4 ms·

Given how they make a minimum $450M a year in revenue, how on Earth is Mozilla not swimming in cash?! How high can their expenses be?

rmsaksida 5y ago
Mozilla pays millions of dollars per year to their CEO, despite the decrease in usage and user base. Could be a symptom of a larger problem in the organization.
- Nextgrid 5y ago
  Mozilla also spends its cash on various other bullshit that nobody cares about.
  - TLLtchvL8KZ 5y ago
    Feels like a lifetime ago they were humble-bragging about their Paris office with gold leaf ceilings!
- gibba999 5y ago
  In general, I don't donate to non-profits where anyone earns more than I do. I've worked for nonprofits for most of my career, and have seen the insides of several. The most effective ones tend to have a small team on shoestring salaries and really need money. The least effective ones have a CEO making $5M and an executive team above $400k. I've seen a lot of people argue that good people cost money, but they don't. I know $5M CEOs, $1M CEOs and $100k CEOs. The $100k CEO was by far the most effective. That said, the Mozilla 990 doesn't look crazy. Many big nonprofits are bad. It's not an organization I'd donate to myself, but it's not one I'd discourage others from donating to either. CEO makes $3M, which isn't really reasonable, but the next-highest salary is $286k. That said, the whole for-profit Mozilla Corporation bit sketches me out. It feels like it might be a way to dodge IRS reporting regulations. I'd want to do due diligence before donating to a non-profit that has a structure like that (it may be innocuous), but I don't have time for due diligence when there are transparent nonprofits too.
- aftergibson 5y ago
  I use Firefox but I don’t donate anymore which is awful but I want to donate to Firefox not Mozilla. If anyone knows a way to only support Firefox and not Mozilla at large do let me know!
  - pabs3 5y ago
    One way to help Firefox would be to spend some time on Firefox bug reports or patches.
    - CRConrad 5y ago
      But aren't Firefox bug reports known mainly for being ignored (or if not ignored then viciously denied)?
      - pabs3 5y ago
        They wouldn't be ignored if more people such as GP, you, me etc put work into fixing them.
  - soundnote 5y ago
    They have paid products like Pocket, VPN etc. Those are sold by the for-profit corp that develops Firefox, not the non-profit foundation that owns the corp.
- TranquilMarmot 5y ago
  Fire the CEO, start paying open source developers for quality pull requests. Maybe in another dimension...
- practice9 5y ago
  Reminds me of this comment : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058629
sciurus 5y ago
There is a year of lag, but you can read Mozilla's financial statements and Form 990. The latest ones are linked at https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/
bzbarsky 5y ago
How many developers do you think a browser engine needs? How much do they cost? But also, the answer to your question is at https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-fdn-2019-short-form-0926.pdf https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-fdn-201... and https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-2019-form-990.pdf https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-2019-fo... (the 2020 numbers are not up yet because the audit starts when the tax return is filed and lasts for several months, so isn't completed yet). Just for comparison, last I checked Chrome's marketing budget was estimated to be in the ballpark of Mozilla's total budget. Disclaimer: used to work for Mozilla.
- freediver 5y ago
  > How many developers do you think a browser engine needs? How much do they cost? Browser: ~20 Web rendering engine: ~100 Worldwide average senior C/C++ developer salary: $100k/year So $12M/year should do it. Let's say $20M to allow for management and overhead. Disclaimer: founder of a browser company
  - Jyaif 5y ago
    * They support many platforms (windows, Linux,macOS, android, iOS). * There are server side components (bookmark sync for instance) * They need infrastructure to run the tests, do the builds, handle the bug reports, etc... I don't know where you got your 20% overhead, but from what I heard it's wayyyy off.
JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> how on Earth is Mozilla not swimming in cash?! How high can their expenses be? Mozilla launches a new idiot side project like once a month. As a Firefox user, it's deeply frustrating to watch bug tickets go unfilled while a multimillion-dollar rebranding rolls out.

rmsaksida 5y ago

Mozilla pays millions of dollars per year to their CEO, despite the decrease in usage and user base. Could be a symptom of a larger problem in the organization.

Nextgrid 5y ago
Mozilla also spends its cash on various other bullshit that nobody cares about.
- TLLtchvL8KZ 5y ago
  Feels like a lifetime ago they were humble-bragging about their Paris office with gold leaf ceilings!
gibba999 5y ago
In general, I don't donate to non-profits where anyone earns more than I do. I've worked for nonprofits for most of my career, and have seen the insides of several. The most effective ones tend to have a small team on shoestring salaries and really need money. The least effective ones have a CEO making $5M and an executive team above $400k. I've seen a lot of people argue that good people cost money, but they don't. I know $5M CEOs, $1M CEOs and $100k CEOs. The $100k CEO was by far the most effective. That said, the Mozilla 990 doesn't look crazy. Many big nonprofits are bad. It's not an organization I'd donate to myself, but it's not one I'd discourage others from donating to either. CEO makes $3M, which isn't really reasonable, but the next-highest salary is $286k. That said, the whole for-profit Mozilla Corporation bit sketches me out. It feels like it might be a way to dodge IRS reporting regulations. I'd want to do due diligence before donating to a non-profit that has a structure like that (it may be innocuous), but I don't have time for due diligence when there are transparent nonprofits too.
aftergibson 5y ago
I use Firefox but I don’t donate anymore which is awful but I want to donate to Firefox not Mozilla. If anyone knows a way to only support Firefox and not Mozilla at large do let me know!
- pabs3 5y ago
  One way to help Firefox would be to spend some time on Firefox bug reports or patches.
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    But aren't Firefox bug reports known mainly for being ignored (or if not ignored then viciously denied)?
    - pabs3 5y ago
      They wouldn't be ignored if more people such as GP, you, me etc put work into fixing them.
- soundnote 5y ago
  They have paid products like Pocket, VPN etc. Those are sold by the for-profit corp that develops Firefox, not the non-profit foundation that owns the corp.
TranquilMarmot 5y ago
Fire the CEO, start paying open source developers for quality pull requests. Maybe in another dimension...
practice9 5y ago
Reminds me of this comment : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058629

sciurus 5y ago

There is a year of lag, but you can read Mozilla's financial statements and Form 990. The latest ones are linked at https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/

bzbarsky 5y ago

How many developers do you think a browser engine needs? How much do they cost? But also, the answer to your question is at https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-fdn-2019-short-form-0926.pdf https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-fdn-201... and https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-2019-form-990.pdf https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2019/mozilla-2019-fo... (the 2020 numbers are not up yet because the audit starts when the tax return is filed and lasts for several months, so isn't completed yet). Just for comparison, last I checked Chrome's marketing budget was estimated to be in the ballpark of Mozilla's total budget. Disclaimer: used to work for Mozilla.

freediver 5y ago
> How many developers do you think a browser engine needs? How much do they cost? Browser: ~20 Web rendering engine: ~100 Worldwide average senior C/C++ developer salary: $100k/year So $12M/year should do it. Let's say $20M to allow for management and overhead. Disclaimer: founder of a browser company
- Jyaif 5y ago
  * They support many platforms (windows, Linux,macOS, android, iOS). * There are server side components (bookmark sync for instance) * They need infrastructure to run the tests, do the builds, handle the bug reports, etc... I don't know where you got your 20% overhead, but from what I heard it's wayyyy off.

JumpCrisscross 5y ago

> how on Earth is Mozilla not swimming in cash?! How high can their expenses be? Mozilla launches a new idiot side project like once a month. As a Firefox user, it's deeply frustrating to watch bug tickets go unfilled while a multimillion-dollar rebranding rolls out.