Internet company AOL says it will cut off support for Netscape web browsers after the former giant lost its market dominance to competitors.

AOL, which acquired Netscape in 1999, announced in an online journal (blog) entry Friday that it would stop further development of the web browser.

Netscape director Tom Drapeau said efforts to revive the browser were not successful in gaining market share from Microsoft's Internet Explorer.

Netscape browsers will still be operational, but AOL says it will stop releasing security or other updates on February 1.

Drapeau urged customers to switch to another browser called Firefox which was developed by a not-for-profit software company (Mozilla) and is available free of charge.

Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.