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That's not their core business. It's redolent of the complaints when Twitter etc limit their API/number of tokens per app etc. They're doing it because it no lo

That's not their core business. It's redolent of the complaints when Twitter etc limit their API/number of tokens per app etc. They're doing it because it no longer serves a purpose. Perhaps Mozilla is slightly different but Google would only benefit from ad/tracker blockers going away.

Zhenya 7y ago
Google would benefit (maybe) only in the short term. If folks leave Chrome for browsers with adblock that would be a 1-2 punch. They'd loose their influence on the browser world and loose the ad revenue as well.
eitland 7y ago
> Google would only benefit from ad/tracker blockers going away. In the long run, this might sadly be true, but I disagree for now. No way Google is doing this because of the goodness of their hearts. They do it because they haven't completely squeezed out all competitors yet. Removing or utterly crippling addons now would force users to realize what Chrome is while there still are options, meaning a huge chunk of the users would go to other browsers. Look to Chrome mobile, the one that they can force ram down the throat of > 50% of mobile users. Chrome mobile doesn't have addons because it doesn't compete. Sorry to all Googlers here for being so blunt, and feel free to point out one or more examples from the last few years where Google has prioritized their users above quarterly / yearly profits. I used to be a huge fan but Google has massively disappointed me over the last 5-10 years.
- 9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
  They pay the biggest and most popular adblock extension already long time ago to get their stuff whitelisted. Ublock is a niche thing.
- rifung 7y ago
  I work for Google, opinions are my own. > Sorry to all Googlers here for being so blunt, and feel free to point out one or more examples from the last few years where Google has prioritized their users above quarterly / yearly profits. No need to apologize =] An example that comes to mind is the current focus on accessibility. I think from an objective financial/engineering perspective, it's much preferable to just ignore accessibility because it adds complexity and isn't used by the vast majority of users. However, providing access to everyone is the right thing to do. Another example is crisis tools (https://crisisresponse.google/ https://crisisresponse.google/). I don't think we make money from these apps. Of course, I'm sure people will say this is just for marketing or something but in the end, how can one get around that? I don't think Google is flawless. Far from it! But it's a huge company with way too many products so it's only natural there will be bad decisions and good ones, just as there are bad people as well as good people. > Look to Chrome mobile, the one that they can force ram down the throat of > 50% of mobile users. Chrome mobile doesn't have addons because it doesn't compete. I'm not sure I understand.. are you saying that Chrome mobile takes up a lot of RAM? Because if so I would agree with that, but isn't that precisely why extensions shouldn't be allowed? Implementing extensions would add an even greater burden and poorly written extensions would provide a bad user experience. If anything I really wish we could strip Chrome down. I think people adopted Chrome early on because it was really light and personally I really feel like we let everyone down by letting it get so bloated.
  - jefftk 7y ago
    "they can force ram down the throat" here means "they can forcefully ram it down the throat"
  - SquareWheel 7y ago
    I'm curious. What specifically would you like to see removed from Chrome?
    - rifung 7y ago
      To be honest I don't know too much about what's been added but I can only assume new functionality must account for the increased bloat. I imagine it's support for things like "Chrome Apps" or more generally the desire to get websites to be able to do the same things as native apps. I suspect there's also the fact that Chrome has to support Chrome OS as well. But I am new to Chrome OS so admittedly I am not too familiar on the history or background =]
      - SquareWheel 7y ago
        Chrome OS was my thought as well. I'm not sure how much of that is included in Chrome itself, and how much is bundled separately as part of the OS though. For some reason I thought Chrome Apps were deprecated. PWAs can do most of the same things today.
        rifung 7y ago
        Ah I think you might be right! But to be totally honest, I really don't care for PWAs either.. Maybe I am just too old fashioned but I don't care for my web apps having offline functionality. That being said, I am not familiar with the technology so this is very much an uninformed opinion!
  - feanaro 7y ago
    I don't think stripping even more functionality from the already dumb Chrome on mobile is the answer. How about concentrating efforts on making it more performant instead of removing things? Firefox on Android shows it can be done.
frandroid 7y ago
Their core business is to have a useful/featureful browser. Browsers gain extra features thanks to extensions. One of the reasons that keeps me with Firefox are many of its extensions. They almost lost me as a user when they deprecated a gazilion tons of extensions last year. I would say extensions are an integral part of the browser offering even if produced by third-parties.
danShumway 7y ago
It's pretty clearly in line with Mozilla's goals for an Open Internet -- and from a pragmatic point-of-view a mass exodus of extension developers from Chrome would be big problem for Google. I could see this as a way for Mozilla to further distinguish Firefox from Chrome. If Firefox was seen in the developer community as the platform to target if you want to make money, it won't take long for extension developers to start targeting Chrome only as an afterthought, and users would start to shift towards thinking of Firefox as "the one I can extend."
- pessimizer 7y ago
  > an Open Internet I have no idea what this means, especially capitalized like a brand of some sort, so I don't know how supporting extension developers would help or hinder that. > users would start to shift towards thinking of Firefox as "the one I can extend." Users already thought of firefox as the browser you could extend, but mozilla decided that wasn't a priority. I don't see them suddenly reprioritizing that.
  - geofft 7y ago
    I think that's a bit unfair to Mozilla. They previously had prioritized extensibility over security, that is, extensions and plugins had basically direct access to the browser's C code itself. They've now prioritized security over extensibility. That's not to say that extensibility isn't a priority (or that security was previously not a priority).
kllrnohj 7y ago
> but Google would only benefit from ad/tracker blockers going away. That's a gross mischaracterization of the situation. There are far, far more extensions than just ad blockers. Google could trivially block ad blockers without killing all extensions, and ad blockers can survive just fine without extensions (pihole being the obvious example of one such alternative). Google even has their own rather large suite of extensions: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/category/ext/15-by-google?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/category/ext/15-by-google... None of any of this has anything to do with ad blockers nor some hidden agenda to kill them. It's about how selling a hobby project can be disastrous for users, and what (if anything) Google/Mozilla should be doing to prevent those hobby developers from wanting to sell in the first place. Personally I think that's treating the symptom and not the cause, and a better policy would be something like Google or Mozilla preventing updates to extensions whose backing developer has changed. Although that would be hard to enforce.

Zhenya 7y ago

Google would benefit (maybe) only in the short term. If folks leave Chrome for browsers with adblock that would be a 1-2 punch. They'd loose their influence on the browser world and loose the ad revenue as well.

eitland 7y ago

> Google would only benefit from ad/tracker blockers going away. In the long run, this might sadly be true, but I disagree for now. No way Google is doing this because of the goodness of their hearts. They do it because they haven't completely squeezed out all competitors yet. Removing or utterly crippling addons now would force users to realize what Chrome is while there still are options, meaning a huge chunk of the users would go to other browsers. Look to Chrome mobile, the one that they can force ram down the throat of > 50% of mobile users. Chrome mobile doesn't have addons because it doesn't compete. Sorry to all Googlers here for being so blunt, and feel free to point out one or more examples from the last few years where Google has prioritized their users above quarterly / yearly profits. I used to be a huge fan but Google has massively disappointed me over the last 5-10 years.

9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
They pay the biggest and most popular adblock extension already long time ago to get their stuff whitelisted. Ublock is a niche thing.
rifung 7y ago
I work for Google, opinions are my own. > Sorry to all Googlers here for being so blunt, and feel free to point out one or more examples from the last few years where Google has prioritized their users above quarterly / yearly profits. No need to apologize =] An example that comes to mind is the current focus on accessibility. I think from an objective financial/engineering perspective, it's much preferable to just ignore accessibility because it adds complexity and isn't used by the vast majority of users. However, providing access to everyone is the right thing to do. Another example is crisis tools (https://crisisresponse.google/ https://crisisresponse.google/). I don't think we make money from these apps. Of course, I'm sure people will say this is just for marketing or something but in the end, how can one get around that? I don't think Google is flawless. Far from it! But it's a huge company with way too many products so it's only natural there will be bad decisions and good ones, just as there are bad people as well as good people. > Look to Chrome mobile, the one that they can force ram down the throat of > 50% of mobile users. Chrome mobile doesn't have addons because it doesn't compete. I'm not sure I understand.. are you saying that Chrome mobile takes up a lot of RAM? Because if so I would agree with that, but isn't that precisely why extensions shouldn't be allowed? Implementing extensions would add an even greater burden and poorly written extensions would provide a bad user experience. If anything I really wish we could strip Chrome down. I think people adopted Chrome early on because it was really light and personally I really feel like we let everyone down by letting it get so bloated.
- jefftk 7y ago
  "they can force ram down the throat" here means "they can forcefully ram it down the throat"
- SquareWheel 7y ago
  I'm curious. What specifically would you like to see removed from Chrome?
  - rifung 7y ago
    To be honest I don't know too much about what's been added but I can only assume new functionality must account for the increased bloat. I imagine it's support for things like "Chrome Apps" or more generally the desire to get websites to be able to do the same things as native apps. I suspect there's also the fact that Chrome has to support Chrome OS as well. But I am new to Chrome OS so admittedly I am not too familiar on the history or background =]
    - SquareWheel 7y ago
      Chrome OS was my thought as well. I'm not sure how much of that is included in Chrome itself, and how much is bundled separately as part of the OS though. For some reason I thought Chrome Apps were deprecated. PWAs can do most of the same things today.
      - rifung 7y ago
        Ah I think you might be right! But to be totally honest, I really don't care for PWAs either.. Maybe I am just too old fashioned but I don't care for my web apps having offline functionality. That being said, I am not familiar with the technology so this is very much an uninformed opinion!
- feanaro 7y ago
  I don't think stripping even more functionality from the already dumb Chrome on mobile is the answer. How about concentrating efforts on making it more performant instead of removing things? Firefox on Android shows it can be done.

frandroid 7y ago

Their core business is to have a useful/featureful browser. Browsers gain extra features thanks to extensions. One of the reasons that keeps me with Firefox are many of its extensions. They almost lost me as a user when they deprecated a gazilion tons of extensions last year. I would say extensions are an integral part of the browser offering even if produced by third-parties.

danShumway 7y ago

It's pretty clearly in line with Mozilla's goals for an Open Internet -- and from a pragmatic point-of-view a mass exodus of extension developers from Chrome would be big problem for Google. I could see this as a way for Mozilla to further distinguish Firefox from Chrome. If Firefox was seen in the developer community as the platform to target if you want to make money, it won't take long for extension developers to start targeting Chrome only as an afterthought, and users would start to shift towards thinking of Firefox as "the one I can extend."

pessimizer 7y ago
> an Open Internet I have no idea what this means, especially capitalized like a brand of some sort, so I don't know how supporting extension developers would help or hinder that. > users would start to shift towards thinking of Firefox as "the one I can extend." Users already thought of firefox as the browser you could extend, but mozilla decided that wasn't a priority. I don't see them suddenly reprioritizing that.
- geofft 7y ago
  I think that's a bit unfair to Mozilla. They previously had prioritized extensibility over security, that is, extensions and plugins had basically direct access to the browser's C code itself. They've now prioritized security over extensibility. That's not to say that extensibility isn't a priority (or that security was previously not a priority).

kllrnohj 7y ago

> but Google would only benefit from ad/tracker blockers going away. That's a gross mischaracterization of the situation. There are far, far more extensions than just ad blockers. Google could trivially block ad blockers without killing all extensions, and ad blockers can survive just fine without extensions (pihole being the obvious example of one such alternative). Google even has their own rather large suite of extensions: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/category/ext/15-by-google?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/category/ext/15-by-google... None of any of this has anything to do with ad blockers nor some hidden agenda to kill them. It's about how selling a hobby project can be disastrous for users, and what (if anything) Google/Mozilla should be doing to prevent those hobby developers from wanting to sell in the first place. Personally I think that's treating the symptom and not the cause, and a better policy would be something like Google or Mozilla preventing updates to extensions whose backing developer has changed. Although that would be hard to enforce.