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The pure browser business doesn't bring in any money. Browsers are a commodity, you sell them as a vehicle for the real thing. Much like razor handles for the r

The pure browser business doesn't bring in any money. Browsers are a commodity, you sell them as a vehicle for the real thing. Much like razor handles for the razor blades. Firefox is a great handle but nobody wants or needs their blades.

chrisseaton 5y ago
> The pure browser business doesn't bring in any money. Firefox brings in hundreds of millions of dollars.
- kortilla 5y ago
  By feeding search traffic to google. That’s one of the most unstable income streams there is.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    It's stable within a few tens of millions over the last years.
  - samwillis 5y ago
    No it’s pretty consistently $400-450M per year. Up from the brief period when Yahoo was default. https://www.androidheadlines.com/2020/08/mozilla-firefox-google-search?amp https://www.androidheadlines.com/2020/08/mozilla-firefox-goo...
    - kortilla 5y ago
      Bringing a lot of money doesn’t mean it’s stable. Search traffic to google is putting all of your eggs in one basket and putting you at odds with your users interest.
  - rvz 5y ago
    There you go. What the rest of the comments in your reply don't tell you is that Mozilla's expenses outweigh their income for years, which means they are constantly losing money. [0] Given that Google is their only source of income, (excluding one-time payments) it is indeed very unstable and they are ultimately at the mercy of Google, despite 14 years ago promising [1] to move away from being completely dependent on their income. At this point, Mozilla is on life support. Privacy (which is their main selling point) to Mozilla is also a joke to them. If Google wasn't bad enough, why not work with Meta on 'ads' too? Not exactly 'privacy first' - they might as well drop that claim. [0] https://www.computerworld.com/article/3600206/mozilla-reports-338m-revenue-spike-from-settlement-over-yahoo-contract.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/3600206/mozilla-report... [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20120105090543/https://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9044160/Mozilla_can_live_without_Google_s_money_Baker_says_ https://web.archive.org/web/20120105090543/https://www.compu...
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      > Mozilla's expenses outweigh their income for years Are those expenses for developing the browser, or burning money on other things that nobody cares about? For example have you seen their YouTube recently? Why are they spending money on making these bizarre rants about their competitors? https://www.youtube.com/user/Mozilla/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/Mozilla/videos
whywhywhywhy 5y ago
I think this is what the Mozilla execs believe and also why Firefox likely wont exist at all in 15 years. Making a web browser in the hopes of getting people to subscribe to your VPN or relay systems seems an absurd engineering and management cost, surely if you just want to sell VPN subs there are easier ways than taking on one of the most complex engineering tasks in tech. Of course, I don't think Mozilla should be selling VPN subs at all but their exec team certainly think it's a major priority. Low vision, low ambition, riding on past success till they sink. Confident I'll see the headline "Mozilla switches Firefox engine to Blink" within the next 10 years.
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  I don't know why you think Mozilla VPN is a "major priority" for anyone. The service is repackaged Mullvad, and I doubt the WireGuard wrapper or the website have some huge development cost. It seems like an easy way to try and earn a few extra bucks, not a major priority.
  - whywhywhywhy 5y ago
    Few months ago it was the first thing you saw on their homepage and is still one of the major things. Also, you know the whole firing of dev teams thing.
    - boomboomsubban 5y ago
      A link on the homepage is not some huge deal, who even goes to Mozilla's homepage? People that want Firefox will search for Firefox, with no VPN mentioned. I don't think the burden of making the VPN client forced them to fire the developers.
- danShumway 5y ago
  Meanwhile, everyone else complains that they take search money from Google. What would be acceptable to you as a monetization model for Mozilla? Google makes money from Chrome because Chrome fits into their larger advertising goals. Apple makes money from Safari because it fits into their larger goals about platform control, particularly on iOS. Brave makes money because they inject ads into the browsing experience. What should Mozilla make money on? They apparently shouldn't take money from Google because that makes them dependent on a competitor. They also apparently shouldn't focus on platforms like Pocket or Email because those are independent of the browser. And they also apparently shouldn't sell VPN subs that are directly integrated into the browser because those are bad. Should they charge directly for the browser itself? That's a good way of crashing your browser market share. Off the top of my head, I wish Mozilla took direct donations for Firefox, but I also don't think that would be enough. I wish Mozilla would do more donation campaigns for specific features, that would be really cool, but also not a solution on its own. I wish we saw more sponsorship of the browser, but people seem to be angry about sponsorship, particularly when it comes from large tech companies. Outside of those partial solutions, I really like that Mozilla is doing subscription features around the browser. I don't personally feel like the subscription features they're currently offering are particularly strong, I wish they would make some more compelling stuff that's easier for me to recommend to people. But it's not the core idea of subscriptions that upsets me. > I think this is what the Mozilla execs believe and also why Firefox likely wont exist at all in 15 years. Nobody in the current market monetizes browsers directly with the exception of Brave, and Brave's monetization model is toxic and should be rejected. Everybody else is using browsers to further other interests that they have. Vivaldi is partner deals and secondary services. Safari is iOS. Chrome is Google dominance and other services. Edge is Bing/Windows. Who is selling browsers successfully as its core product?

chrisseaton 5y ago

> The pure browser business doesn't bring in any money. Firefox brings in hundreds of millions of dollars.

kortilla 5y ago
By feeding search traffic to google. That’s one of the most unstable income streams there is.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  It's stable within a few tens of millions over the last years.
- samwillis 5y ago
  No it’s pretty consistently $400-450M per year. Up from the brief period when Yahoo was default. https://www.androidheadlines.com/2020/08/mozilla-firefox-google-search?amp https://www.androidheadlines.com/2020/08/mozilla-firefox-goo...
  - kortilla 5y ago
    Bringing a lot of money doesn’t mean it’s stable. Search traffic to google is putting all of your eggs in one basket and putting you at odds with your users interest.
- rvz 5y ago
  There you go. What the rest of the comments in your reply don't tell you is that Mozilla's expenses outweigh their income for years, which means they are constantly losing money. [0] Given that Google is their only source of income, (excluding one-time payments) it is indeed very unstable and they are ultimately at the mercy of Google, despite 14 years ago promising [1] to move away from being completely dependent on their income. At this point, Mozilla is on life support. Privacy (which is their main selling point) to Mozilla is also a joke to them. If Google wasn't bad enough, why not work with Meta on 'ads' too? Not exactly 'privacy first' - they might as well drop that claim. [0] https://www.computerworld.com/article/3600206/mozilla-reports-338m-revenue-spike-from-settlement-over-yahoo-contract.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/3600206/mozilla-report... [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20120105090543/https://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9044160/Mozilla_can_live_without_Google_s_money_Baker_says_ https://web.archive.org/web/20120105090543/https://www.compu...
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    > Mozilla's expenses outweigh their income for years Are those expenses for developing the browser, or burning money on other things that nobody cares about? For example have you seen their YouTube recently? Why are they spending money on making these bizarre rants about their competitors? https://www.youtube.com/user/Mozilla/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/Mozilla/videos

whywhywhywhy 5y ago

I think this is what the Mozilla execs believe and also why Firefox likely wont exist at all in 15 years. Making a web browser in the hopes of getting people to subscribe to your VPN or relay systems seems an absurd engineering and management cost, surely if you just want to sell VPN subs there are easier ways than taking on one of the most complex engineering tasks in tech. Of course, I don't think Mozilla should be selling VPN subs at all but their exec team certainly think it's a major priority. Low vision, low ambition, riding on past success till they sink. Confident I'll see the headline "Mozilla switches Firefox engine to Blink" within the next 10 years.

boomboomsubban 5y ago
I don't know why you think Mozilla VPN is a "major priority" for anyone. The service is repackaged Mullvad, and I doubt the WireGuard wrapper or the website have some huge development cost. It seems like an easy way to try and earn a few extra bucks, not a major priority.
- whywhywhywhy 5y ago
  Few months ago it was the first thing you saw on their homepage and is still one of the major things. Also, you know the whole firing of dev teams thing.
  - boomboomsubban 5y ago
    A link on the homepage is not some huge deal, who even goes to Mozilla's homepage? People that want Firefox will search for Firefox, with no VPN mentioned. I don't think the burden of making the VPN client forced them to fire the developers.
danShumway 5y ago
Meanwhile, everyone else complains that they take search money from Google. What would be acceptable to you as a monetization model for Mozilla? Google makes money from Chrome because Chrome fits into their larger advertising goals. Apple makes money from Safari because it fits into their larger goals about platform control, particularly on iOS. Brave makes money because they inject ads into the browsing experience. What should Mozilla make money on? They apparently shouldn't take money from Google because that makes them dependent on a competitor. They also apparently shouldn't focus on platforms like Pocket or Email because those are independent of the browser. And they also apparently shouldn't sell VPN subs that are directly integrated into the browser because those are bad. Should they charge directly for the browser itself? That's a good way of crashing your browser market share. Off the top of my head, I wish Mozilla took direct donations for Firefox, but I also don't think that would be enough. I wish Mozilla would do more donation campaigns for specific features, that would be really cool, but also not a solution on its own. I wish we saw more sponsorship of the browser, but people seem to be angry about sponsorship, particularly when it comes from large tech companies. Outside of those partial solutions, I really like that Mozilla is doing subscription features around the browser. I don't personally feel like the subscription features they're currently offering are particularly strong, I wish they would make some more compelling stuff that's easier for me to recommend to people. But it's not the core idea of subscriptions that upsets me. > I think this is what the Mozilla execs believe and also why Firefox likely wont exist at all in 15 years. Nobody in the current market monetizes browsers directly with the exception of Brave, and Brave's monetization model is toxic and should be rejected. Everybody else is using browsers to further other interests that they have. Vivaldi is partner deals and secondary services. Safari is iOS. Chrome is Google dominance and other services. Edge is Bing/Windows. Who is selling browsers successfully as its core product?