Software is supposed to be a mature industry, characterized by some sort of mono- or duopoly. How to explain, then, the activity around Web browsers: Three of the tech industry's biggest names--Microsoft, Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) and Apple (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people )--each has a significant in-house browser development effort, with periodic fresh releases. Then, of course, there is the Mozilla Foundation, the folks behind the popular open-source browser Firefox.

Competition is always good, but especially these days with browsers. Features are being added to them that may, in a year or two, make a browser-based application look and feel no different from a desktop one. Imagine having the equivalent of Photoshop or PowerPoint in your browser--and thus available on whatever machine you happen to be using, desktop or smart phone or laptop.

The coming evolution in browsers is akin to the Ajax phenomenon of recent years. Ajax is a name given to a quartet of programming technologies that collectively made possible the likes of Google Maps and Gmail.

Before Ajax the typical Web site was a collection of static pages. With Ajax, programmers were able to change only part of the screen, displaying, for example, different information as you move a cursor around on a map. Ajax also allowed Web pages to be more dynamic in other ways, letting users, say, right-click and see a menu tailored to their needs.

The components of this new browser programming paradigm are esoteric. One is a new, extra-speedy Javascript interpreter, found in the latest browsers from Google and Apple, that allows programs in the browser's standard language to zip along faster than ever thought possible. Another is an Apple-created graphics technology known as Canvas, which gives programmers much more freedom using text and drawings.

Other under-the-cover changes include giving browsers the sort of sophisticated software-control features usually found only in operating systems. Web Workers, for instance, is an emerging system for isolating a browser's individual tasks into separate "threads," making it easier for a browser-based program to perform a computationally intensive task such as photo-editing in a background tab while the user is attending to something else, like e-mail, in the foreground.

This new approach to programming doesn't yet have a handy name like Ajax, though some refer to it as HTML 5. No browser yet has all of these new elements. Apple, Google and Mozilla have pieces. All are competing to add more.

So far there are no Google Maps-style killer apps for this new programming approach; indeed, programmers are just beginning to wake up to the possibilities. But one modest example is an early version of the sort of text editor used by engineers for writing computer programs. It's at bespin.mozilla.com and works with the Mozilla browser, Firefox.

Ben Galbraith and Dion Almaer, the Mozilla engineers who developed the site, said it will be expanding into a full-blown "programming environment" for the new software approach, but one that itself uses the same technologies that programmers will be making use of to build other applications. In a year or two, they say, software will be available that is indistinguishable from traditional desktop programs. The two men helped chronicle the Ajax movement; Galbraith said the new tools "have us more excited than we were for Ajax."

Many people assume that browser-based programs would run "in the cloud," that is, on servers situated remotely at companies like Google or Amazon. But Almaer said there's no reason software has to be written that way. A photo-editing program based in a browser, for instance, could run entirely on your desktop. PCs have power to spare.

Who wins and who loses with this new approach? Adobe (nasdaq: ADBE - news - people ) might not look too kindly upon it. The maker of Flash software would prefer that programmers stick with its software. Microsoft usually doesn't warm to standards it can't control; it is also pushing its new Silverlight multimedia program, which performs some of the functions of HTML 5 software.

Apple, Google and Mozilla, by contrast, favor anything that curbs Microsoft's market position. The three cooperate in browser development even as they compete for market share. If the day arrives when a browser is the only program anyone needs, those three would be among the ones cheering loudest.

Senior editor Lee Gomes covers technology from our Silicon

Suze Orman will be a guest on Larry King Live Tuesday.

She is a well-known personal finance expert, and host of The Suze Orman Show on CNBC.

Suze’s commentary is a Larry King Live Blog exclusive.

Last week I watched the CEOs of the big three automakers testify before Congress. Testify is being kind, as what they really seemed to be doing was begging for money. All because their companies refused to invest in what they had to know was true, for more than 20 years.

Those supposedly smart CEOs that you are programmed to believe are smarter than you, didn’t follow the simple law of making choices that are based on fact, on what is known. We have known for years that oil is a limited commodity, yet Detroit did not aggressively pursue higher fuel efficiency (and don’t get me started on the fact that Congress didn’t exactly push them in that direction). They saw their competitive edge erode to foreign car manufacturers, yet they didn’t manage their business to adapt to that competition. And in the process they turned off their main client: Americans, who refused to support products that they now judge to be of inferior quality.

They saw the marketing surveys; they knew they were losing ground to the competition, yet it sure doesn’t seem like they made the massive changes necessary to reinvent themselves for an evolving auto industry.

Yet, I firmly believe that as incompetent and clueless as they were, now is not the time to let the Big Three fail. We as a nation can’t afford the impact of all the lost jobs: both those employed directly by Chrysler, Ford and General Motors, and the millions more whose livelihood is linked to the industry.

Yes, we should all be mad and annoyed that we have to bail out these companies that have been run with an indifference to tackling what is known. My hope is that at the very least, any federal aid will come with serious requirements, oversight and regulations. What is needed is that these CEO’s finally get their heads out of the sand and make the known changes that have always been needed and start running these companies like this is 2008 not 1958.

In the meantime, as I was watching the Congressional hearing I was thinking about you, and how my wish is that you act far more intelligently than the auto CEOs this holiday season. I hope that you have the fortitude and foresight to make choices based on what you know is true today.

• You know you need to build an emergency savings fund that can cover six to eight months of living expenses; so you and your family will be okay if you are laid off.
• You know you need to get serious-finally-about tackling your credit card debt, because you understand how a high unpaid balance can mean big trouble in 2009.
• You know you need to invest more for retirement to have any shot at living comfortably later in life.
• You know you need to sit down with your child and discuss how much you can honestly afford to cover for college

If you honestly know all that, you will not spend money on holiday shopping that should instead be used to build financial security. If you know all that, you will take actions based on what you know so you never have to turn to anyone for a bailout (as if you could get one). Stop looking up to the CEOs of the world as if they are smarter than you. If they are so smart, why have they run their companies into the ground? I want better for you and your family. Focus on what you know you have to do to build security and you will give your family the most wonderful gift of all.

Happy Holidays.
– Suze

The Big Three's Stalemate

The players in this high-stakes confrontation are the domestic auto companies, their creditors, their unions, their dealers and elected officials in Washington. Each party seeks advantage by pointing the equivalent of loaded guns at the other parties. But none really wants to pull the trigger, knowing nobody is likely to emerge a winner in the ensuing financial and political shootout.

The companies know that none of the parties wants to be held responsible for pushing them into a long and messy bankruptcy that could send the economy into a tailspin.

The creditors, the unions and the dealers all know that they are going to have to give up something to which they are legally entitled, but they hope that if they hang tough, the government will bail them out without having to give up too much.

And government leaders know that if they provide a bailout without wringing sufficient concessions from all of the parties, they will be publicly vilified and punished in the next election.

Meanwhile, the clock is quickly running out. General Motors and Chrysler both acknowledge that they will effectively be out of cash by the end of the month and will have to file for bankruptcy if they don't get a government loan. The fear is that if either files, the other two companies would be forced to follow suit as parts suppliers fail and consumers get even more nervous about buying a car from a company in trouble.

In truth, there's not much doubt that the government is going to step in here, just as it has done with the financial system. The consequences of doing nothing -- for the economy, for government revenue, for the political and social fabric -- are just too great. The only questions concern the size of the bailout and what form it will take.

Although each of the companies is looking for something slightly different, it was General Motors that presented the most detailed and convincing plan. After getting the first $4 billion installment to keep the wolf from the door, GM proposes, it would spend the next three months negotiating with various stakeholders the kind of deep restructuring that normally goes on as part of a "pre-packaged" bankruptcy -- only in this case without actually going to court. Additional sums -- up to $18 billion in all -- would be dependent on how successful the company is in executing its program, which it proposed to do under the watchful eye of a government oversight board much like the one created for the airline industry after the attacks of Sept. 11.

As part of its plan, GM envisions cutting a deal with creditors to reduce in half the amount of money it owes to bank lenders, bondholders and a new benefit plan set up to provide health care to retirees, in return for an unspecified ownership stake in the company. The automaker would effectively shed the Saab, Hummer, Pontiac and Saturn nameplates and reduce its network of dealers by 27 percent.

It would close an additional 9 assembly plants, shave an additional 25,000 jobs and negotiate reductions in pay and benefits to bring them in line with those at nonunionized plants. Shareholders would agree to go without dividends until the government loan is repaid and give ownership stakes to the government if things turn out as planned. Top executives would give up their bonuses and their private jets.

There is real pain in the GM plan, and the prospect of real gain. But there is no guarantee that the various parties will agree to it. GM's gamble is that the benefits afforded by a government bailout, and the threat of a bankruptcy filing, will finally bring folks around.

Ford, on the other hand, basically takes the position that it has already done the necessary restructuring over the past year and raised sufficient private capital that it probably won't need a government loan unless the economy falls even deeper into recession. That's why its request is for a standby $9 billion loan facility that it hopes to never use. Other than a vague reference to seeking further concessions from the United Auto Workers and a promise that its chief executive would forgo his $21 million annual salary and bonus, Ford presented no plan for how it would repay that $9 billion should it turn out that its optimism proves unfounded.

Another problem for Ford is that the company pledged as collateral all the remaining unsecured assets on its balance sheet when it borrowed $18.5 billion from private lenders two years ago. That means that should it be forced to use any of the $9 billion, Ford cannot honor Congress's demand that the government be first in line for repayment. Ford's position, effectively, is that the government will have to learn to live with its "junior" position in the company's capital structure. One would hope that congressional leaders would call that bluff and tell Ford that if it wants a government credit line, it will have to renegotiate the deal with its other lenders.

Finally, there is the proposal from Chrysler, which winds up being an unsatisfying blend of the GM and Ford approaches. On the one hand, Chrysler says that the economy is now so bad that it is running out of cash and needs $7 billion by the end of the month. On the other hand, it claims that it has already done most of the necessary restructuring to put it on a sound long-term footing, with only a vague and passing reference to "concessions from the company's constituencies."

As I read its proposal, Chrysler is basically looking for the government to tide it over until it can merge with GM or be sold off to a foreign automaker. Chrysler is now controlled by the private-equity firm Cerberus Capital, and its not-so-subtle message to Congress is that $7 billion is a lot less than the government would have to put up in a full-fledged bankruptcy restructuring and a whole lot more attractive than a forced liquidation.

Steven Pearlstein will host a Web discussion today at 2 p.m. at washingtonpost.com. He can be reached at pearlsteins@washpost.com.