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When I was there, we speculated Google was using Mozilla as antitrust lawyer repellant, but it's a weak argument. Google pushed Chrome onto Firefox users repeat

When I was there, we speculated Google was using Mozilla as antitrust lawyer repellant, but it's a weak argument. Google pushed Chrome onto Firefox users repeatedly, by accident or on purpose doesn't matter. Now that Google is in antitrust court, I think the Mozilla deal is mainly for PR, both positive while it lasts, and negative sense (to avoid being the Firefox killer by not renewing the deal this year -- Google preannounced renewal after Mozilla's August layoffs, and let others repeat the too-high-by-now $400M/year number).

benlivengood 6y ago
My impression is that Google is simply having to play the same game their own advertising business makes others play; in order to keep getting customers (eyeballs for adsense+doubleclick) they have to pay for it because the competition also advertises (via paid default search). Firefox switching to Yahoo for default search was probably an eye opener for them; 30% of global search traffic (at whatever fraction of users didn't change their search engine) is a boatload of money and from public estimates at least an order of magnitude more than they pay Mozilla for the traffic. From a business perspective Google might benefit if Firefox disappeared but there's no guarantee. Opera, Brave, Safari, Edge, etc. could take up Firefox's install-base without significantly increasing Chrome's. At least Firefox is a known entity for them and they would probably rather have a guaranteed platform with Google as the default search engine than having to negotiate with whatever sprang up to replace Firefox.
- BrendanEich 6y ago
  The Yahoo deal failed badly in first year, as Firefox users who were shocked by the change of default search from G to Y overrode default back to G. This caused Marissa Mayer's Yahoo to bleed money, as rumors supported by Mozilla statements say the deal was fixed-payment-per-year, not traffic-based. IIRC searchengineland cracked Yahoo's 10Q to show the blood loss. We also know the deal bled money because of Verizon getting out of it in 2017, when Mozilla went back to Google. Firefox market share is now in the danger zone where Google can replace it with more Chrome promotion and still save on TAC vs. Chrome-eng+mktg. Also the danger zone where webdevs do not test in Gecko and break Firefox, even on such properties as AirBNB.

benlivengood 6y ago

My impression is that Google is simply having to play the same game their own advertising business makes others play; in order to keep getting customers (eyeballs for adsense+doubleclick) they have to pay for it because the competition also advertises (via paid default search). Firefox switching to Yahoo for default search was probably an eye opener for them; 30% of global search traffic (at whatever fraction of users didn't change their search engine) is a boatload of money and from public estimates at least an order of magnitude more than they pay Mozilla for the traffic. From a business perspective Google might benefit if Firefox disappeared but there's no guarantee. Opera, Brave, Safari, Edge, etc. could take up Firefox's install-base without significantly increasing Chrome's. At least Firefox is a known entity for them and they would probably rather have a guaranteed platform with Google as the default search engine than having to negotiate with whatever sprang up to replace Firefox.

BrendanEich 6y ago
The Yahoo deal failed badly in first year, as Firefox users who were shocked by the change of default search from G to Y overrode default back to G. This caused Marissa Mayer's Yahoo to bleed money, as rumors supported by Mozilla statements say the deal was fixed-payment-per-year, not traffic-based. IIRC searchengineland cracked Yahoo's 10Q to show the blood loss. We also know the deal bled money because of Verizon getting out of it in 2017, when Mozilla went back to Google. Firefox market share is now in the danger zone where Google can replace it with more Chrome promotion and still save on TAC vs. Chrome-eng+mktg. Also the danger zone where webdevs do not test in Gecko and break Firefox, even on such properties as AirBNB.