3 ms·

You know you can donate to it, right? And Mozilla gets 2% of their revenue from donation. People just don't pay for software when free alternative is available.

You know you can donate to it, right? And Mozilla gets 2% of their revenue from donation. People just don't pay for software when free alternative is available. Also if other mozilla products are profitable, then that money will go to firefox as mozilla is non profit company. Edit: Leared that you could only donate to mozilla foundation which is not the same.

fabrice_d 3y ago
You can donate to the Mozilla Foundation, but not to Mozilla Corporation. The foundation owns the corp 100%. Gecko/Firefox developers on payroll are employed by Mozilla Corporation, which pays taxes etc. like any company.
infogulch 3y ago
Actually you can't. You can donate to the not-for-profit Mozilla Foundation. But Firefox is owned by the for-profit Mozilla Corporation (which itself is wholly owned by the foundation). The Foundation does "other stuff" in addition to directing the Corporation to develop firefox (what exactly? it's not clear to me). It's managed like a single entity, but the org is broken up like this for some #bigcorp reason (taxes, control how profits are allocated, or some such). Not to drag on it, do business however you want, but my point is that you can't directly donate to firefox development because you have no say on how the Foundation allocates its funds. It's a bit complicated so I drew up a little diagram: 1. Mozilla Foundation (not for profit) <- Donations accepted here ├── 2. Mozilla Corporation (for profit, wholly owned by the foundation so all profit goes to the foundation) X- No donations │ └── 3. Firefox X- No donations └── 4. Other social causes (??? it's not clear) At least, that's how I understand it. Honestly I'm super curious about what the benefits of this kind of org structure are, and what objectives they optimize for. This org structure is clearly not an accident...
- patmorgan23 3y ago
  Maybe it's something around them charging Google to be the default search engine. If that kind of activity would endanger the non-profit status I could see them creating a wholly owned "for-profit" subsidiary to protect the tax status of the rest of the organization.
- sen_armstrong 3y ago
  pkill Mozilla sadly apt in that nothing can adopt

fabrice_d 3y ago

You can donate to the Mozilla Foundation, but not to Mozilla Corporation. The foundation owns the corp 100%. Gecko/Firefox developers on payroll are employed by Mozilla Corporation, which pays taxes etc. like any company.

infogulch 3y ago

Actually you can't. You can donate to the not-for-profit Mozilla Foundation. But Firefox is owned by the for-profit Mozilla Corporation (which itself is wholly owned by the foundation). The Foundation does "other stuff" in addition to directing the Corporation to develop firefox (what exactly? it's not clear to me). It's managed like a single entity, but the org is broken up like this for some #bigcorp reason (taxes, control how profits are allocated, or some such). Not to drag on it, do business however you want, but my point is that you can't directly donate to firefox development because you have no say on how the Foundation allocates its funds. It's a bit complicated so I drew up a little diagram: 1. Mozilla Foundation (not for profit) <- Donations accepted here ├── 2. Mozilla Corporation (for profit, wholly owned by the foundation so all profit goes to the foundation) X- No donations │ └── 3. Firefox X- No donations └── 4. Other social causes (??? it's not clear) At least, that's how I understand it. Honestly I'm super curious about what the benefits of this kind of org structure are, and what objectives they optimize for. This org structure is clearly not an accident...

patmorgan23 3y ago
Maybe it's something around them charging Google to be the default search engine. If that kind of activity would endanger the non-profit status I could see them creating a wholly owned "for-profit" subsidiary to protect the tax status of the rest of the organization.
sen_armstrong 3y ago
pkill Mozilla sadly apt in that nothing can adopt