A new series of posts by Tim Kadlec on proxy browsers and why some people need them:
I’d venture to say that most developers and designers are not big fans of proxy browsers—assuming they pay attention to them at all. They don’t behave in ways a typical browser does, which leads to frustration as we see our carefully created sites fall apart for seemingly no reason at all. And frankly, most of us don’t really need to use them on a day-to-day basis. Through the lens we view the web, proxy browsers are merely troublesome relics of a time before the idea of a “smartphone” was anything other than a pipe dream.
But our view of the web is not the only view of the web. People all over the world face challenges getting online—everything from the cost of data and poor connectivity to religious and political obstacles. In these environments proxy browsers are far from troublesome; they are essential.