Few details are available in the NYTimes story published today, except to say that the company was co-founded by Eric Vishria and Tim Howes, both of whom worked with Andreessen at Opsware, the software company he sold to Hewlett Packard for $1.6 billion.
A Facebook Browser?
Most interestingly, the NYT reports that RockMelt is designed to work with Facebook. That idea, a browser based around social networking, has been tried before by the startup Flock, with mixed results:
The policy says that a person could use a Facebook ID to log into RockMelt, suggesting that the browser may be tailored to display Facebook updates and other features as users browse the Web. Another browser, Flock, based on Firefox, already incorporates feeds from social networking sites.
But RockMelt is not currently working with Facebook. “We are not aware of any details about RockMelt and its product,” said Brandee Barker, a Facebook spokeswoman.
Nonetheless, this project is likely to attract attention: the pioneer of web browsers taking another shot at the increasingly fragmented space.
Could a new browser entice you away from Firefox or Chrome? Let us know in the comments.
Andreessen image credit: Joi on Flickr