Are you a secret IE abuser?

It’s the secret craving you don’t talk about, the shameful act that you keep hidden from your peers. You’ve tried to quit, but something keeps pulling you back, click after unsavory click.

I’m referring, of course, to IE abuse: the illicit launching of, and surfing with, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer Web browser. As social diseases go, this one is pandemic. Look around you right now. Chances are that, as you’re reading this blog entry, someone in your immediate vicinity is abusing IE.

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I know what you’re going to say: that it’s all nonsense, that Internet Explorer’s market share is falling faster than D.B. Cooper with a torn parachute. You? You’re a loyal Firefox user. Or Chrome aficionado. Or Opera lover. You wouldn’t even think of clicking on the IE icon on any of your myriad PCs, let alone actually using it to browse someplace. And though you can’t speak for them, you’re confident that your dearest friends and closest colleagues feel the same.

Then perhaps you can explain these statistics from the exo.repository, which tracks the real-world usage data from more than 20,000 Windows PCs: According to the most recent sampling of running applications from our nearly 22,000 Windows Sentinel member sites, fully 87 percent of you still run Internet Explorer at least two hours each day, while nearly half as many of you run IE for six hours a day or more.

More disturbingly, more than 56 percent of you also run Firefox regularly, which means that, though you may outwardly profess your disdain for Microsoft’s browser — even going so far as installing a third-party alternative to mask your abuse — the fact remains that the vast majority of your still abuse IE.

It truly is a sad state of affairs, one that gives the lie to our conventional wisdom about normalcy and just what defines healthy browsing behavior. And don’t get me started on plug-ins (one addiction at a time, please)!

Of course, some of you closet IE abusers may have no choice in the matter. Passed down by corporate decree, your IE abuse may in fact be a mandatory part of your computing experience. Irreplaceable internal applications, maintained by intractable IT staffers, can be a major source of pressure: to submit, to conform, to abuse.

And therein lies the rub: In a depressed economic cycle, the desire to uphold one’s principles often must take a backseat to the need to remain gainfully employed. And for many upstanding netizens, this means leading a double life. Publicly, you profess your love of open standards and collaborative processes, while privately you carry the shame of your addiction. You fancy yourself a progressive, a rebel, a free thinker. But in reality, you’re just another cog in the machine.

I wish I could offer you some hope, that I could say it will all be better soon, that the Great Google will swoop down from his lofty perch in the foothills of the self-righteous and somehow make the Web anew. However, the truth is that we will be stuck with this scourge for many years to come. As long as IT shops refuse to retire their legacy, IE-centric application stacks, corporate standards will continue to mandate Internet Explorer for a great many tasks.

And you, my friend, will remain just what the statistics say you are: a closet IE abuser.

This article, “Are you a secret IE abuser?,” was orignally published at InfoWorld.com. Follow the latest developments on browsers and Internet Explorer at InfoWorld.com.