We've all seen the “Rediscover the web” or even the “This website is optimized for Firefox” banners from back in the day when Firefox was the new kid on the block. OK, so maybe not all of the sites were actually optimized for Firefox but as long as it spread the message and got people using a better browser it was all in good faith, right? A number of sites, big and small, still sport these types of banners and, apparently, Twitter has decided to join the party.

That's right, one of the hottest sites on the web, which boasts the fact that it doesn't have any ads of any kind, is telling people “There's a better way to browse the web!” and recommending them to upgrade to the latest version. The banner started popping up yesterday on top of the search page but only for a few users. It set a lot of people off as Twitter preferring one browser over the others, or getting paid to promote one, was unexpected and somewhat questionable. However, Twitter cofounder Biz Stone set the record straight.

“This is not an advertisement and it’s not just for one browser—it’s customized based on which browser you’re currently using. We’ve optimized Twitter.com for older browsers but we thought it would be worthwhile to let folks know that they could have a better Web experience on Twitter and in general if they upgrade to a newer version of whatever browser it is that they are using,” Stone told TechCrunch.

That makes more sense. And, judging by some of the tweets about the subject, it's not just Firefox; Twitter is recommending users to update their Internet Explorer and other browsers. Common sense dictates that users should have the latest version of whatever software they are using as, generally, it's the fastest, safest most feature-rich. This isn't true 100 percent of the time but, as a general rule, it's pretty accurate. So Twitter encouraging users to upgrade whatever browser they are using should be seen as a nice gesture on its part.

Well, not by everyone it seems, as some Twitter users are pretty vocal about not wanting to upgrade, or not being able to because of their older hardware. But you can't please everyone, and the number of those irritated by the feature seems to be rather small, not to mention that on the whole the move could prove beneficial for everyone: users, browser makers and other web sites.