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Using the new Firefox, I find myself wishing the phone OS project had succeeded. I want something to Android what Quantum is to Chrome. Timing is everything, I

Using the new Firefox, I find myself wishing the phone OS project had succeeded. I want something to Android what Quantum is to Chrome. Timing is everything, I wonder if it could have succeeded now.

fro0116 9y ago
Ah yes. The fight for smartphone OS dominance is unfortunately over, but I do hope a company like Mozilla could secure a leading spot in the next big consumer technology platform (my bet would be AR), so we can have the option to choose an open platform that respects user freedom, backed by a team that truly has the users' best interests in mind.
- nasredin 9y ago
  >an open platform that respects user freedom, backed by a team that truly has the users' best interests in mind. Until they begin introducing useless features no one has asked for, redesigning the interface - I'm sorry - "user experience" to be more "modern" (cough... chrome-like... cough) and then change the API without full backward compatibility rendering about a decade of extensions - cough... addons - cough... I think they back to calling them extensions - useless. Not to mention the users, who had about a decade worth of muscle memory and their extensions configured just the way they like, who now have to start over.
dingo_bat 9y ago
We'd finally have been free from the shit Google and Apple keep pulling. I'm afraid the mobile train is so long gone that it's impossible to get on board now. Even Microsoft, armed with a solid polished product could not make a dent.
- imron 9y ago
  > it's impossible to get on board now To be fair people said the same thing thing to Apple when they decided to enter the phone market
  - nasredin 9y ago
    The "smartphone" was still in its infancy back then. Today the technology is mature enough, so it's more about the (small) gimmicks like fingerprint scanners.
    - pletnes 9y ago
      Fingerprint scanners changed the game again for me. Saves countless times of typing the pin code over and over.
    - imron 9y ago
      All the innovations the iPhone had were also called gimmicks by industry leaders at the time.
- m1sta_ 9y ago
  Solid base product. Terrible browser and poor store management were are problem for too long.
- gregknicholson 9y ago
  I don't think you necessarily need a large market share. You just need your alternative to be viable for individuals to choose to use. Then if it's better, you'll gain users. Firefox itself needs large market share, as a bulkhead against sites that work only in {IE6|Chrome}. Mobile OSes need large enough market share because you have to persuade the proprietors of important services to make their services available on the OS — if those services aren't available, your OS won't have enough utility for most users. But it is possible to get a large number of services working on an unpopular mobile OS — if there's a common standard that unpopular platforms can make use of, which is good enough for most users — such as web apps. (For example, DuckDuckGo can succeed or fail on merit, because it's a viable alternative. In the Linux bubble, most apps don't specifically target unpopular distros, but they can make use of the same source code or the same packaging formats.) So if we want better mobile OSes, we should support interoperability of apps.

Using the new Firefox, I find myself wishing the phone OS project had succeeded. I want something to Android what Quantum is to Chrome. Timing is everything, I wonder if it could have succeeded now.

fro0116 9y ago

Ah yes. The fight for smartphone OS dominance is unfortunately over, but I do hope a company like Mozilla could secure a leading spot in the next big consumer technology platform (my bet would be AR), so we can have the option to choose an open platform that respects user freedom, backed by a team that truly has the users' best interests in mind.

nasredin 9y ago
>an open platform that respects user freedom, backed by a team that truly has the users' best interests in mind. Until they begin introducing useless features no one has asked for, redesigning the interface - I'm sorry - "user experience" to be more "modern" (cough... chrome-like... cough) and then change the API without full backward compatibility rendering about a decade of extensions - cough... addons - cough... I think they back to calling them extensions - useless. Not to mention the users, who had about a decade worth of muscle memory and their extensions configured just the way they like, who now have to start over.

dingo_bat 9y ago

We'd finally have been free from the shit Google and Apple keep pulling. I'm afraid the mobile train is so long gone that it's impossible to get on board now. Even Microsoft, armed with a solid polished product could not make a dent.

imron 9y ago
> it's impossible to get on board now To be fair people said the same thing thing to Apple when they decided to enter the phone market
- nasredin 9y ago
  The "smartphone" was still in its infancy back then. Today the technology is mature enough, so it's more about the (small) gimmicks like fingerprint scanners.
  - pletnes 9y ago
    Fingerprint scanners changed the game again for me. Saves countless times of typing the pin code over and over.
  - imron 9y ago
    All the innovations the iPhone had were also called gimmicks by industry leaders at the time.
m1sta_ 9y ago
Solid base product. Terrible browser and poor store management were are problem for too long.
gregknicholson 9y ago
I don't think you necessarily need a large market share. You just need your alternative to be viable for individuals to choose to use. Then if it's better, you'll gain users. Firefox itself needs large market share, as a bulkhead against sites that work only in {IE6|Chrome}. Mobile OSes need large enough market share because you have to persuade the proprietors of important services to make their services available on the OS — if those services aren't available, your OS won't have enough utility for most users. But it is possible to get a large number of services working on an unpopular mobile OS — if there's a common standard that unpopular platforms can make use of, which is good enough for most users — such as web apps. (For example, DuckDuckGo can succeed or fail on merit, because it's a viable alternative. In the Linux bubble, most apps don't specifically target unpopular distros, but they can make use of the same source code or the same packaging formats.) So if we want better mobile OSes, we should support interoperability of apps.