4 ms·

I just wanted to say that you (content blocker devs) have been heard, maybe not by the majority of browser users but at least people like me are championing Fir

I just wanted to say that you (content blocker devs) have been heard, maybe not by the majority of browser users but at least people like me are championing Firefox over webkit-based browsers precisely because to do otherwise would be to loose control of the web to FAANG, especially Google. I've been telling everyone who would listen about how Google leverages Chrom(e/ium) against user interests and have deployed Firefox to every friend & family user whose machines I support.

Tijdreiziger 4y ago
I also recommend people I know to use Firefox, but a lot of people either don't understand the problem or just don't care. A lot of people even conflate Google Chrome, Google Search and other Google services (understandable, as Chrome's home page is a big Google logo with a search box), so they think that they cannot use Google anymore if they install Firefox. The stats [1] speak for themselves: only 3.3% of users use Firefox. Even Edge has more users. [1] https://gs.statcounter.com/ https://gs.statcounter.com/
- novax81 4y ago
  It's harder to get people to switch browsers nowadays. When Chrome first came out as a breath of fresh air (IE was IE, Firefox was better but a bit "heavy", Opera was... Opera), normal users would just nod and agree if you recommended a switch, and even as a power user, I only had to migrate a handful of extensions and behaviors over. At this point, browsers (particularly Chrome and Safari on their respective platforms) have ingrained themselves into their users daily routine. Things like bookmarks and some habits transfer pretty quickly, but casual users won't care enough about this (until they're impacted more).
- cycomanic 4y ago
  I think the stats are showing that we really need debundling of the browser from the OS. I'd wadger that those stats pretty closely align with the percentage of android and IOS users, or in other words the stats are completely dominated by mobile browsers, where hardly anyone changes browsers. I can't understand why we have not seen strong regulatory/antitrust action on this front considering the precedent with MS.
  - HWR_14 4y ago
    I dread the debundling. The day Google can tell iOS users to "just download Chrome" is the same day all non-Chrome browsers will stop working on Google properties. Well, they'll let Chromium browsers (which also support their ad-blcoking-blocking) work too, for antitrust reasons.
  - happymellon 4y ago
    That's funny because my phone is weaker than my laptop, and has a smaller screen to show useful information Firefox and uBlock get installed faster to remove the slowdowns and popups.
- mdaniel 4y ago
  One thing to be cautious of when trying to count browser stats is that the recent releases of Firefox are pretty aggressive about blocking tracking scripts, such as those used by a site like statcounter.com uses to count up browser usage <https://gs.statcounter.com/faq#methodology https://gs.statcounter.com/faq#methodology> I don't know how to solve that problem, since those two outcomes are at odds with one another, but wanted to raise awareness
moonchrome 4y ago
I wonder why not create a ad-free/privacy fork of Chromium. Especially on Mobile, I'd use that for sure. Existing ones have huge strings attached. Mozilla is basically FUBAR at this point.
- cycomanic 4y ago
  Why is Mozilla fubar? I'd argue it's much less work to get behind Mozilla than trying to maintain a chromium fork.
- kmeisthax 4y ago
  This exists, it's called Ungoogled Chromium. Removing whatever misfeatures Google adds to Chrome is fairly straightforward. The real danger to having a single codebase for the whole web is spec validation. Most web standards rely on two independent implementations. For newer technologies we could technically count WebKit and Blink as separate, but Gecko was providing an entirely separate codebase that isn't a fork of anything. Remember how WebSQL was basically put out to pasture because it was just SQLite, warts and all, shoved inside the web sandbox? That's the sort of problem we'd rather avoid. Single-implementation standards tend to pick up bugs and misbehaviors from their implementation, since everyone winds up depending on implementation bugs rather than getting them fixed to match spec.
  - HWR_14 4y ago
    > Removing whatever misfeatures Google adds to Chrome is fairly straightforward. Yes. But adding back in Manifest v2 isn't. Even MSFT claims that it's too much work for them.
    - NeverFade 4y ago
      IIUC, the only problem with Mv3 is that they disabled the WebRequest API. A fork of Chromium that solves this problem will just have to re-enable the WebRequest API, which seems doable.
      - 4y ago

Tijdreiziger 4y ago

I also recommend people I know to use Firefox, but a lot of people either don't understand the problem or just don't care. A lot of people even conflate Google Chrome, Google Search and other Google services (understandable, as Chrome's home page is a big Google logo with a search box), so they think that they cannot use Google anymore if they install Firefox. The stats [1] speak for themselves: only 3.3% of users use Firefox. Even Edge has more users. [1] https://gs.statcounter.com/ https://gs.statcounter.com/

novax81 4y ago
It's harder to get people to switch browsers nowadays. When Chrome first came out as a breath of fresh air (IE was IE, Firefox was better but a bit "heavy", Opera was... Opera), normal users would just nod and agree if you recommended a switch, and even as a power user, I only had to migrate a handful of extensions and behaviors over. At this point, browsers (particularly Chrome and Safari on their respective platforms) have ingrained themselves into their users daily routine. Things like bookmarks and some habits transfer pretty quickly, but casual users won't care enough about this (until they're impacted more).
cycomanic 4y ago
I think the stats are showing that we really need debundling of the browser from the OS. I'd wadger that those stats pretty closely align with the percentage of android and IOS users, or in other words the stats are completely dominated by mobile browsers, where hardly anyone changes browsers. I can't understand why we have not seen strong regulatory/antitrust action on this front considering the precedent with MS.
- HWR_14 4y ago
  I dread the debundling. The day Google can tell iOS users to "just download Chrome" is the same day all non-Chrome browsers will stop working on Google properties. Well, they'll let Chromium browsers (which also support their ad-blcoking-blocking) work too, for antitrust reasons.
- happymellon 4y ago
  That's funny because my phone is weaker than my laptop, and has a smaller screen to show useful information Firefox and uBlock get installed faster to remove the slowdowns and popups.
mdaniel 4y ago
One thing to be cautious of when trying to count browser stats is that the recent releases of Firefox are pretty aggressive about blocking tracking scripts, such as those used by a site like statcounter.com uses to count up browser usage <https://gs.statcounter.com/faq#methodology https://gs.statcounter.com/faq#methodology> I don't know how to solve that problem, since those two outcomes are at odds with one another, but wanted to raise awareness

moonchrome 4y ago

I wonder why not create a ad-free/privacy fork of Chromium. Especially on Mobile, I'd use that for sure. Existing ones have huge strings attached. Mozilla is basically FUBAR at this point.

cycomanic 4y ago
Why is Mozilla fubar? I'd argue it's much less work to get behind Mozilla than trying to maintain a chromium fork.
kmeisthax 4y ago
This exists, it's called Ungoogled Chromium. Removing whatever misfeatures Google adds to Chrome is fairly straightforward. The real danger to having a single codebase for the whole web is spec validation. Most web standards rely on two independent implementations. For newer technologies we could technically count WebKit and Blink as separate, but Gecko was providing an entirely separate codebase that isn't a fork of anything. Remember how WebSQL was basically put out to pasture because it was just SQLite, warts and all, shoved inside the web sandbox? That's the sort of problem we'd rather avoid. Single-implementation standards tend to pick up bugs and misbehaviors from their implementation, since everyone winds up depending on implementation bugs rather than getting them fixed to match spec.
- HWR_14 4y ago
  > Removing whatever misfeatures Google adds to Chrome is fairly straightforward. Yes. But adding back in Manifest v2 isn't. Even MSFT claims that it's too much work for them.
  - NeverFade 4y ago
    IIUC, the only problem with Mv3 is that they disabled the WebRequest API. A fork of Chromium that solves this problem will just have to re-enable the WebRequest API, which seems doable.
    - 4y ago