"Porn Mode" For Browsers

Ok, ok, so it's really more commonly referred to as "private browsing" or in Chrome it's called "Incognito." The basic concept is that rather than having to dump all your history, cookies, passwords, etc. after visiting a "questionable" site - you could just open a new window and none of the stuff would be saved in the first place.

It's a feature that the Mozilla people had planned for Firefox 3.0 (and 3.1) - but decided to pull. It's also rumored to be in Internet Explorer 8 - and it's already been in Safari since 2005.

People have really been wanting more granular control over their browsing history, temporary Internet files, cookies, passwords, etc. for a long time - even people from Microsoft want it.

Here's a quote from Mary Jo-Foley's "All About Microsoft" blog. She's quoting Nick Davis who posted on a IE blog back in 2006:

“I *hate* clearing my history, because lots of history is useful. What’s that new supplier’s site I went to last week and forgot to bookmark, etc. I hate losing all that info, just to cover up the fact that I, ahem, bought a gift for a loved one.

“Selective history. That’s what we need. Or a way to selectively delete browsing history after the fact. I mean, we’re only over 10 years into this whole web browser thing, and we have basically the same feature since v1.”

I would agree with Mr. Davis. Now, maybe it's because he works at Microsoft and can't install another browser - but I mean it's not rocket science to use another brand browser (where you don't have all the stuff you want to keep) as your own personal "private browser" - and then just blow away all that info when you're done... ahem... "buying a gift for a loved one."