The point is, Internet Explorer is popular and widely used. And yet, among Silicon Valley elites, it might as well be invisible. Google Chrome, with its six-week update cycles and unabashed geekiness, is the default browser of web developers, the tech press, and hipsters in general. IE is a tarnished brand, considered old, slow, and tragically uncool. It�s the browser everyone loves to hate. It doesn�t matter that Internet Explorer 9 is a modern browser, with excellent performance and a level of security that is arguably higher than its rivals. No one in Silicon Valley would even think of running IE. It's literally a non-starter. IE is not the only brand that was born in Redmond and now suffers from negative public perception. There�s also Hotmail, the original free webmail service, which celebrates its 16th birthday this week. Microsoft bought the service back in 1997, when it was just over a year old. Today, hundreds of millions of people use Hotmail every month. But having Hotmail.com as part of your primary email address suggests to the world�at least that part of the world that is bordered by San Francisco on the north and San Jose on the south�that you spend your days feeding pigeons in the park and screaming at little kids to get off your lawn.