is to use, how elegant it looks, and most importantly, how well it performs will entice users to switch over to the Mac platform in hope that all Apple software is that blissful to use. Of course, this doesn’t come without its risks. With Safari market share already quite high (given how low the Mac market share is), web developers have always been keen to test their sites on Apple’s browser, but the only way to accomplish this was to obtain a Mac. Now that Safari is on Windows, web developers running Windows will no longer need to fire up a Mac just to test their website, because Apple has given them all that they need.

3. Now we’re starting to get into more likely reasons as to why Apple ported over Safari. With iPhone arriving in a matter of days now, developers of Web 2.0 applications using Safari will be requiring the browser to test their products, especially given the fact that iPhone runs a full version of Safari. A perfect way to get more people developing software for the iPhone is to open up the development platform to the largest operating system in the world, Windows.

4. Revenue from Google and Yahoo searching. In the most popular web browsers available, such as Camino, Opera, and Firefox, you always see (usually in the top right hand corner) a Google, Yahoo, or other search engine field. A lot of people don’t realize that every time you use that box to search for something, you give Apple an extra “point” which Google, for example, acknowledges and offers a cash reward to Apple in the process, a.k.a revenue. If Safari is used by only 100 people on the Windows platform, that’s 100 people more than Apple is getting now by holding it out for the Mac platform only, and that’s 100 more people who are likely to use that search box from time to time to quickly access a popular search engine such as Google or Yahoo and increase Apple’s revenue. If Apple can expand their market share by using the Windows platform as a catalyst, they’ll surely gain a much higher income at the end of each year—clever, eh?

There’s a good chance that the above four reasons aren’t the only reasons Apple decided to move Safari over to Windows, but I bet you they’re some of the main ones, especially point 4.

Feel free to add your own opinions as to why Apple ported Safari over to Windows in the comments field below. Maybe I’m way off the mark with some of these or perhaps you think I’ve got it spot on; either way, don’t be afraid to let us know.