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Counterpoint: Apple when Jobs came back. Sometimes the answer to a company which is trying too many things at random is to drastically reduce the dispersion of

Counterpoint: Apple when Jobs came back. Sometimes the answer to a company which is trying too many things at random is to drastically reduce the dispersion of effort, and focus ruthlessly. It's very hard to do psychologically, though. IMO Mozilla would probably be better served, business-wise, as being "the customizable Chrome". It would be a much smaller business (i.e. less IP under development), but it could be profitable and it leverages their USP in a way that Chrome doesn't seem able or willing to follow. Finding different products to sell simply leads to Firefox going away, IMO. I don't care about Mozilla; I care about what Firefox does that Chrome does not. And at the end of the day, that's mostly Tree Style Tabs, uBlock and a menu bar.

gfodor 6y ago
I think one challenge is a lot of Mozilla's users see Mozilla as a browser company, whereas Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. The users may be right. Your Apple analogy is a tough one - if Apple had just stayed focused on PCs, and not the higher level mission of the company around comput-ing-, they would have not invented new kinds of computers. Focus makes sense, once you've locked in on something. The trick of what to focus on is hard though, and the scope of things to consider as possible to focus on is informed by the mission of the company and its fundamental thesis for existing. When the iPod came out it was often chastised as being off-mission for Apple, and many Mac enthusiasts yelled that it would detract away from having them fix whatever the problem of the day was bothering them about their Mac. This kind of complaint is obviously very familiar in the Mozilla case - things other than Firefox are often considered 'distractions' much like the iPod (which led to the iPhone) was by similar people who were heavily invested in the company's existing product line. Time will tell if Mozilla survives if it turns out they should, unlike Apple, listen to them and accept they can't do more than one thing. Mozilla's thesis is about unlocking the potential of the Internet and ensuring it remains a public resource. Its purpose for existing is not about tree style tabs or ad blockers. But this makes for a tough process of determining how to foster innovative products since the mission is so broad.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  > I think one challenge is a lot of Mozilla's users see Mozilla as a browser company, whereas Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. Spot on. In fact, I think that without FireFox Mozilla might as well be dead, even if it survives as a legal entity and employs people. That's it's whole reason for existence as far as I'm concerned.
  - gred 6y ago
    Agree. I use Firefox for all the usual reasons. I've considered donating to Mozilla in the past, but have always decided not to -- because my impression is that most of that money would be spent on experiments and signaling, not work on the core product that I care about.
- treis 6y ago
  > Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. I don't think Mozilla sees themselves as a "company". Their philosophical core is as a foundation promoting core believes. The title of their website is "Internet for people, not profit" and their recruiting pitch is "We're on a mission. Join us".
- morelisp 6y ago
  > a lot of Mozilla's users see Mozilla as a browser company, whereas Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. To the extent Mozilla sees itself as an internet company, it seems it is is so it can subsume other parts of the internet into the browser. If it genuinely saw itself as an internet company and not a browser company, it would not have: - killed Thunderbird, its premier non-web non-browser application; - built a phone where every app was a browser + ad hoc web-y extensions, even where using a web application approach did not make sense; - the exact same dumb idea as above but for IoT; - integrated every product idea it makes or acquires (Pocket, Send, now Reality) into its browser as the primarily / solitary entry point - continually sidelined / demoted even web-but-non-browser technologies like RSS "Mozilla's users" (and by this you really mean, Firefox's users) see Mozilla as a browser company because everything they do revolves around their browser.
jacquesm 6y ago
> And at the end of the day, that's mostly Tree Style Tabs, uBlock and a menu bar. Amen. And not send each and every keystroke to Google.
- ytpete 6y ago
  > And not send each and every keystroke to Google Is there evidence Chrome does that? I've never heard this claim before.
  - jacquesm 6y ago
    https://www.reddit.com/r/chrome/comments/25jfzg/how_can_i_disable_chrome_from_sending_keystrokes/ https://www.reddit.com/r/chrome/comments/25jfzg/how_can_i_di... Ok, maybe not every keystroke. For instance, form fields should be safe.
- rrdharan 6y ago
  Firefox does that too, by that exact same definition (which I think is a silly one): https://smallbusiness.chron.com/turn-autosuggestion-off-mozilla-64259.html https://smallbusiness.chron.com/turn-autosuggestion-off-mozi...
shock 6y ago
> And at the end of the day, that's mostly Tree Style Tabs, uBlock and a menu bar. I regard Firefox Container Tabs and Rust as the most useful things that come out of Mozilla.
freeopinion 6y ago
Your counterpoint is a little confusing to me. Apple reversed their sinking fortunes when they released the iPhone. That seems to make the exact opposite of your point.
- Miraste 6y ago
  Apple's fortunes were by no means sinking when they released the iPhone. You could make that argument for the iPod, perhaps. I've always seen OS X and the iMac G3 as the turnaround point, both of which play into GP's idea of simplification and focus.
  - Ericson2314 6y ago
    Yeah agreed the iPod saved apple. I have 0 clue how everyone has this pre-iPhone amnesia.
    - freeopinion 6y ago
      Yes. Me, either. :)
  - iso1210 6y ago
    The G3 definitely, it was marketed, and marketed heavily, to the average person in the days of a beige box and computers being complex boring office tools.
  - underbluewaters 6y ago
    People forget about that period between Jobs coming back and the iPhone since their rise afterwards was so incredible. Their laptops and the imac were such a better alternative to the pc at that time and the fan base they developed helped create the conditions for success of the iPhone (which as a bit of a weird product when it arrived).
- sah2ed 6y ago
  > Your counterpoint is a little confusing to me. Apple reversed their sinking fortunes when they released the iPhone. That seems to make the exact opposite of your point. Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1996 and one of the things he stopped was the heavy bleeding from having too many (confusing) SKUs. His first new product was the iPod, released in 2001 while development of the iPhone started around 2005. The release of the iPhone would happen ~11 years after his return.
rrdharan 6y ago
Chrome (still) does uBlock.

gfodor 6y ago

I think one challenge is a lot of Mozilla's users see Mozilla as a browser company, whereas Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. The users may be right. Your Apple analogy is a tough one - if Apple had just stayed focused on PCs, and not the higher level mission of the company around comput-ing-, they would have not invented new kinds of computers. Focus makes sense, once you've locked in on something. The trick of what to focus on is hard though, and the scope of things to consider as possible to focus on is informed by the mission of the company and its fundamental thesis for existing. When the iPod came out it was often chastised as being off-mission for Apple, and many Mac enthusiasts yelled that it would detract away from having them fix whatever the problem of the day was bothering them about their Mac. This kind of complaint is obviously very familiar in the Mozilla case - things other than Firefox are often considered 'distractions' much like the iPod (which led to the iPhone) was by similar people who were heavily invested in the company's existing product line. Time will tell if Mozilla survives if it turns out they should, unlike Apple, listen to them and accept they can't do more than one thing. Mozilla's thesis is about unlocking the potential of the Internet and ensuring it remains a public resource. Its purpose for existing is not about tree style tabs or ad blockers. But this makes for a tough process of determining how to foster innovative products since the mission is so broad.

jacquesm 6y ago
> I think one challenge is a lot of Mozilla's users see Mozilla as a browser company, whereas Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. Spot on. In fact, I think that without FireFox Mozilla might as well be dead, even if it survives as a legal entity and employs people. That's it's whole reason for existence as far as I'm concerned.
- gred 6y ago
  Agree. I use Firefox for all the usual reasons. I've considered donating to Mozilla in the past, but have always decided not to -- because my impression is that most of that money would be spent on experiments and signaling, not work on the core product that I care about.
treis 6y ago
> Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. I don't think Mozilla sees themselves as a "company". Their philosophical core is as a foundation promoting core believes. The title of their website is "Internet for people, not profit" and their recruiting pitch is "We're on a mission. Join us".
morelisp 6y ago
> a lot of Mozilla's users see Mozilla as a browser company, whereas Mozilla sees itself as an Internet company. To the extent Mozilla sees itself as an internet company, it seems it is is so it can subsume other parts of the internet into the browser. If it genuinely saw itself as an internet company and not a browser company, it would not have: - killed Thunderbird, its premier non-web non-browser application; - built a phone where every app was a browser + ad hoc web-y extensions, even where using a web application approach did not make sense; - the exact same dumb idea as above but for IoT; - integrated every product idea it makes or acquires (Pocket, Send, now Reality) into its browser as the primarily / solitary entry point - continually sidelined / demoted even web-but-non-browser technologies like RSS "Mozilla's users" (and by this you really mean, Firefox's users) see Mozilla as a browser company because everything they do revolves around their browser.

jacquesm 6y ago

> And at the end of the day, that's mostly Tree Style Tabs, uBlock and a menu bar. Amen. And not send each and every keystroke to Google.

ytpete 6y ago
> And not send each and every keystroke to Google Is there evidence Chrome does that? I've never heard this claim before.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  https://www.reddit.com/r/chrome/comments/25jfzg/how_can_i_disable_chrome_from_sending_keystrokes/ https://www.reddit.com/r/chrome/comments/25jfzg/how_can_i_di... Ok, maybe not every keystroke. For instance, form fields should be safe.
rrdharan 6y ago
Firefox does that too, by that exact same definition (which I think is a silly one): https://smallbusiness.chron.com/turn-autosuggestion-off-mozilla-64259.html https://smallbusiness.chron.com/turn-autosuggestion-off-mozi...

shock 6y ago

> And at the end of the day, that's mostly Tree Style Tabs, uBlock and a menu bar. I regard Firefox Container Tabs and Rust as the most useful things that come out of Mozilla.

freeopinion 6y ago

Your counterpoint is a little confusing to me. Apple reversed their sinking fortunes when they released the iPhone. That seems to make the exact opposite of your point.

Miraste 6y ago
Apple's fortunes were by no means sinking when they released the iPhone. You could make that argument for the iPod, perhaps. I've always seen OS X and the iMac G3 as the turnaround point, both of which play into GP's idea of simplification and focus.
- Ericson2314 6y ago
  Yeah agreed the iPod saved apple. I have 0 clue how everyone has this pre-iPhone amnesia.
  - freeopinion 6y ago
    Yes. Me, either. :)
- iso1210 6y ago
  The G3 definitely, it was marketed, and marketed heavily, to the average person in the days of a beige box and computers being complex boring office tools.
- underbluewaters 6y ago
  People forget about that period between Jobs coming back and the iPhone since their rise afterwards was so incredible. Their laptops and the imac were such a better alternative to the pc at that time and the fan base they developed helped create the conditions for success of the iPhone (which as a bit of a weird product when it arrived).
sah2ed 6y ago
> Your counterpoint is a little confusing to me. Apple reversed their sinking fortunes when they released the iPhone. That seems to make the exact opposite of your point. Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1996 and one of the things he stopped was the heavy bleeding from having too many (confusing) SKUs. His first new product was the iPod, released in 2001 while development of the iPhone started around 2005. The release of the iPhone would happen ~11 years after his return.

rrdharan 6y ago

Chrome (still) does uBlock.