What Part of “Beta” Do We Not Understand?

This morning I’ve read about 5 blog entries about how Apple’s Safari 3 beta for Windows isn’t ready for prime time. I think you’re all full of yourselves. Most of you probably wouldn’t understand true value even if it knocked out both your knee caps. Surely I must sound like an Apple fanboy. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. My biggest hang-up with people and their interpretation of Beta is exactly that, their interpretation. No one seems to have the true skinny on what “Beta” actually means for software development.  The general consensus says that when software is in “Beta” it works pretty well but its not ready for final release. Some software companies choose to withhold or release Beta software for testing. In the case of Apple, they have chosen to release a Beta of Safari 3 to be tested. Of course its not ready for prime time and no one ever stated that it was. So how about all you haters just calm down and give the browser some time to grow up.