Microsoft has now released Internet Explorer 8 in advance of the version that will appear in Windows 7. It’s already in use, because people have been able to download the RC1 release candidate version, but it should achieve rapid adoption. Whether it will be good enough to reverse IE’s decline in market share — roughly, from 85% to 70% — remains to be seen.Since IE8 represents another big step forward in Microsoft’s support for web standards, it should be supported and recommended by web sites. But it will be interesting to see how many of them support IE8’s innovative features, such as Web Slices and Accelerators.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2009/mar/19/microsoft-ie8-launched