The browser that started it all is going the way of the dodo

Tom Drapeau, AOL's director of the Netscape brand, announced in a blog post Friday that AOL will cease development on all Netscape web browsers on February 1, 2008. The company will continue to support the current version of the browser, Netscape 9, by releasing patches or security fixes until that date. After February 1, all development will stop

Given AOL's current business focus and the success the Mozilla Foundation has had in developing critically-acclaimed products, we feel it's the right time to end development of Netscape branded browsers, hand the reigns fully to Mozilla and encourage Netscape users to adopt Firefox."

AOL's Drapeau sullenly notes that any users feeling nostalgic for the days of old can install Netscape's theme and extensions pack for Firefox

Support for all versions of the software will be off-loaded to the Netscape community forum. Netscape.com will continue to live on as a web portal.