6 ms·

How is firefox legitimate competition when they are basically financed by Google?

by vasco 1y ago

scbzzzzz 1y ago
You need to look at history. In early 90s why did Microsoft invest in apple when it is its competitors. Investment doesn't mean they are medling into mozilla business. For companies like google (present) or Microsoft in 90's. It is better to have a crippled competitor than no competitor. No competitor attracts government agencies for monopoly which is worse.
- baruz 1y ago
  In the 1990s Microsoft “invested” in Apple because Steve Jobs allowed them to save face by giving them the option to settle their part of Apple v San Francisco Canyon Co by calling part of it—$150 M—a stock purchase that only lasted a few years. I do not know how much the total cash settlement from Microsoft was, but industry rumors went up to $1B.
  - pjmlp 1y ago
    The first time yes, the last time, there would be no Apple Silicon to talk about today.
tclover 1y ago
Mozilla is fine taking money from Google, because it keeps "competition" alive otherwise Google would face antitrust lawsuits for running a monopoly.
- fumar 1y ago
  Isn’t Safari 30% of browser share in the US?
  - godelski 1y ago
    What's your point? Even 3 players is too few.
  - swiftcoder 1y ago
    Only due to iOS, which isn't necessarily enough to stave off monopoly complaints across other platforms
FlyingSnake 1y ago
Because it's the only other browser engine that's currently available in the market.
- ssl-3 1y ago
  Indeed. It is important to try to avoid letting perfection be the enemy of good. Firefox is at least something that is distinct from WebKit or Chromium (which is itself based on a fork of WebKit). That's good. It's not perfect, in part because deals with Google pay for most of it, but it is still good despite its imperfect status.
- esskay 1y ago
  Which sucks because it's not exactly fantastic as a competitor. There's still very, very noticeable performance differences and render speed/pattern differences that after you've been using a chromium based browser for a long time give firefox a feeling of being slow (it's not, it is absolutely just a perception thing, but it's enough to put you off using it)
rkomorn 1y ago
Maybe it's also the other way around: if Firefox was legitimate competition, Google wouldn't "fund" them (quotes because really, google is also just buying user traffic with their investment). Is Google actively sabotaging Mozilla or is Mozilla a genuine competitor that just hasn't figured out how to build a browser that'll actually challenge Chrome (and Chromiumy browsers) beyond ideologist users? I say it's the latter. Google's money doesn't actually negatively impact Firefox's competitiveness.
- theK 1y ago
  I dont see how the competitiveness argument can still stand. I've been using both browsers for the better part of two decades now and chrome/chromium never was the better product. Sure it had slightly better devtools for a while but nowadays it is very difficult to argue either way. Performance was rubbish on both ends for years in a row, right now both seem to do fine. Firefox has sync, a significantly better product than whatever google comes up with every two years. So yeah, I think Mozilla has a good enough product to challenge chrome. What they don't have is comparable traffic to their site. Oh and of course focus. Mozilla has lacked focus for almost a decade now with all the random products and initiatives they launch.
  - rkomorn 1y ago
    As someone who almost compulsively changes browsers every so often with the mistaken belief that "there's gotta be something better" and has swung by Firefox on multiple occasions, it has never offered me any compelling reason to stick with it beyond not being Chrome. Zen came close, but also didn't stick. Containers seemed nice at first but my personal usage of them devolved into an over abundance of containers to isolate everything from one another (my fault, though). On the other hand, I've had various small nits here and there that always eventually push me back towards a chromium browser. But hey, I'm a believer in not holding on to my decisions so long that they become assumptions, so off I go to install Firefox and give it a 4th whirl since 2010.
    - dotancohen 1y ago
godelski 1y ago
Allow me to rephrase my earlier choice Chromium: Entirely dependent on Google, a $3T company who's entire business model relies upon invading your privacy and currently has a >70% global share of browsers WebKit: A closed source browser with ~18% of browser share and run by a nearly $4T company who forces all browsers on their mobile devices to be reskinned versions of their browser and probably wants to do the same on their other devices Gecko: An open source browser with ~4% of the browser share, run by a non-profit with a mission of to preserve privacy but is struggling to find funding. All three choices suck. I don't think anyone is disagreeing with that. But there's only one option on here that isn't trying to royally fuck everyone over and actually cares about the very service we're arguing over. So what... we're going to let the internet get screwed because a bunch of dudes making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year can't toss some beer money over to the little guy? You paint this as a hopeless picture, but seriously, have you considered donating? Every time I see these types of threads I see comments like > I would happily pay a small monthly subscription fee for a browser if it has strong legally protected privacy guarantees.[0] Seriously, are we all that greedy and myopic? They're a non-profit. You know tons of companies, such as Google and every other big tech company, have some donation matching system. Google pays the Mozilla Foundation about half a billion a year to make Google the default search engine. How is the fact that they are throwing such massive amounts of money not a concerning thing? Yet FF has enough users that we could give them an extra 40% revenue if we tossed them $5 PER YEAR. That's it. Do you really think your browser provides to you less value than your Netflix (160%/360%/500% more expensive) or Spotify (240% more expensive) account? Seriously? If literally 30% of FF users gave to Mozilla what they are willing to give to Spotify, then the problem is solved. Or 15% of users did it through their company's matching program. If instead of discouraging people, you got more people to convert then the percentage of necessary contributors decreases! It's even tax fucking deductible so it isn't even that <$5/yr... [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45369141 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45369141
- john01dav 1y ago
  You can't donate to Firefox. You can donate to Mozilla, but that money doesn't go to Firefox.

How is firefox legitimate competition when they are basically financed by Google?

by vasco 1y ago

How is firefox legitimate competition when they are basically financed by Google?

You need to look at history. In early 90s why did Microsoft invest in apple when it is its competitors. Investment doesn't mean they are medling into mozilla business. For companies like google (present) or Microsoft in 90's. It is better to have a crippled competitor than no competitor. No competitor attracts government agencies for monopoly which is worse.

baruz 1y ago
In the 1990s Microsoft “invested” in Apple because Steve Jobs allowed them to save face by giving them the option to settle their part of Apple v San Francisco Canyon Co by calling part of it—$150 M—a stock purchase that only lasted a few years. I do not know how much the total cash settlement from Microsoft was, but industry rumors went up to $1B.
- pjmlp 1y ago
  The first time yes, the last time, there would be no Apple Silicon to talk about today.

tclover 1y ago

Mozilla is fine taking money from Google, because it keeps "competition" alive otherwise Google would face antitrust lawsuits for running a monopoly.

fumar 1y ago
Isn’t Safari 30% of browser share in the US?
- godelski 1y ago
  What's your point? Even 3 players is too few.
- swiftcoder 1y ago
  Only due to iOS, which isn't necessarily enough to stave off monopoly complaints across other platforms

FlyingSnake 1y ago

Because it's the only other browser engine that's currently available in the market.

ssl-3 1y ago
Indeed. It is important to try to avoid letting perfection be the enemy of good. Firefox is at least something that is distinct from WebKit or Chromium (which is itself based on a fork of WebKit). That's good. It's not perfect, in part because deals with Google pay for most of it, but it is still good despite its imperfect status.
esskay 1y ago
Which sucks because it's not exactly fantastic as a competitor. There's still very, very noticeable performance differences and render speed/pattern differences that after you've been using a chromium based browser for a long time give firefox a feeling of being slow (it's not, it is absolutely just a perception thing, but it's enough to put you off using it)

rkomorn 1y ago

Maybe it's also the other way around: if Firefox was legitimate competition, Google wouldn't "fund" them (quotes because really, google is also just buying user traffic with their investment). Is Google actively sabotaging Mozilla or is Mozilla a genuine competitor that just hasn't figured out how to build a browser that'll actually challenge Chrome (and Chromiumy browsers) beyond ideologist users? I say it's the latter. Google's money doesn't actually negatively impact Firefox's competitiveness.

theK 1y ago
I dont see how the competitiveness argument can still stand. I've been using both browsers for the better part of two decades now and chrome/chromium never was the better product. Sure it had slightly better devtools for a while but nowadays it is very difficult to argue either way. Performance was rubbish on both ends for years in a row, right now both seem to do fine. Firefox has sync, a significantly better product than whatever google comes up with every two years. So yeah, I think Mozilla has a good enough product to challenge chrome. What they don't have is comparable traffic to their site. Oh and of course focus. Mozilla has lacked focus for almost a decade now with all the random products and initiatives they launch.
- rkomorn 1y ago
  As someone who almost compulsively changes browsers every so often with the mistaken belief that "there's gotta be something better" and has swung by Firefox on multiple occasions, it has never offered me any compelling reason to stick with it beyond not being Chrome. Zen came close, but also didn't stick. Containers seemed nice at first but my personal usage of them devolved into an over abundance of containers to isolate everything from one another (my fault, though). On the other hand, I've had various small nits here and there that always eventually push me back towards a chromium browser. But hey, I'm a believer in not holding on to my decisions so long that they become assumptions, so off I go to install Firefox and give it a 4th whirl since 2010.
  - dotancohen 1y ago

godelski 1y ago

Allow me to rephrase my earlier choice Chromium: Entirely dependent on Google, a $3T company who's entire business model relies upon invading your privacy and currently has a >70% global share of browsers WebKit: A closed source browser with ~18% of browser share and run by a nearly $4T company who forces all browsers on their mobile devices to be reskinned versions of their browser and probably wants to do the same on their other devices Gecko: An open source browser with ~4% of the browser share, run by a non-profit with a mission of to preserve privacy but is struggling to find funding. All three choices suck. I don't think anyone is disagreeing with that. But there's only one option on here that isn't trying to royally fuck everyone over and actually cares about the very service we're arguing over. So what... we're going to let the internet get screwed because a bunch of dudes making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year can't toss some beer money over to the little guy? You paint this as a hopeless picture, but seriously, have you considered donating? Every time I see these types of threads I see comments like > I would happily pay a small monthly subscription fee for a browser if it has strong legally protected privacy guarantees.[0] Seriously, are we all that greedy and myopic? They're a non-profit. You know tons of companies, such as Google and every other big tech company, have some donation matching system. Google pays the Mozilla Foundation about half a billion a year to make Google the default search engine. How is the fact that they are throwing such massive amounts of money not a concerning thing? Yet FF has enough users that we could give them an extra 40% revenue if we tossed them $5 PER YEAR. That's it. Do you really think your browser provides to you less value than your Netflix (160%/360%/500% more expensive) or Spotify (240% more expensive) account? Seriously? If literally 30% of FF users gave to Mozilla what they are willing to give to Spotify, then the problem is solved. Or 15% of users did it through their company's matching program. If instead of discouraging people, you got more people to convert then the percentage of necessary contributors decreases! It's even tax fucking deductible so it isn't even that <$5/yr... [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45369141 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45369141

john01dav 1y ago
You can't donate to Firefox. You can donate to Mozilla, but that money doesn't go to Firefox.