4 ms·

I personally love Pocket, it's my bookmarking service and I'm a paying customer. And staying true to their mission, Mozilla bought Pocket and is now releasing

I personally love Pocket, it's my bookmarking service and I'm a paying customer. And staying true to their mission, Mozilla bought Pocket and is now releasing it as open source [1]. You're speaking of "betraying the foundation of the Open Web", but Mozilla is the only one out of the big players that isn't guilty of betrayal, the only big player that tried opposing patent encumbered video codecs or DRM, that have been promoted by Google, Microsoft and Apple, the W3C being basically a charade. If you're upset of W3C EME, your anger should be directed at the parties responsible for it, which are Google, Microsoft and Netflix and which now control the industry, with a majority market share I might add, which would make all resistance moot. So I hope you're boycotting Google, Microsoft and Netflix, because otherwise it's unfair to expect that from Mozilla, an organization with a responsibility towards its employees, users and customers. [1] https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2017/02/27/mozilla-acquires-pocket/ https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2017/02/27/mozilla-acquires-po...

syshum 9y ago
>>and is now releasing it as open source I will believe that when I see the code. 7 months now still no code, and outside of the single blog post no other comments from Pocket, Read It later, or Mozilla has given any indication they will Open Source it. In fact Read It Later is still a for profit corporations operating as a subsidiary of the For Profit Mozilla Corporation, not the Mozilla Foundation the non-profit organizations >Mozilla is the only one out of the big players that isn't guilty of betrayal, the only big player that tried opposing patent encumbered video codecs or DRM They did... When??? >If you're upset of W3C EME, your anger should be directed at the parties responsible for it, which are Google, Microsoft and Netflix I can be upset with W3c, Netflix, Google, Microsoft and at the same time be upset with Mozilla. I am more upset with Mozilla because they are a Non-Profit organization that had (and I stress Had) a mission to promoting Open Standards, Open Web, and User Privacy. They have turned their back on that when those issues became less popular than performance. They turned their back on those principles because market share. They have stopped attempting to education the public on why they should care about EME, about privacy, about anything really. I find it sad that Mozilla is no longer a leader creating conversations about why the Open Web is needed for Society, about way Standing up for Privacy and User Freedom is important. Instead they have choosen to play follow the Leader to MS and Google. Where is the 1990's Mozilla when Microsoft wanted to maket Active X a Standard and they stood up and said NO Where is the 2000's Mozilla when w3c wanted to drop HTML in favor of XHTML and they formed WHATWG to force the W3C in to adopting HTML5 we have today. Where did the Leader in the open Web go? Where did Mozilla go and what is this abomination that replace it?
- noncoml 9y ago
  I share your views and I am as angry as you are, but I think you are idealizing the Mozilla of the past. I always felt that Mozilla was just forced in a role it never really wanted. If you remember Mozilla was a child of the browser wars and my guesss is that if Netscape wasn’t cornered by MS it would still be closed source today. Even today you can see that business is still in their DNA, the for-profit subsidiary. However although Mozilla is far from perfect, they are our only hope.
  - bigbugbag 9y ago
    Actually mozilla means Mosaic Killer as their sole purpose was to replace NCSA mosaic browser to become the n°1 browser. It was the internal codename and user-agent for netscape and became the name of mozilla a reminder that their objective is to be the number 1 browser and the new target to replace had been IE.
    - noncoml 9y ago
      You are right. I am aware of the history of the name. All I was trying to say was that it wouldn’t be open source if it wasn’t for the browser wars.
- bigbugbag 9y ago
  > Where did the Leader in the open Web go? It was killed by moving focus from users and long term to quarterly profits and short term, around the time Jonvon Tetzchner was pushed to leave the company. wait are you talking about the leader in the open web or about mozilla here ?
bigbugbag 9y ago
As a long time user of wallabag why would I welcome the addition of a proprietary alternative that's difficult to disable into firefox ? Stripping user of choice is the opposite of free software and empowering users. It's arguably not so smart to spend millions of dollars to buy the company behind pocket to release it opensource when an opensource alternative already exists. Turns out mozilla did not buy pocket as much as the 10 millions user base and 1 billion saved link to get a foot on the mobile platform and helps with their upcoming recommendation engine. Not exactly putting the user first. Besides there's no integration of pocket into shaarli whereas wallabag has one. Also where is the option to self host a pocket service ? Not sorry, but pocket sucks on many counts compared to open source alternative. I've been boycotting microsoft (because microsoft), google (because privacy), apple (because vendor lock-in), netflix (because pollution and bandwidth saturation and killing p2p) was before mozilla made its betrayal to their own words for their own profit. Yup I tend to boycott all opponent to net neutrality and open web. Neither google, microsoft, apple, nor netflix bear responsibility for mozilla deciding to bake support for DRM for fear of becoming irrelevant. To me they showed that they do not put their money where their mouth is and as such are not worthy of trust, also their priorities are not aligned with an open web based on their actions. Had mozilla been serious about opposing they would not have implemented it in their browser to be netflix compatible out of fear of losing market share. I've had a difficult time reconciliating myself with mozilla "let's do one evil here so we can try to do one good there" approach to things.
- bad_user 9y ago
  Disabling Pocket in Firefox has been basically a right-click and then clicking the remove button option, even in Firefox 57. Of course, this isn't really about disabling Pocket, but about removing it, being some kind of ideological struggle. To set the records straight, Free Software has nothing to do with choice, as can be seen by how GCC and other projects were developed. I did try wallabag. I appreciate the effort of its developers, I wish the project succeeds, but the mobile apps are pieces of shit compared with Pocket. So arguably, that open source alternative you're speaking of does not exist. I really don't understand how Mozilla is not putting the users first, because by their actions, it seems to me like they are. The really interesting phenomenon however is that I'm not seeing the same vitriol whenever Google's Chrome is being discussed on HN. It's like there's this really vocal minority that really wants Firefox to die, this comment included. No worries, if the current trends holds, Firefox will end up being dead and then you'll be able to have a choice between Chrome, Edge or Safari. Or you'll be able to fork Firefox, invest in whatever projects you want to invest, build whatever features you want to build and in general put your money where your mouth is. Can't wait to see that happening. Good luck.

syshum 9y ago

>>and is now releasing it as open source I will believe that when I see the code. 7 months now still no code, and outside of the single blog post no other comments from Pocket, Read It later, or Mozilla has given any indication they will Open Source it. In fact Read It Later is still a for profit corporations operating as a subsidiary of the For Profit Mozilla Corporation, not the Mozilla Foundation the non-profit organizations >Mozilla is the only one out of the big players that isn't guilty of betrayal, the only big player that tried opposing patent encumbered video codecs or DRM They did... When??? >If you're upset of W3C EME, your anger should be directed at the parties responsible for it, which are Google, Microsoft and Netflix I can be upset with W3c, Netflix, Google, Microsoft and at the same time be upset with Mozilla. I am more upset with Mozilla because they are a Non-Profit organization that had (and I stress Had) a mission to promoting Open Standards, Open Web, and User Privacy. They have turned their back on that when those issues became less popular than performance. They turned their back on those principles because market share. They have stopped attempting to education the public on why they should care about EME, about privacy, about anything really. I find it sad that Mozilla is no longer a leader creating conversations about why the Open Web is needed for Society, about way Standing up for Privacy and User Freedom is important. Instead they have choosen to play follow the Leader to MS and Google. Where is the 1990's Mozilla when Microsoft wanted to maket Active X a Standard and they stood up and said NO Where is the 2000's Mozilla when w3c wanted to drop HTML in favor of XHTML and they formed WHATWG to force the W3C in to adopting HTML5 we have today. Where did the Leader in the open Web go? Where did Mozilla go and what is this abomination that replace it?

noncoml 9y ago
I share your views and I am as angry as you are, but I think you are idealizing the Mozilla of the past. I always felt that Mozilla was just forced in a role it never really wanted. If you remember Mozilla was a child of the browser wars and my guesss is that if Netscape wasn’t cornered by MS it would still be closed source today. Even today you can see that business is still in their DNA, the for-profit subsidiary. However although Mozilla is far from perfect, they are our only hope.
- bigbugbag 9y ago
  Actually mozilla means Mosaic Killer as their sole purpose was to replace NCSA mosaic browser to become the n°1 browser. It was the internal codename and user-agent for netscape and became the name of mozilla a reminder that their objective is to be the number 1 browser and the new target to replace had been IE.
  - noncoml 9y ago
    You are right. I am aware of the history of the name. All I was trying to say was that it wouldn’t be open source if it wasn’t for the browser wars.
bigbugbag 9y ago
> Where did the Leader in the open Web go? It was killed by moving focus from users and long term to quarterly profits and short term, around the time Jonvon Tetzchner was pushed to leave the company. wait are you talking about the leader in the open web or about mozilla here ?

bigbugbag 9y ago

As a long time user of wallabag why would I welcome the addition of a proprietary alternative that's difficult to disable into firefox ? Stripping user of choice is the opposite of free software and empowering users. It's arguably not so smart to spend millions of dollars to buy the company behind pocket to release it opensource when an opensource alternative already exists. Turns out mozilla did not buy pocket as much as the 10 millions user base and 1 billion saved link to get a foot on the mobile platform and helps with their upcoming recommendation engine. Not exactly putting the user first. Besides there's no integration of pocket into shaarli whereas wallabag has one. Also where is the option to self host a pocket service ? Not sorry, but pocket sucks on many counts compared to open source alternative. I've been boycotting microsoft (because microsoft), google (because privacy), apple (because vendor lock-in), netflix (because pollution and bandwidth saturation and killing p2p) was before mozilla made its betrayal to their own words for their own profit. Yup I tend to boycott all opponent to net neutrality and open web. Neither google, microsoft, apple, nor netflix bear responsibility for mozilla deciding to bake support for DRM for fear of becoming irrelevant. To me they showed that they do not put their money where their mouth is and as such are not worthy of trust, also their priorities are not aligned with an open web based on their actions. Had mozilla been serious about opposing they would not have implemented it in their browser to be netflix compatible out of fear of losing market share. I've had a difficult time reconciliating myself with mozilla "let's do one evil here so we can try to do one good there" approach to things.

bad_user 9y ago
Disabling Pocket in Firefox has been basically a right-click and then clicking the remove button option, even in Firefox 57. Of course, this isn't really about disabling Pocket, but about removing it, being some kind of ideological struggle. To set the records straight, Free Software has nothing to do with choice, as can be seen by how GCC and other projects were developed. I did try wallabag. I appreciate the effort of its developers, I wish the project succeeds, but the mobile apps are pieces of shit compared with Pocket. So arguably, that open source alternative you're speaking of does not exist. I really don't understand how Mozilla is not putting the users first, because by their actions, it seems to me like they are. The really interesting phenomenon however is that I'm not seeing the same vitriol whenever Google's Chrome is being discussed on HN. It's like there's this really vocal minority that really wants Firefox to die, this comment included. No worries, if the current trends holds, Firefox will end up being dead and then you'll be able to have a choice between Chrome, Edge or Safari. Or you'll be able to fork Firefox, invest in whatever projects you want to invest, build whatever features you want to build and in general put your money where your mouth is. Can't wait to see that happening. Good luck.