5 ms·

> Why aren't we collectively putting our time/effort etc.. into making Firefox the singular and best FOSS browser ever? Because the leadership is hellbent on c

> Why aren't we collectively putting our time/effort etc.. into making Firefox the singular and best FOSS browser ever? Because the leadership is hellbent on copying Chrome but worse and investing in utterly pointless endeavors instead of making a good browser. It's a shame. Giving money to the Mozilla Foundation is the same as throwing it to a black hole. I hope a new truly FOSS browser shows up and catches on that does not use Blink and isn't owned by a group of human-shaped leeches.

AndrewKemendo 3y ago
>Because the leadership is hellbent on copying Chrome but worse and investing in utterly pointless endeavors instead of making a good browser. Is this a hypothesis that we can specify and test? Is this how we would approach this problem? It sounds more like a cynical write-off, not a actual strategy >I hope a new truly FOSS browser shows up and catches on that does not use Blink and isn't owned by a group of human-shaped leeches Cool, but that strategy clearly isn't working. I'm suggesting, instead of writing off Firefox, we (you specifically, and me and whomever else wants to) start engaging with Mozilla to help figure this stuff out Nothing is perfect, but at least it's got some of the hardest parts right: Organizational momentum and distribution. Technical stuff is easy to change compared to that. The challenge now is finding competent people who can actually put the effort in, with no compensation, to make it work and that might take convincing the Mozilla folks to do something differently. Having done this kind of thing a few times, that sounds way easier than trying to totally start over from scratch though.
- sirwhinesalot 3y ago
  > Is this a hypothesis that we can specify and test? Is this how we would approach this problem? It sounds more like a cynical write-off, not a actual strategy There is nothing to test, it's why I stopped using Firefox. Check the Mozilla foundation page for all the crap they fund instead of the browser. Look how much the UI looks like Chrome, even little things like clicking the searchbar expanding it outside its bounds. > I'm suggesting, instead of writing off Firefox, we (you specifically, and me and whomever else wants to) start engaging with Mozilla to help figure this stuff out They don't listen to feedback. When Apple (the company known for telling people they were holding their phones wrong) introduced the safari tab-redesign that merged tabs with the searchbar, it was nearly universally disliked and they backtracked on the change. Apple of all companies backtracked on a bad design. Mozilla? They just keep on going. When Nintendo was struggling due to the failure of the Wii U, Satoru Iwata took on a massive pay cut to avoid firing people. Mozilla? Fired the Servo team and raised executive compensation. > In 2020 Mozilla announced it would cut 25% of its worldwide staff of nearly 1,000 to reduce costs. Firefox has fallen from 30% market share to 4% in 10 years. Despite this, executive pay increased 400%, with Mitchell Baker, Mozilla’s top executive, receiving $2.4m in 2018.
  - tedivm 3y ago
    Firing the Servo team was probably the dumbest thing they could have done.
  - kyleee 3y ago
    Yep, they’d need to fire Baker to right the ship at this point, among other things
    - wolpoli 3y ago
      Under section 3.5 of the Mozilla foundation Bylaws [1], Baker could be removed by the board, which consists of Mitchell Baker, Brian Behlendorf, Helen Turvey, Nicole Wong, Amy Keating, and Mark Surman [2]. Note that the directors are elected by the directors in the first place so sadly, it is unlikely to happen. [1]: https://static.mozilla.com/foundation/documents/mf-bylaws.pdf https://static.mozilla.com/foundation/documents/mf-bylaws.pd... [2]: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/who-we-are/leadership/ https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/who-we-are/leadership/
  - jjav 3y ago
    > Check the Mozilla foundation page for all the crap they fund instead of the browser. Notwithstanding that, they still put out firefox. And Firefox is a far superior browser to any of the alternatives if you care about user-centric control and privacy. So to anyone who cares even a little about being able about these things, supporting Firefox is the way to go. If a mythical even-better browser shows up, great. But here and now, it's Firefox, or completely surrender the web to commercial interests.
    - the_third_wave 3y ago
      > Notwithstanding that, they still put out firefox Firefox was created by pre-Baker Mozilla which was an organisation focused mostly on - to coopt the terminology used by those who coopted Mozilla later - "software justice". When Eich was ousted (for voicing an opinion he shared with people like Barack Obama [1]) and Baker took his place she set a course towards different goals: Mozilla was going to focus more on social justice because it was not enough to only build software. She clearly did not realise - or did not care - that it was through creating viable open alternatives to proprietary browsers and related software that Mozilla was in fact doing the best it could towards achieving the aim of a more just world. Baker needs to be ousted, she can go lead some NGO somewhere if she wants to fly social justice flags. Let Mozilla be led by those who understand that software freedom is an integral part of freedom of information access and an open internet which are essential to counteract the tendency towards authoritarianism which has plagued society since the dawn of time. [1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/3375059/Barack-Obama-marriage-is-between-a-man-and-a-woman.html https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/33750...
satvikpendem 3y ago
Isn't that because Firefox itself basically makes no money? I know about Google's deal with them but it seems like Mozilla is trying to diversify away from them.
- MikusR 3y ago
  Firefox is the only thing that makes money. The problem is that the money made by Firefox was not invested back into Firefox. As a result market share fell. Less market share leads to less money from search deal.
- thfuran 3y ago
  I'd say it's because it is the nature of bureaucracy to expand. An open source browser doesn't need to make money, but a foundation tends not to maintain an unerring focus on a single specific goal.
- hooverd 3y ago
  The only thing Firefox users hate more than Mozilla taking money from Google is Mozilla making money from other sources. Why can't the Mozilla team just be ascetic hairshirts who make exactly the browser they want and bring XUL back while they're at it. /s
  - sirwhinesalot 3y ago
    The Mozilla Foundation is a non-profit that owns the for-profit Mozilla Corporation. Step 1 is get rid of the for-profit corporation that pays its CEO 2.4 million dollars a year to lose market share. That's 24 well-paid developers, or double that from lower-income countries. The foundation had a revenue of $441 million in 2020. We know that in 2014 ~90% of their revenue come from its search-engine deal with Google. That means that without Google they'd have ~44 million to work with these days (or more). That's a lot of devs, before even considering non-search-engine sources of revenue. Personally I don't mind ideas like the VPN. I do mind the stupid grants the foundation does unrelated to a web-browser or acquisitions like pocket.
    - 3y ago
anotherhue 3y ago
https://browser.kagi.com/ https://browser.kagi.com/
- sirwhinesalot 3y ago
  Once it supports other platforms it can definitely be a good alternative!
- antiframe 3y ago
  It doesn't have any builds for any open OS.
- AndrewKemendo 3y ago
  I just donated $5.65 so, that's something
kdmccormick 3y ago
Just curious, would you need something completely new to show up, or would a well-funded, openly-governed fork of Firefox work?
- sirwhinesalot 3y ago
  Firefox (the underlying tech) is fine, the problem is the management. Fork away.
_y5hn 3y ago
Firefox have no way to support Tab Groups like any Chrome does by default. So is a no-go for me. Any suggestion that Firefox do support Tab Groups will be met with ridicule. It just doesn't.

AndrewKemendo 3y ago

>Because the leadership is hellbent on copying Chrome but worse and investing in utterly pointless endeavors instead of making a good browser. Is this a hypothesis that we can specify and test? Is this how we would approach this problem? It sounds more like a cynical write-off, not a actual strategy >I hope a new truly FOSS browser shows up and catches on that does not use Blink and isn't owned by a group of human-shaped leeches Cool, but that strategy clearly isn't working. I'm suggesting, instead of writing off Firefox, we (you specifically, and me and whomever else wants to) start engaging with Mozilla to help figure this stuff out Nothing is perfect, but at least it's got some of the hardest parts right: Organizational momentum and distribution. Technical stuff is easy to change compared to that. The challenge now is finding competent people who can actually put the effort in, with no compensation, to make it work and that might take convincing the Mozilla folks to do something differently. Having done this kind of thing a few times, that sounds way easier than trying to totally start over from scratch though.

sirwhinesalot 3y ago
> Is this a hypothesis that we can specify and test? Is this how we would approach this problem? It sounds more like a cynical write-off, not a actual strategy There is nothing to test, it's why I stopped using Firefox. Check the Mozilla foundation page for all the crap they fund instead of the browser. Look how much the UI looks like Chrome, even little things like clicking the searchbar expanding it outside its bounds. > I'm suggesting, instead of writing off Firefox, we (you specifically, and me and whomever else wants to) start engaging with Mozilla to help figure this stuff out They don't listen to feedback. When Apple (the company known for telling people they were holding their phones wrong) introduced the safari tab-redesign that merged tabs with the searchbar, it was nearly universally disliked and they backtracked on the change. Apple of all companies backtracked on a bad design. Mozilla? They just keep on going. When Nintendo was struggling due to the failure of the Wii U, Satoru Iwata took on a massive pay cut to avoid firing people. Mozilla? Fired the Servo team and raised executive compensation. > In 2020 Mozilla announced it would cut 25% of its worldwide staff of nearly 1,000 to reduce costs. Firefox has fallen from 30% market share to 4% in 10 years. Despite this, executive pay increased 400%, with Mitchell Baker, Mozilla’s top executive, receiving $2.4m in 2018.
- tedivm 3y ago
  Firing the Servo team was probably the dumbest thing they could have done.
- kyleee 3y ago
  Yep, they’d need to fire Baker to right the ship at this point, among other things
  - wolpoli 3y ago
    Under section 3.5 of the Mozilla foundation Bylaws [1], Baker could be removed by the board, which consists of Mitchell Baker, Brian Behlendorf, Helen Turvey, Nicole Wong, Amy Keating, and Mark Surman [2]. Note that the directors are elected by the directors in the first place so sadly, it is unlikely to happen. [1]: https://static.mozilla.com/foundation/documents/mf-bylaws.pdf https://static.mozilla.com/foundation/documents/mf-bylaws.pd... [2]: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/who-we-are/leadership/ https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/who-we-are/leadership/
- jjav 3y ago
  > Check the Mozilla foundation page for all the crap they fund instead of the browser. Notwithstanding that, they still put out firefox. And Firefox is a far superior browser to any of the alternatives if you care about user-centric control and privacy. So to anyone who cares even a little about being able about these things, supporting Firefox is the way to go. If a mythical even-better browser shows up, great. But here and now, it's Firefox, or completely surrender the web to commercial interests.
  - the_third_wave 3y ago
    > Notwithstanding that, they still put out firefox Firefox was created by pre-Baker Mozilla which was an organisation focused mostly on - to coopt the terminology used by those who coopted Mozilla later - "software justice". When Eich was ousted (for voicing an opinion he shared with people like Barack Obama [1]) and Baker took his place she set a course towards different goals: Mozilla was going to focus more on social justice because it was not enough to only build software. She clearly did not realise - or did not care - that it was through creating viable open alternatives to proprietary browsers and related software that Mozilla was in fact doing the best it could towards achieving the aim of a more just world. Baker needs to be ousted, she can go lead some NGO somewhere if she wants to fly social justice flags. Let Mozilla be led by those who understand that software freedom is an integral part of freedom of information access and an open internet which are essential to counteract the tendency towards authoritarianism which has plagued society since the dawn of time. [1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/3375059/Barack-Obama-marriage-is-between-a-man-and-a-woman.html https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/33750...

satvikpendem 3y ago

Isn't that because Firefox itself basically makes no money? I know about Google's deal with them but it seems like Mozilla is trying to diversify away from them.

MikusR 3y ago
Firefox is the only thing that makes money. The problem is that the money made by Firefox was not invested back into Firefox. As a result market share fell. Less market share leads to less money from search deal.
thfuran 3y ago
I'd say it's because it is the nature of bureaucracy to expand. An open source browser doesn't need to make money, but a foundation tends not to maintain an unerring focus on a single specific goal.
hooverd 3y ago
The only thing Firefox users hate more than Mozilla taking money from Google is Mozilla making money from other sources. Why can't the Mozilla team just be ascetic hairshirts who make exactly the browser they want and bring XUL back while they're at it. /s
- sirwhinesalot 3y ago
  The Mozilla Foundation is a non-profit that owns the for-profit Mozilla Corporation. Step 1 is get rid of the for-profit corporation that pays its CEO 2.4 million dollars a year to lose market share. That's 24 well-paid developers, or double that from lower-income countries. The foundation had a revenue of $441 million in 2020. We know that in 2014 ~90% of their revenue come from its search-engine deal with Google. That means that without Google they'd have ~44 million to work with these days (or more). That's a lot of devs, before even considering non-search-engine sources of revenue. Personally I don't mind ideas like the VPN. I do mind the stupid grants the foundation does unrelated to a web-browser or acquisitions like pocket.
  - 3y ago

anotherhue 3y ago

https://browser.kagi.com/ https://browser.kagi.com/

sirwhinesalot 3y ago
Once it supports other platforms it can definitely be a good alternative!
antiframe 3y ago
It doesn't have any builds for any open OS.
AndrewKemendo 3y ago
I just donated $5.65 so, that's something

kdmccormick 3y ago

Just curious, would you need something completely new to show up, or would a well-funded, openly-governed fork of Firefox work?

sirwhinesalot 3y ago
Firefox (the underlying tech) is fine, the problem is the management. Fork away.

_y5hn 3y ago

Firefox have no way to support Tab Groups like any Chrome does by default. So is a no-go for me. Any suggestion that Firefox do support Tab Groups will be met with ridicule. It just doesn't.