Firefox 3. Beta 4 was released on Monday. It’s gotten much attention in the press given this release likely represents the final beta for Firefox 3.5. Coverage has been positive, focusing on improvements around speed and performance, private browsing, and geolocation.

Mike Beltzner spoke with TG Daily’s Wolfgang Gruener and commented about the significance of a beta release. Wolfgang writes, “While Mozilla releases nightly builds of the browser on a continuous basis, each new beta may not be as interesting to users as those rare betas for Safari and IE. ‘It is a fundamental difference in the way how our culture works,’ Beltzner said. Mozilla believes that its beta software is a crucial tool for developers, while other browser makers are using their beta browsers for marketing purposes. ‘Internet Explorer has such a long upgrade cycle. And when a beta is released people end up installing that software since they believe it is the latest and greatest.’”

U. S. coverage highlights include:

CNET,  ComputerWorld, ReadWriteWeb, TGDaily, InternetNews.com, Lifehacker, Mashable, PC Magazine, BetaNews and InfoWorld