4 ms·

You realise how weird this sounds, right? Presumably you donate because you care about the Mozilla mission, and those ads are there because donations alone aren

You realise how weird this sounds, right? Presumably you donate because you care about the Mozilla mission, and those ads are there because donations alone aren't enough, and relying purely on Google's money is also not a great strategy. What do you want them to do, invent money out of thin air? And it's still Firefox: if you're upset enough to consider "migration to a different browser", why not instead get upset enough to just look up the pref that turns them off? Because that's the whole point of Firefox: you're still in control of your browser, and almost everything is yours to set to your liking, even if it's not in the normal options UI. Don't want those ads? Hit up about:config, turn them off, problem solved? And in the mean time, Mozilla still needs your help, because breaking today's Chrome dominance by offering a better product (not just a competing one. People don't switch if the offering is more of the same) is orders of magnitudes more difficult than when they broke IE's dominance many decades ago.

eganist 6y ago
> You realise how weird this sounds, right? Presumably you donate because you care about the Mozilla mission, and those ads are there because donations alone aren't enough, and relying purely on Google's money is also not a great strategy. What do you want them to do, invent money out of thin air? If Facebook made 32.03 per user last year, I think it's fair to say that Mozilla will probably do even better if they offer an ad-free subscription option for e.g. 36/y across their entire suite of services. It's not weird to expect Mozilla to do their best to try and remain solvent.
- monsieurbanana 6y ago
  I'm afraid I'm understanding this correctly: Near 100% of Mozilla users would agree to get the $36/year subscription?
  - eganist 6y ago
    > I'm afraid I'm understanding this correctly: > Near 100% of Mozilla users would agree to get the $36/year subscription? No, not at all. And I'm surprised at how many downvotes this is getting, but the basic concept is that at $36/y, each person paying that amount will assuredly be donating more to Mozilla than Mozilla would be making from ads on that user. I couldn't find any numbers on what Mozilla makes from ads, but I'd be surprised if it approached what Facebook makes per user.
  - pmontra 6y ago
    Not at all. Most of them will do what everybody does when there are free (as in beer) alternatives: use the free one.
jug 6y ago
> What do you want them to do, invent money out of thin air? You're talking of Bitcoin donations, right? ;-)
- TheRealPomax 6y ago
  Not after the Tesla thing =D
jhhh 6y ago
How many ads could they add to the browser before you'd agree with them?
anonymousab 6y ago
Adding ads, unannounced, and purposely placing them where they know people will accidentally open them due to muscle memory is some absolute user-hostile garbage. They know exactly what they are doing. More importantly, it's not just ads. This is another example in a long line of conveniently whoops-didn't-mean-to thumbs in the eyes of users. Mozilla has this weird split-brain, one step forward two steps back mentality when it comes to building and fighting for their users. It's exhausting to see this pattern play out over and over, so it absolutely makes sense that people will eventually get fed up with it and stop donating.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  > Mozilla has this weird split-brain, one step forward two steps back mentality when it comes to building and fighting for their users. The forward people and the backward people are probably different people.
berkes 6y ago
> invent money out of thin air? This is the exact businessmodel of Brave. So apparently is is not that strange a suggestion.
- CodeGlitch 6y ago
  I meant what is 'money' anyway? :)
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
corobo 6y ago
You know what most sites and services do when they need our help? They ask. If Mozilla is going broke, ask for donations by all means! Slap ads all over Firefox by all means. Get my consent first though, eh? Give me a chance to open my wallet before you start ruining the only reason I interact with your company. Can I note this is not the first time Firefox had made people think they've been hacked for monetary gain. I also disabled any and all checkboxes that involved being experimented on which they have ignored for this one. Remember when they promised it wouldn't happen again? I do. https://www.cnet.com/news/mozilla-investigates-mr-robot-firefox-extension-problem/ https://www.cnet.com/news/mozilla-investigates-mr-robot-fire...
- TheRealPomax 6y ago
  I absolutely do, and this is nothing like the mr. robot nonsense. Browsers constantly pull the rug from under you, firefox is on the same level of offender as Chrome in that respect, but at least in firefox you get to then go "actually, no", instead of going "well I guess I'm fucked, time to get used to this. Again"
csunbird 6y ago
> You realise how weird this sounds, right? Presumably you donate because you care about the Mozilla mission, and those ads are there because donations alone aren't enough, and relying purely on Google's money is also not a great strategy It also feels weird to donate to have an ad-free, privacy first, open source browser and get ads in it. > And it's still Firefox: if you're upset enough to consider "migration to a different browser", why not instead get upset enough to just look up the pref that turns them off? Default settings matter. "Just turn it off" is not a valid suggestion in my opinion.
- TheRealPomax 6y ago
  That's not what you donate to? You don't donations to the firefox application, you donate to Mozilla. It's not a "pay to get a better browser" scheme, you're donating because you care about their mission, and Mozilla uses that money to further that mission. Firefox does not get funded by donation, it has its own revenue stream and it's been losing money for years, so do you want it to at least not die? Then you'll have to accept that they _need_ money and unless you happen to have a cool few hundred million lying around to sign over directly for Firefox as a non-donation, no-obligations-other-than-it-goes-to-firefox sponsor partnership, this is how hard it is to get money in this landscape.

eganist 6y ago

> You realise how weird this sounds, right? Presumably you donate because you care about the Mozilla mission, and those ads are there because donations alone aren't enough, and relying purely on Google's money is also not a great strategy. What do you want them to do, invent money out of thin air? If Facebook made 32.03 per user last year, I think it's fair to say that Mozilla will probably do even better if they offer an ad-free subscription option for e.g. 36/y across their entire suite of services. It's not weird to expect Mozilla to do their best to try and remain solvent.

monsieurbanana 6y ago
I'm afraid I'm understanding this correctly: Near 100% of Mozilla users would agree to get the $36/year subscription?
- eganist 6y ago
  > I'm afraid I'm understanding this correctly: > Near 100% of Mozilla users would agree to get the $36/year subscription? No, not at all. And I'm surprised at how many downvotes this is getting, but the basic concept is that at $36/y, each person paying that amount will assuredly be donating more to Mozilla than Mozilla would be making from ads on that user. I couldn't find any numbers on what Mozilla makes from ads, but I'd be surprised if it approached what Facebook makes per user.
- pmontra 6y ago
  Not at all. Most of them will do what everybody does when there are free (as in beer) alternatives: use the free one.

jug 6y ago

> What do you want them to do, invent money out of thin air? You're talking of Bitcoin donations, right? ;-)

TheRealPomax 6y ago
Not after the Tesla thing =D

jhhh 6y ago

How many ads could they add to the browser before you'd agree with them?

anonymousab 6y ago

Adding ads, unannounced, and purposely placing them where they know people will accidentally open them due to muscle memory is some absolute user-hostile garbage. They know exactly what they are doing. More importantly, it's not just ads. This is another example in a long line of conveniently whoops-didn't-mean-to thumbs in the eyes of users. Mozilla has this weird split-brain, one step forward two steps back mentality when it comes to building and fighting for their users. It's exhausting to see this pattern play out over and over, so it absolutely makes sense that people will eventually get fed up with it and stop donating.

thaumasiotes 6y ago
> Mozilla has this weird split-brain, one step forward two steps back mentality when it comes to building and fighting for their users. The forward people and the backward people are probably different people.

berkes 6y ago

> invent money out of thin air? This is the exact businessmodel of Brave. So apparently is is not that strange a suggestion.

CodeGlitch 6y ago
I meant what is 'money' anyway? :)

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

corobo 6y ago

You know what most sites and services do when they need our help? They ask. If Mozilla is going broke, ask for donations by all means! Slap ads all over Firefox by all means. Get my consent first though, eh? Give me a chance to open my wallet before you start ruining the only reason I interact with your company. Can I note this is not the first time Firefox had made people think they've been hacked for monetary gain. I also disabled any and all checkboxes that involved being experimented on which they have ignored for this one. Remember when they promised it wouldn't happen again? I do. https://www.cnet.com/news/mozilla-investigates-mr-robot-firefox-extension-problem/ https://www.cnet.com/news/mozilla-investigates-mr-robot-fire...

TheRealPomax 6y ago
I absolutely do, and this is nothing like the mr. robot nonsense. Browsers constantly pull the rug from under you, firefox is on the same level of offender as Chrome in that respect, but at least in firefox you get to then go "actually, no", instead of going "well I guess I'm fucked, time to get used to this. Again"

csunbird 6y ago

> You realise how weird this sounds, right? Presumably you donate because you care about the Mozilla mission, and those ads are there because donations alone aren't enough, and relying purely on Google's money is also not a great strategy It also feels weird to donate to have an ad-free, privacy first, open source browser and get ads in it. > And it's still Firefox: if you're upset enough to consider "migration to a different browser", why not instead get upset enough to just look up the pref that turns them off? Default settings matter. "Just turn it off" is not a valid suggestion in my opinion.

TheRealPomax 6y ago
That's not what you donate to? You don't donations to the firefox application, you donate to Mozilla. It's not a "pay to get a better browser" scheme, you're donating because you care about their mission, and Mozilla uses that money to further that mission. Firefox does not get funded by donation, it has its own revenue stream and it's been losing money for years, so do you want it to at least not die? Then you'll have to accept that they _need_ money and unless you happen to have a cool few hundred million lying around to sign over directly for Firefox as a non-donation, no-obligations-other-than-it-goes-to-firefox sponsor partnership, this is how hard it is to get money in this landscape.