4 ms·

We Must Fight for Firefox

22 points by redbell 3y ago

tortoise_in 3y ago
I have replaced chrome from almost all my devices. In past with 4gb ram devices the Firefox on Android use to lag. But now it's just working with unlock origin. I don't even chrome except webview is stuck with chromium i guess.
nubinetwork 3y ago
> As more and more sites block access to Firefox's rendering engine Citation please
Rastonbury 3y ago
Based on the comments in there Mozilla should push/sell corporate use, I'm not sure if they have it but organization managed browser that is privacy/security focused and has better Dev Tools. Im sure that there are many tech companies that will support FF purely out of principle
- 4oo4 3y ago
  They very well could do this for a company that requires really strict privacy and security, but unfortunately in its current state Firefox doesn't have nearly the corporate sysadmin-friendly tooling that Chrome and especially Edge do. When I was tasked with implementing CIS browser hardening policies at a previous job a few years ago, this was just a matter of enabling some Group Policy template settings for Chrome and Edge, but for Firefox this involved distributing a prefs.js file to all the workstations. In any corporate environment it's very likely going to be point and click Windows admins that are implementing browser standards, who tend to be allergic to anything resembling code and are already used to using GPOs for just about everything. Yes, Firefox does have GPO templates but it's not nearly as rich as Chrome and Edge. Edge has even more GPO templates than does Chrome iirc, Chrome already had a lot to begin with and then Microsoft added even more of their own on top of that. https://github.com/mozilla/policy-templates/blob/v4.11/README.md https://github.com/mozilla/policy-templates/blob/v4.11/READM... https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/deployedge/configure-microsoft-edge https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/deployedge/configure-micro... That alone already puts Firefox at a huge disadvantage for corporate deployment, the other thing that makes it even less attractive, even to companies where privacy/security is a huge requirement (like my previous job) is that Edge is already bundled with the OS, and is one less thing that needs to be manually patched. In high security corporate environments, just keeping things patched is always a huge task so it's very hard to convince someone that they need to put in more work to keep an extra piece of software patched (which is already very difficult considering how frequently browsers are updated). To make things even worse, just about all vendors will only support Chromium-based browsers for whatever SaaS they sell you, so Firefox is a nonstarter for getting support, even if it will work just fine 99.9% of the time. For all these reasons, I lost the battle to keep Firefox around, which is a huge shame because of how much I love it and wanted to fight the Chromium monoculture. So I guess for a corporation to support Firefox despite how much more corporate-friendly the alternatives are, they'd have to reaaaally want to.
pxtail 3y ago
I would gladly pay monthly subscription for Firefox development - but obviously not in current state when it's under Mozilla's curation which itself suffers greatly from infestation.
hammyhavoc 3y ago
The problem with Firefox is the baggage of Mozilla. The problem with forking Firefox is that gaining meaningful traction is difficult. Software is apolitical, but the forces that develop it and use it aren't. A lot of users are very militant about ideology rather than technology, but equally, Mozilla makes stupid decision after stupid decision.
- mr_woozy 3y ago
  [dead]
- paulryanrogers 3y ago
  What Mozilla decisions have disqualified using Firefox, for you? How do they compare to decisions of Firefox competitors?
  - hammyhavoc 3y ago
    In-browser Disney ads in partnership with Disney. Killing the RSS reader, which was awesome. Mozilla Corp's CEO compensation is disproportionate to the value generated and users lost. Treading water on low-hanging fruit for what a web browser needs to do. Lack of focus on problem-solving browser-related issues. Political activism is a double standard, particularly regarding censorship. OOBE isn't privacy-centric. The privacy focus is largely a LARP. Woeful Android app. I could go on.
    - paulryanrogers 3y ago
      How does the competition fare in comparison?
      - hammyhavoc 3y ago
        Some have superior privacy, others have worse. Everything worth speaking of has better performance, better Android app et al. Mozilla are a shadow of their former selves, as is Firefox. The browser wars are over, they aren't a sexy thing, most people prefer apps for their centralized services instead. There's not much money to be made in being a second-rate browser whose users choose it because "it's better than using Google because it isn't Google derp", meanwhile Google are responsible for the majority of its revenue with the search partnership. It's lip service. Google pays them money so they appear to have less of a monopoly on browsers, Mozilla takes the cash, telling the public they deeply care about making a good browser and care about privacy and related digital issues like intellectual property—whilst delivering jackshit of actual meaningful substance. AI is the next war. Is Google even prepared for the impact it'll have on search and their advertising model? Will AI make browsers and traditional search irrelevant for most consumers? Apps and centralization already put a pretty big dent in it.
ranguna 3y ago
I've been using librewolf on desktop and mull on android for around a year now and it has been great! Occasionally I have to switch to Firefox because some websites hard code agents and flag librewolf as not being Firefox, but that's rare and far apart. I also have to switch to chrome because of a few "chrome only" features like webgpu usb api etc. All in all, it feels like I can stick with librewolf and mull 95% of the time with minimum hassle when switching, which gives me peace of mind compared to 0%.

22 points by redbell 3y ago

I have replaced chrome from almost all my devices. In past with 4gb ram devices the Firefox on Android use to lag. But now it's just working with unlock origin. I don't even chrome except webview is stuck with chromium i guess.

nubinetwork 3y ago

> As more and more sites block access to Firefox's rendering engine Citation please

Rastonbury 3y ago

Based on the comments in there Mozilla should push/sell corporate use, I'm not sure if they have it but organization managed browser that is privacy/security focused and has better Dev Tools. Im sure that there are many tech companies that will support FF purely out of principle

4oo4 3y ago
They very well could do this for a company that requires really strict privacy and security, but unfortunately in its current state Firefox doesn't have nearly the corporate sysadmin-friendly tooling that Chrome and especially Edge do. When I was tasked with implementing CIS browser hardening policies at a previous job a few years ago, this was just a matter of enabling some Group Policy template settings for Chrome and Edge, but for Firefox this involved distributing a prefs.js file to all the workstations. In any corporate environment it's very likely going to be point and click Windows admins that are implementing browser standards, who tend to be allergic to anything resembling code and are already used to using GPOs for just about everything. Yes, Firefox does have GPO templates but it's not nearly as rich as Chrome and Edge. Edge has even more GPO templates than does Chrome iirc, Chrome already had a lot to begin with and then Microsoft added even more of their own on top of that. https://github.com/mozilla/policy-templates/blob/v4.11/README.md https://github.com/mozilla/policy-templates/blob/v4.11/READM... https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/deployedge/configure-microsoft-edge https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/deployedge/configure-micro... That alone already puts Firefox at a huge disadvantage for corporate deployment, the other thing that makes it even less attractive, even to companies where privacy/security is a huge requirement (like my previous job) is that Edge is already bundled with the OS, and is one less thing that needs to be manually patched. In high security corporate environments, just keeping things patched is always a huge task so it's very hard to convince someone that they need to put in more work to keep an extra piece of software patched (which is already very difficult considering how frequently browsers are updated). To make things even worse, just about all vendors will only support Chromium-based browsers for whatever SaaS they sell you, so Firefox is a nonstarter for getting support, even if it will work just fine 99.9% of the time. For all these reasons, I lost the battle to keep Firefox around, which is a huge shame because of how much I love it and wanted to fight the Chromium monoculture. So I guess for a corporation to support Firefox despite how much more corporate-friendly the alternatives are, they'd have to reaaaally want to.

pxtail 3y ago

I would gladly pay monthly subscription for Firefox development - but obviously not in current state when it's under Mozilla's curation which itself suffers greatly from infestation.

hammyhavoc 3y ago

The problem with Firefox is the baggage of Mozilla. The problem with forking Firefox is that gaining meaningful traction is difficult. Software is apolitical, but the forces that develop it and use it aren't. A lot of users are very militant about ideology rather than technology, but equally, Mozilla makes stupid decision after stupid decision.

mr_woozy 3y ago
[dead]
paulryanrogers 3y ago
What Mozilla decisions have disqualified using Firefox, for you? How do they compare to decisions of Firefox competitors?
- hammyhavoc 3y ago
  In-browser Disney ads in partnership with Disney. Killing the RSS reader, which was awesome. Mozilla Corp's CEO compensation is disproportionate to the value generated and users lost. Treading water on low-hanging fruit for what a web browser needs to do. Lack of focus on problem-solving browser-related issues. Political activism is a double standard, particularly regarding censorship. OOBE isn't privacy-centric. The privacy focus is largely a LARP. Woeful Android app. I could go on.
  - paulryanrogers 3y ago
    How does the competition fare in comparison?
    - hammyhavoc 3y ago
      Some have superior privacy, others have worse. Everything worth speaking of has better performance, better Android app et al. Mozilla are a shadow of their former selves, as is Firefox. The browser wars are over, they aren't a sexy thing, most people prefer apps for their centralized services instead. There's not much money to be made in being a second-rate browser whose users choose it because "it's better than using Google because it isn't Google derp", meanwhile Google are responsible for the majority of its revenue with the search partnership. It's lip service. Google pays them money so they appear to have less of a monopoly on browsers, Mozilla takes the cash, telling the public they deeply care about making a good browser and care about privacy and related digital issues like intellectual property—whilst delivering jackshit of actual meaningful substance. AI is the next war. Is Google even prepared for the impact it'll have on search and their advertising model? Will AI make browsers and traditional search irrelevant for most consumers? Apps and centralization already put a pretty big dent in it.

ranguna 3y ago

I've been using librewolf on desktop and mull on android for around a year now and it has been great! Occasionally I have to switch to Firefox because some websites hard code agents and flag librewolf as not being Firefox, but that's rare and far apart. I also have to switch to chrome because of a few "chrome only" features like webgpu usb api etc. All in all, it feels like I can stick with librewolf and mull 95% of the time with minimum hassle when switching, which gives me peace of mind compared to 0%.