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> If they do, what incentive does Google have to keep maintaining Chromium? I agree, this is a problem, but there should be a trivial solution: Users of the br

by xp84 2y ago

> If they do, what incentive does Google have to keep maintaining Chromium? I agree, this is a problem, but there should be a trivial solution: Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day. This money should go into paying to maintain it. Anything else is perpetuating the Trash Web as it's come to be. The only reason a "web browser" is "free" (as in beer) is because Microsoft in the 90s was (belatedly) very worried about a world where Netscape held a lot of power, and realized making and giving away a slightly better browser would neutralize this upstart. Everything flowed from that one tactical decision by a couple of execs at MS. I'd argue that a browser should be a part of the OS or be a paid product, but funding it with ad money from under the same corporate umbrella is a gross practice which promotes things like... Google nerfing adblocker plugins, and Google trying to kill cookies in favor of something only they control. (Although on that last one, by some miracle their hand was stayed and they backed down.) Of course the DOJ can't ban the idea of a browser funded by ad money (and most are) but separating it from the other side of the business which should have zero say in how it's implemented, that's common sense to me.

DaiPlusPlus 2y ago
Netscape was free for non-business users before Internet Explorer existed. Netscape was competing with Mosaic, which was free, what with being a product of the NCSA (hence “Mozilla = Mosaic Killer”).
anon-3988 2y ago
> Anything else is perpetuating the Trash Web as it's come to be. unless you ban "Free" products, this is going to keep happening. People seems to think that just because something is "Free" it must therefore cost nothing to make. I mean, downloading Chrome takes 2 minutes max and seems trivial to me? Whats the problem? People think Youtube should just allow them to watch videos without any ads nor paying any money. Clearly, the consumer is not rational.
- portaouflop 2y ago
  Right but companies are perfectly rational actors /s
- throwinothrside 2y ago
  Android shares my location more than 14 times a day IIRC. They snoop through every single thing in my life. I can list a bizillion no. Of things. Zero damn given when they are horrible. Let them stop with dark patterns. Then I will start caring. I pay for all my games, all good services which ainuse. I try and donate to open source project wherever and when I can. But I couldnt care less about FAANG like companies. If they want us to be good to them, let them be good first. Hell, its just the other day we were talking about Youtube showing ads to paying customers. I really dont care whether a company is big or small. When companies are bad, they just are. That is it. I dont lose sleep over using FreeTube for watching youtube videos for free. Paying will solve issues, yeah right! Edit: Language
graemep 2y ago
> The only reason a "web browser" is "free" (as in beer) is because Microsoft in the 90s was (belatedly) very worried about a world where Netscape held a lot of power, and realized making and giving away a slightly better browser would neutralize this upstart. Everything flowed from that one tactical decision by a couple of execs at MS. There were free as in beer browsers before IE (although many were free for non-commercial use only). Chromium is a fork (well, a fork of a fork) of a FOSS browser specifically developed to be a FOSS browser for FOSS OSes (primarily Linux).
Numerlor 2y ago
> Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day How do you do this for something that's a basic necessity at this point? There must be a free browser because so many services depend on their user having access to them through one, and browsers aren't in the category of product where you can provide users a basic browser without features and then selling them a better version. If it's not Chrome that's free, any other free issue would inevitably run into the same issue. If not bankrolled by a company, browsers would need to be government funded
- hk__2 2y ago
  > How do you do this for something that's a basic necessity at this point? The response is further in OP’s comment: > I'd argue that a browser should be a part of the OS or be a paid product
  - Numerlor 2y ago
    Part of the OS is basically free and the same situation as Chrome, and you can't do paid because basic necessities are done through the browser
  - creesch 2y ago
    > I'd argue that a browser should be a part of the OS or be a paid product I am getting Microsoft flashbacks now. There is no way that bundling browsers with OSes and making all the others paid will have negative side effects! Oh wait... The 90s just called, it is Netscape and they would like to have a stern word.
- a2800276 2y ago
  > How do you do this for something that's a basic necessity at this point? ... If not bankrolled by a company, browsers would need to be government funded You mean like government funded food, housing, health care and other basic necessities?
  - creesch 2y ago
runeks 2y ago
> I agree, this is a problem, but there should be a trivial solution: Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day. If getting people to pay for stuff they use were trivial then advertising wouldn't be as big as it is.
- HeavyStorm 2y ago
  Yeah, OP is naive. Nobody ever paid for browsers, even before IE was a thing (well, nobody I know...). We also don't pay for open TV which is ad supported. This isn't a single decision that someone madennn it's actually very natural. We don't pay for most of the web, not only browsers. Indirect monetization is great because making a consumer open his/her wallet takes a lot, no matter the price.
  - paulryanrogers 2y ago
    Netscape was sold at Babbages in my local mall. Plenty of people bought it. Just like my father bought Telix and Laplink and earlier communication software. Not knowing anyone who admits to having done something, doesn't mean that thing never happens.
Buttons840 2y ago
Could Chromium be made close source? It's easy to just say "well, a company should charge money for a browser", but a company is free to write their own browser and charge for it right now. Chromium though, is bound by its open-source license and its copyright is owned by thousands of different contributors.
- pbmonster 2y ago
  > Could Chromium be made close source? Sure, it's BSD licensed, all future development could be done closed-source. Note that the name "Chromium" would need to stay with the open source side of the project, so it would be more like a closed fork than a re-licencing. 99% sure you could just keep using the name "Chrome", though, and stop releasing code into chromium instead.
  - Buttons840 2y ago
    So all companies can, right now, make a private fork and start selling it. There's no reason to pay for that right, everyone already has that right. (I'm, of course, speaking in the context of xp84's suggestion that the browser should cost money. It's a fine idea, but I don't see how it applies here.)
    - pbmonster 2y ago
      You're essentially paying for control over the currently dominant web browser. You're paying for the existing Chrome installation base and to skip an absolute hell of a hiring process. Because forking Chromium and continuing development on your own needs over 100 of extremely narrowly specialized experts. If you want your project to remain the currently dominant web browser, you better keep developing APIs people love, you better keep doing it faster than your competition can keep up with implementing them, and you better keep dominating the web standards committees. Doing this from a position of a Chromium fork is orders of magnitude more difficult than just buying Chrome (and then keeping up pumping money into it at the rate Google has been doing).
      - 2y ago
whywhywhywhy 2y ago
Would Google still be allowed to fund Mozilla if ad funded browsers are an issue.
chipdart 2y ago
> I agree, this is a problem, but there should be a trivial solution: Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day. What a brain-dead idea. Having to pay for something does not affect the openness of a platform. You just create a de-facto tax that benefits no one at all.

by xp84 2y ago

DaiPlusPlus 2y ago

Netscape was free for non-business users before Internet Explorer existed. Netscape was competing with Mosaic, which was free, what with being a product of the NCSA (hence “Mozilla = Mosaic Killer”).

anon-3988 2y ago

> Anything else is perpetuating the Trash Web as it's come to be. unless you ban "Free" products, this is going to keep happening. People seems to think that just because something is "Free" it must therefore cost nothing to make. I mean, downloading Chrome takes 2 minutes max and seems trivial to me? Whats the problem? People think Youtube should just allow them to watch videos without any ads nor paying any money. Clearly, the consumer is not rational.

portaouflop 2y ago
Right but companies are perfectly rational actors /s
throwinothrside 2y ago
Android shares my location more than 14 times a day IIRC. They snoop through every single thing in my life. I can list a bizillion no. Of things. Zero damn given when they are horrible. Let them stop with dark patterns. Then I will start caring. I pay for all my games, all good services which ainuse. I try and donate to open source project wherever and when I can. But I couldnt care less about FAANG like companies. If they want us to be good to them, let them be good first. Hell, its just the other day we were talking about Youtube showing ads to paying customers. I really dont care whether a company is big or small. When companies are bad, they just are. That is it. I dont lose sleep over using FreeTube for watching youtube videos for free. Paying will solve issues, yeah right! Edit: Language

graemep 2y ago

> The only reason a "web browser" is "free" (as in beer) is because Microsoft in the 90s was (belatedly) very worried about a world where Netscape held a lot of power, and realized making and giving away a slightly better browser would neutralize this upstart. Everything flowed from that one tactical decision by a couple of execs at MS. There were free as in beer browsers before IE (although many were free for non-commercial use only). Chromium is a fork (well, a fork of a fork) of a FOSS browser specifically developed to be a FOSS browser for FOSS OSes (primarily Linux).

Numerlor 2y ago

> Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day How do you do this for something that's a basic necessity at this point? There must be a free browser because so many services depend on their user having access to them through one, and browsers aren't in the category of product where you can provide users a basic browser without features and then selling them a better version. If it's not Chrome that's free, any other free issue would inevitably run into the same issue. If not bankrolled by a company, browsers would need to be government funded

hk__2 2y ago
> How do you do this for something that's a basic necessity at this point? The response is further in OP’s comment: > I'd argue that a browser should be a part of the OS or be a paid product
- Numerlor 2y ago
  Part of the OS is basically free and the same situation as Chrome, and you can't do paid because basic necessities are done through the browser
- creesch 2y ago
  > I'd argue that a browser should be a part of the OS or be a paid product I am getting Microsoft flashbacks now. There is no way that bundling browsers with OSes and making all the others paid will have negative side effects! Oh wait... The 90s just called, it is Netscape and they would like to have a stern word.
a2800276 2y ago
> How do you do this for something that's a basic necessity at this point? ... If not bankrolled by a company, browsers would need to be government funded You mean like government funded food, housing, health care and other basic necessities?
- creesch 2y ago

runeks 2y ago

> I agree, this is a problem, but there should be a trivial solution: Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day. If getting people to pay for stuff they use were trivial then advertising wouldn't be as big as it is.

HeavyStorm 2y ago
Yeah, OP is naive. Nobody ever paid for browsers, even before IE was a thing (well, nobody I know...). We also don't pay for open TV which is ad supported. This isn't a single decision that someone madennn it's actually very natural. We don't pay for most of the web, not only browsers. Indirect monetization is great because making a consumer open his/her wallet takes a lot, no matter the price.
- paulryanrogers 2y ago
  Netscape was sold at Babbages in my local mall. Plenty of people bought it. Just like my father bought Telix and Laplink and earlier communication software. Not knowing anyone who admits to having done something, doesn't mean that thing never happens.

Buttons840 2y ago

Could Chromium be made close source? It's easy to just say "well, a company should charge money for a browser", but a company is free to write their own browser and charge for it right now. Chromium though, is bound by its open-source license and its copyright is owned by thousands of different contributors.

pbmonster 2y ago
> Could Chromium be made close source? Sure, it's BSD licensed, all future development could be done closed-source. Note that the name "Chromium" would need to stay with the open source side of the project, so it would be more like a closed fork than a re-licencing. 99% sure you could just keep using the name "Chrome", though, and stop releasing code into chromium instead.
- Buttons840 2y ago
  So all companies can, right now, make a private fork and start selling it. There's no reason to pay for that right, everyone already has that right. (I'm, of course, speaking in the context of xp84's suggestion that the browser should cost money. It's a fine idea, but I don't see how it applies here.)
  - pbmonster 2y ago
    You're essentially paying for control over the currently dominant web browser. You're paying for the existing Chrome installation base and to skip an absolute hell of a hiring process. Because forking Chromium and continuing development on your own needs over 100 of extremely narrowly specialized experts. If you want your project to remain the currently dominant web browser, you better keep developing APIs people love, you better keep doing it faster than your competition can keep up with implementing them, and you better keep dominating the web standards committees. Doing this from a position of a Chromium fork is orders of magnitude more difficult than just buying Chrome (and then keeping up pumping money into it at the rate Google has been doing).
    - 2y ago

whywhywhywhy 2y ago

Would Google still be allowed to fund Mozilla if ad funded browsers are an issue.

chipdart 2y ago

> I agree, this is a problem, but there should be a trivial solution: Users of the browser should pay a small amount of "money" for the product they use all day every day. What a brain-dead idea. Having to pay for something does not affect the openness of a platform. You just create a de-facto tax that benefits no one at all.