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I used to refuse Chromium for the Same reason. But honestly it already happened, Firefox is already irrelevant. Mozilla is mis-managed organization that is fu

I used to refuse Chromium for the Same reason. But honestly it already happened, Firefox is already irrelevant. Mozilla is mis-managed organization that is funded to avoid anti-trust investigations, they dont fully push for privacy because they are afraid of google, do out of touch changes, and focus on political advocacy. Compare that to brave, which builds its own independent search engine, ad network, and has privacy by default in its products. There is no hope that Mozilla and Firefox will change the status-quo anytime soon, Firefox is losing users at crazy rate, and Mozilla is absolutely failing to do anything to change Firefox's destiny towards irrelevance. Brave is almost everything Mozilla should've been. Actually do what they sey, no hidden google analytics in their products, no unique ID for each installer downloaded, push for privacy by default and independence from big tech, not being shy from google, because they are their only income. I would argue, that if Mozilla wants to turn its course around with their "limited resources" it should drop gecko, and anything irrelevant to the users experience. Fork Chromium, the best web engine out there by a mile, and remove any anti-privacy / anticompetitive code, while still taking advantage of the huge development resources directed to chromium from many parties, and maybe Mozilla can also influence Chromium's development. Start pushing privacy by default, its the reason brave is gaining users at such a rapid pace, its a browser I recommend to everyone, as just by installing it they already are much more private than with chrome. What matters is the users experience, its why brave is growing.

ravenstine 4y ago
I totally agree that Mozilla is mismanaged, but I'll still take a mismanaged and politicized Mozilla over a tentacle of The Google any day. And that's precisely why I use Firefox. In response to the comment you were responding to, I don't know why anyone should care about how relevant Firefox is. For every browser someone invents, there will be someone claiming how bad it is from a security standpoint because reasons. Whatever. I can't keep changing browsers every time someone on HN says my browser is flawed or that the company behind it sucks. Unless things have changed, there are things about Firefox that I want that Chromium doesn't have. Can I disable history entirely in Chrome? Last time I looked, nope. Can I have multi-account containers? Nope. Can I block autoplaying videos? Nope. Can my ad-blocking not be nerfed? Nope. Can I not have the settings flags get taken away so frequently? Nope. I'm sure there's other things as well. If Brave went the road of completely relying on its own browser engine or a fork of Chromium, I'd be all in. The longer Brave is around, the more likely I might make the switch. Another reason I don't want to leave Firefox is I've seen plenty of new and hip web browsers come and go.
- jacooper 4y ago
  > Unless things have changed, there are things about Firefox that I want that Chromium doesn't have.vCan I disable history entirely in Chrome? Last time I looked, nope. Can I have multi-account containers? Nope. Can I block autoplaying videos? Nope. Can my ad-blocking not be nerfed? Nope. Can I not have the settings flags get taken away so frequently? Nope. I'm sure there's other things as well. > Can I disable history entirely in Chrome? on brave, you can make it completely remove the browser history on every start. > Can I have multi-account containers? I agree, its a great feature of Firefox, the closet thing on chromium is multi profile windows > Can I block autoplaying videos? I think brave does this by default, not sure though. > Can my ad-blocking not be nerfed? Brave shields is based on ublock origin, and its a part of the browser, not limited by any extension API. > Can I not have the settings flags get taken away so frequently? Im not sure you can say this is am advantage of Firefox after the many settings they removed.
  - ravenstine 4y ago
    > on brave, you can make it completely remove the browser history on every start. I guess that's fine, but what I want is no browser history at all except for back-forward navigation purposes. In Firefox, there's an about:config flag that completely turns off history when set to false. Not sure which one. The effect is that nothing ever shows up in History or History > All History, with the exception of the Recently Closed Tabs section, and the URL bar autocomplete doesn't reference anything that you've navigated away from. Not that I'm doing anything bad on the internet, but what I found is not holding info about history in memory or on disk made things a little snappier and I just prefer what I do to be ephemeral unless otherwise opted in to. And yeah, I know that cookies and local storage are a thing, but that's really not the point. > Brave shields is based on ublock origin, and its a part of the browser, not limited by any extension API. Nice, I didn't know that. > Im not sure you can say this is am advantage of Firefox after many settings theg removed. Yeah, Firefox has a similar problem but my perception is it happens less often than with Chromium/Chrome.
- axolotlgod 4y ago
  I agree. There are enough substantial features in Firefox that push it over the top for me. For one, scrolling is just so much better than in any Chrome browsers, which I have noticed tend to drop frames and lag, regardless of the machine. Is it extreme? No, but for me, it is noticeable and Firefox just has that silky smooth scroll feeling. Another big one is Manifest v3. I think Google may alienate a minority of their audience when it is implemented in January, and Firefox may see a bump in users. Having a kick-ass ad blocker like uBlock Origin work robustly will be a selling point for some people. Another one I see people don't often mention is design. I may be in the minority of hardcore Firefox users, but I really have enjoyed the redesigns, and Firefox is still customizable enough for me to feel some joy using it. Overall, Mozilla is definitely mismanaging and leadership needs to be turned over, but the browser is still in a good spot. If things turn around, I could see it becoming more and more popular.
deleted 4y ago
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alwillis 4y ago
Couldn’t agree more. Nice job re: analysis of the situation.

ravenstine 4y ago

I totally agree that Mozilla is mismanaged, but I'll still take a mismanaged and politicized Mozilla over a tentacle of The Google any day. And that's precisely why I use Firefox. In response to the comment you were responding to, I don't know why anyone should care about how relevant Firefox is. For every browser someone invents, there will be someone claiming how bad it is from a security standpoint because reasons. Whatever. I can't keep changing browsers every time someone on HN says my browser is flawed or that the company behind it sucks. Unless things have changed, there are things about Firefox that I want that Chromium doesn't have. Can I disable history entirely in Chrome? Last time I looked, nope. Can I have multi-account containers? Nope. Can I block autoplaying videos? Nope. Can my ad-blocking not be nerfed? Nope. Can I not have the settings flags get taken away so frequently? Nope. I'm sure there's other things as well. If Brave went the road of completely relying on its own browser engine or a fork of Chromium, I'd be all in. The longer Brave is around, the more likely I might make the switch. Another reason I don't want to leave Firefox is I've seen plenty of new and hip web browsers come and go.

jacooper 4y ago
> Unless things have changed, there are things about Firefox that I want that Chromium doesn't have.vCan I disable history entirely in Chrome? Last time I looked, nope. Can I have multi-account containers? Nope. Can I block autoplaying videos? Nope. Can my ad-blocking not be nerfed? Nope. Can I not have the settings flags get taken away so frequently? Nope. I'm sure there's other things as well. > Can I disable history entirely in Chrome? on brave, you can make it completely remove the browser history on every start. > Can I have multi-account containers? I agree, its a great feature of Firefox, the closet thing on chromium is multi profile windows > Can I block autoplaying videos? I think brave does this by default, not sure though. > Can my ad-blocking not be nerfed? Brave shields is based on ublock origin, and its a part of the browser, not limited by any extension API. > Can I not have the settings flags get taken away so frequently? Im not sure you can say this is am advantage of Firefox after the many settings they removed.
- ravenstine 4y ago
  > on brave, you can make it completely remove the browser history on every start. I guess that's fine, but what I want is no browser history at all except for back-forward navigation purposes. In Firefox, there's an about:config flag that completely turns off history when set to false. Not sure which one. The effect is that nothing ever shows up in History or History > All History, with the exception of the Recently Closed Tabs section, and the URL bar autocomplete doesn't reference anything that you've navigated away from. Not that I'm doing anything bad on the internet, but what I found is not holding info about history in memory or on disk made things a little snappier and I just prefer what I do to be ephemeral unless otherwise opted in to. And yeah, I know that cookies and local storage are a thing, but that's really not the point. > Brave shields is based on ublock origin, and its a part of the browser, not limited by any extension API. Nice, I didn't know that. > Im not sure you can say this is am advantage of Firefox after many settings theg removed. Yeah, Firefox has a similar problem but my perception is it happens less often than with Chromium/Chrome.
axolotlgod 4y ago
I agree. There are enough substantial features in Firefox that push it over the top for me. For one, scrolling is just so much better than in any Chrome browsers, which I have noticed tend to drop frames and lag, regardless of the machine. Is it extreme? No, but for me, it is noticeable and Firefox just has that silky smooth scroll feeling. Another big one is Manifest v3. I think Google may alienate a minority of their audience when it is implemented in January, and Firefox may see a bump in users. Having a kick-ass ad blocker like uBlock Origin work robustly will be a selling point for some people. Another one I see people don't often mention is design. I may be in the minority of hardcore Firefox users, but I really have enjoyed the redesigns, and Firefox is still customizable enough for me to feel some joy using it. Overall, Mozilla is definitely mismanaging and leadership needs to be turned over, but the browser is still in a good spot. If things turn around, I could see it becoming more and more popular.

deleted 4y ago

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alwillis 4y ago

Couldn’t agree more. Nice job re: analysis of the situation.