Then two things started happening. First, Firefox started feeling slower and slower with each upgrade, and the glut of extensions I had installed made Firefox feel bloated and hodge-podgy. I loathed closing Firefox because of the inevitable time consuming extension updates upon restart. Make no mistake: Firefox + Firebug + many other extensions have improved my software development life immeasurably, but I was also aware of the heavy tool belt.
(Oh, don't even start about running multiple Firefox profiles. It sucks. Nobody really does that. Thank you.)
Second, I stopped ignoring Safari and now Chrome. These two browsers are snappy, slick, stripped down, start quickly, and are (mostly) extensionless. Sure, they have developer tools built in, but next to a fully loaded Firefox profile they dim in comparison and productivity.
Now I run two browsers: my work browser and my everything-else browser. Firefox is my super-handy, sometimes awkward multitool that has helped me escape many tight spots. Chrome is a Spyderco Delica: simple, sharp, efficient, and opens with a satisfying snick with the flick of the wrist. Use the right tool for the job.
Ready for your Kindle alternative? Skiff might be it. Might. We had a chance to sit down with the team to go hands-on with the 11.5-inch e-Reader. As a device, the near final prototype was big pushing an impressive 1,600 x 1,200 resolution -- enough to stuff an entire page of the New York Times up front including advertisements and still maintain readability. Mind you, it's not an exact reproduction, content has been modified to account for advertisements which, for better or worse, are part of the Skiff publishing model. Fortunately, we found it impossible to differentiate between the locally served ads and those you're already accustomed to seeing inside your favorite newspaper. But as far as competition goes, Skiff isn't hedging its bets on a single device -- this is a publishing platform. As such, Skiff showed us a total of four different devices accessing its content: a color e-reader prototype as well as Skiff apps running on a Palm Pre, Viliv MID, and of course the Linux-based black and white e-reader launching sometime this year. They even promised an iPhone app as you'd expect with synchronization across all your devices (at least as many as the DRM will allow). Skiff tells us that an Android device is also in the works.