4 ms·

I bet something similar is going to happen sooner than later. But what is stopping Facebook from forking Chromium(/Webkit) for their own use? Or for that matte

by amitamb 14y ago

I bet something similar is going to happen sooner than later. But what is stopping Facebook from forking Chromium(/Webkit) for their own use? Or for that matter even Mozilla might be open for partnership.

deno 14y ago
With Chrome Google added some real value to Webkit (V8, sandboxing, etc.), and in the process they created a unique product. Just forking Chromium will make it look like Oracle’s Unbreakable Enterprise Linux, i.e. a cheap knockoff of Redhat. If Facebook wants to enter the game they need something more. At that point doing new frontend for Webkit from scratch is probably not going to be any cheaper than buying Opera. And they’d need to hire people to do that, which buying Opera would also solve.
- krrrh 14y ago
  > At that point doing new frontend for Webkit from scratch is probably not going to be any cheaper than buying Opera The article notes that Opera's current estimated market cap is $670M, which is a lot of money for a browser frontend. I think it's more likely that they want to lock-in the feature phone user base.
  - Aqwis 14y ago
    It's not just a browser front-end, it's also a browser engine. If they acquired Opera and pushed it to increase its market share Facebook could gain a lot of influence on HTML and the adoption of web technologies.
    - gcp 14y ago
      This would actually be an awesome outcome. A bigger Opera marketshare, particularly if they eat into Webkit's, would mean that there will be stronger pressure to keep web development standards compliant. I'm not sure it would promote the standards itself faster though. At least the WebKit side (Apple, Google), has like the exact opposite incentives for that to happen. The Facebook-Opera push would have to be quite hard.
    - m_for_monkey 14y ago
      And even more: a first-class, very innovative developer team. How many now common browser features originate from Opera?
      - jarek 14y ago
        For those not familiar: tabbed browsing (complete with closed page history and undo), whole page zoom, a search engine search bar (and then address bar searching), a download manager, middle click to open in new tab, speed dial/"top sites" for quick navigation in new tabs, and restoring open pages/tabs after the browser has closed or crashed are some of the features "Opera had first."
        cwzwarich 14y ago
        NetCaptor had tabs before Opera, and that probably wasn't the first browser to have tabs either.
  - duaneb 14y ago
    That's chump change compared to doing it in house, especially with the IPO in FB's pocket. Also, I wasn't even aware that opera ran on phones, so it doesn't strike me as something they care about, unless they're looking at 3rd-world countries.
    - ks 14y ago
      According to this article Opera Mini has 169 million users. http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/29/opera-mini-now-has-169-million-users-56-of-them-only-use-the-mobile-web/ http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/29/opera-mini-now-has-169-mill... Considering that many of the users only access the Internet via their mobile devices I think Facebook would care about them.
      - duaneb 14y ago
        > many of the users only access the Internet via their mobile devices Do you have a source for that? I'm finding it a little hard to believe, especially since getting a cheap computer + internet for two years is (much) less expensive than a phone + wireless. Granted, I'm in the US, which is probably very different from the demographics in Opera Mini's user base.
        ks 14y ago
        > Do you have a source for that? The article I linked says the following: "The study, which was conducted between November 2010 and November 2011, found that globally, 56% of Opera users and 43% of those who use another browser only access the Internet via their mobile devices. In some countries, including Egypt (72%), Bangladesh (69%), Brazil (65%) and South Africa (61%), these numbers for Opera users are significantly higher." > Granted, I'm in the US, which is probably very different from the demographics in Opera Mini's user base. I can only speculate to why they prefer using a mobile, but I think that the infrastructure is so different from our countries that we shouldn't necessarily base our assumptions on what we would have done.
robin_reala 14y ago
Doesn’t appear that Facebook think much of Webkit: https://www.facebook.com/unsupportedbrowser https://www.facebook.com/unsupportedbrowser
gcp 14y ago
Or for that matter even Mozilla might be open for partnership. If they buy Opera they can do what they want. Partnering with Mozilla would probably be a more stressful affair as the goals of the Foundation and Facebook probably don't quite align everywhere. It's like the partnership with Google, but even worse.

by amitamb 14y ago

deno 14y ago

With Chrome Google added some real value to Webkit (V8, sandboxing, etc.), and in the process they created a unique product. Just forking Chromium will make it look like Oracle’s Unbreakable Enterprise Linux, i.e. a cheap knockoff of Redhat. If Facebook wants to enter the game they need something more. At that point doing new frontend for Webkit from scratch is probably not going to be any cheaper than buying Opera. And they’d need to hire people to do that, which buying Opera would also solve.

krrrh 14y ago
> At that point doing new frontend for Webkit from scratch is probably not going to be any cheaper than buying Opera The article notes that Opera's current estimated market cap is $670M, which is a lot of money for a browser frontend. I think it's more likely that they want to lock-in the feature phone user base.
- Aqwis 14y ago
  It's not just a browser front-end, it's also a browser engine. If they acquired Opera and pushed it to increase its market share Facebook could gain a lot of influence on HTML and the adoption of web technologies.
  - gcp 14y ago
    This would actually be an awesome outcome. A bigger Opera marketshare, particularly if they eat into Webkit's, would mean that there will be stronger pressure to keep web development standards compliant. I'm not sure it would promote the standards itself faster though. At least the WebKit side (Apple, Google), has like the exact opposite incentives for that to happen. The Facebook-Opera push would have to be quite hard.
  - m_for_monkey 14y ago
    And even more: a first-class, very innovative developer team. How many now common browser features originate from Opera?
    - jarek 14y ago
      For those not familiar: tabbed browsing (complete with closed page history and undo), whole page zoom, a search engine search bar (and then address bar searching), a download manager, middle click to open in new tab, speed dial/"top sites" for quick navigation in new tabs, and restoring open pages/tabs after the browser has closed or crashed are some of the features "Opera had first."
      - cwzwarich 14y ago
        NetCaptor had tabs before Opera, and that probably wasn't the first browser to have tabs either.
- duaneb 14y ago
  That's chump change compared to doing it in house, especially with the IPO in FB's pocket. Also, I wasn't even aware that opera ran on phones, so it doesn't strike me as something they care about, unless they're looking at 3rd-world countries.
  - ks 14y ago
    According to this article Opera Mini has 169 million users. http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/29/opera-mini-now-has-169-million-users-56-of-them-only-use-the-mobile-web/ http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/29/opera-mini-now-has-169-mill... Considering that many of the users only access the Internet via their mobile devices I think Facebook would care about them.
    - duaneb 14y ago
      > many of the users only access the Internet via their mobile devices Do you have a source for that? I'm finding it a little hard to believe, especially since getting a cheap computer + internet for two years is (much) less expensive than a phone + wireless. Granted, I'm in the US, which is probably very different from the demographics in Opera Mini's user base.
      - ks 14y ago
        > Do you have a source for that? The article I linked says the following: "The study, which was conducted between November 2010 and November 2011, found that globally, 56% of Opera users and 43% of those who use another browser only access the Internet via their mobile devices. In some countries, including Egypt (72%), Bangladesh (69%), Brazil (65%) and South Africa (61%), these numbers for Opera users are significantly higher." > Granted, I'm in the US, which is probably very different from the demographics in Opera Mini's user base. I can only speculate to why they prefer using a mobile, but I think that the infrastructure is so different from our countries that we shouldn't necessarily base our assumptions on what we would have done.

robin_reala 14y ago

Doesn’t appear that Facebook think much of Webkit: https://www.facebook.com/unsupportedbrowser https://www.facebook.com/unsupportedbrowser

gcp 14y ago

Or for that matter even Mozilla might be open for partnership. If they buy Opera they can do what they want. Partnering with Mozilla would probably be a more stressful affair as the goals of the Foundation and Facebook probably don't quite align everywhere. It's like the partnership with Google, but even worse.