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That was my initial reaction too, but I think it misses a subtlety. Mozilla installs software on our computers without our explicit consent all the time, each
by gregknicholson 9y ago
That was my initial reaction too, but I think it misses a subtlety.
Mozilla installs software on our computers without our explicit consent all the time, each time you update Firefox; or when you visit mozilla.org and your browser downloads some JS.
It would be impossible for most people to give genuine informed consent, because they'd have to understand what each part of the software does. Most people have not learned to read source code and don't want to. (And the source is available for people sufficiently motivated.) Practically, there isn't time to personally code-review every software update on your system. We defer this to distributors we trust.
And in this case, Mozilla genuinely didn't run any questionable code. They could have done (and arguably have in the past), but didn't. They installed software that actually does nothing. (about:mozilla at least engages the CSS parser; this doesn't even do that.)
I think the problem is just that they're messing with our stuff. Like if someone rearranged the books on your bookshelf to spell out the name of your least favourite whatever, they haven't actually done you any practical damage, but it's really annoying and rude. On principle, it's my stuff and they should leave it alone. Stop being a bad roommate, Mozilla!