The Opera 8.0 Challenge

Posted April 27, 2005

Opera 8 Logo
Frequently I read DSLReports, and this is where I think I first heard about “1 Million Download Challenge” issued by Opera’s CEO, Jon S. von Tetzchner.

I haven’t used Opera predominantly for about a year and a half, but I still try to keep abreast on the latest version of browsers, and download them. I must have missed version 8.0, and what better opportunity then to download it after I heard this story.

Basically, this funny techie business owner (John) was going to swim the ocean, from Norway where Opera is developed, to the USA if there were 1 million downloads of the newest version of Opera, version 8.0 in a 48 hour period.

Well, it happened. Now, this was a claim that he made while standing around a water cooler, that type of jesting situation. So even though he didn’t have to do anything, they made a huge funny event out of it, sending John into a raft into the ocean, only to have the raft start to sink and they had to save him.

It made pretty good press though, which is what Opera needs right now since Firefox came out of nowhere in the last year and is kicking their butt. If you want, you can read the full article at <a href=”http://www.opera.com/swim/” title=”This link will open in a new window” target=”_blank”>Opera’s website which is very amusing, as well as see the photos of the boss, in the water floudering around.

Here’s a sample…

Opera Founder Ocean