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>> He says he could begin to block ad blockers in Firefox and estimates that’d bring in another $150 million, but he doesn’t want to do that. It feels off-missi

• rchaud 11mo ago
  How would it bring in $150m? Is that some tranche of funding Google is witholding from them until they disable extensions?
• chii 11mo ago
  > a pretty uncharitable interpretation like hoping for the best, but planning for the worst, you must interpret people's intentions using the same methodology. By quoting that axing adblock could be bringing $150mil, but also saying that he doesn't want to do it, it's advertising that a higher price would work - it's a way to deniably solicit an offer.
  • SiempreViernes 11mo ago
    So then we should interpret Bruno adopting this uncharitable interpretation as evidence they are intentionally trying to ruin Mozillas reputation rather than sincerely analysing an interview, right? And in turn my comment above is not a honest remark that your suggested interpretation strategy seems to be selectively applied, but rather an attempt to hurt your standing with your peers.
• anothernewdude 11mo ago
  It wouldn't bring in their estimate, it'd kill the browser.
  • cryptonym 11mo ago
    Maybe they'd still get paid $150M for that, while only having to barely keep the browser alive, with no user request, for illusion of non-monopoly. Fewer devs, more bucks, big win for the execs on the short term.
  • lifthrasiir 11mo ago
    The estimate does sound reasonable if it's an one-off payment. I agree that no one would pay that amount of money each year to keep adblocking from Firefox.
    • simiones 11mo ago
      It's not impossible that people would pay Firefox that much yearly to keep their current user-base from using ad blockers. However, what is impossible is to imagine Firefox would have anything close to their current user base if people were prevented from using ad blockers. Most likely they would shrink to almost 0 users overnight if they did this. There are very few reasons to use Firefox over Chrome or Safari (or even Edge) other than the much better ad blocking (or any ad blocking, on mobile).
      • lifthrasiir 11mo ago
        That doesn't explain the apparent market share of 2--3%, which is still quite large if you think about. I believe most non-techie users are just lingering, using Firefox just because they used to. Since Firefox doesn't have a built-in ad blocking and the knowledge about adblocking is not universal (see my other comment), it is possible that there are a large portion of Firefox users who don't use adblockers and conversely adblocking users are in a minority. If this is indeed the case, Mozilla can (technically) take such a bet as such policy will affect a smaller portion of users. But that would work only once; Mozilla doesn't have any more option like that after all. That's why I see $150M is plausible, but only once.
        • simiones 11mo ago
          Of course, I don't know the actual percent of FF users that use ad block. But I think it's far more likely that it is a majority of current FF users, rather than it being a negligible minority. I think 2-3% of web users is not an implausible approximation of how many people use ad block overall on the web. It's not an obscure technology, it's quite well known, even if few people bother with it. Edit: actually I'm way off - it seems estimates are typically around 30-40% of overall users on the web having some kind of ad blocker. So, the Firefox percentage being 60-80+% seems almost a given to me.
  • Croftengea 11mo ago
    Right? This is what all these MBAs and supply chain efficiency experts never get.
    • autoexec 11mo ago
      They don't care if their plans cause long term harm as long as they can cash out after the short term profits come in. As long as there are new companies/products to jump to and exploit next they're making money which is all they care about.
• deleted 11mo ago
  [deleted]
• roenxi 11mo ago
  Yeah, the article's quoting didn't help its case. It doesn't seem fair to quote someone saying [I don't think X is a good idea] as evidence they are about to do X. That being said, in the original context [0] it does sound a lot more like an option on the table. That original article presents it as the weakest of a list of things they're about to explore - but who knows, maybe the journalist has butchered what was said. It is an ambiguous idea without more context about how close it is to Mozilla trying to make life hard for ad-blockers. [0] https://www.theverge.com/tech/845216/mozilla-ceo-anthony-enzor-demeo https://www.theverge.com/tech/845216/mozilla-ceo-anthony-enz...
  • autoexec 11mo ago
    The part about making money through advertising and selling data to 3rd parties (though "search and AI placement deals") is already not a good sign. Planning to make their money through ads and surveillance capitalism is already making it impossible to say "I always know my data is in my control. I can turn the thing off, and they’re not going to do anything sketchy"
  • kunley 11mo ago
    Except that expressing loud doubts about something ethically dubious is often a sign that an opposite action will be taken. So many business people want this moral excuse "but I had doubts" while being totally cynical
    • roenxi 11mo ago
      Logically that is setting up an argument where no matter what the CEO says you're going to assume they're going to take an action. If they say yea, obviously it is a yes. If they say nay, it means they're thinking about it which is basically a yes! That is a completely reasonable position, often it makes sense to ignore what someone says and focus only on their capabilities. But if that is the situation then it doesn't make any sense to quote what someone says because it is about to be ignored.
      • kunley 11mo ago
• kuschku 11mo ago
  You wouldn't calculate the expected RoI of killing adblockers if killing adblockers was never considered.
  • boomboomsubban 11mo ago
    It's not hard to imagine the last default search contract negotiation had Google go "we'll give you $x if you kill manifest v2, $x-$150 million if you don't." edited to correct my misunderstanding.
    • jamesnorden 11mo ago
      Firefox supports Manifest v3, they just didn't kill Manifest v2 after implementing it.
  • gr4vityWall 11mo ago
    > You wouldn't calculate the expected RoI of killing adblockers if killing adblockers was never considered. I agree, although if someone isn't the kind of person who would calculate that, they're probably not the person who will become the CEO of a company that size in the first place. I don't think organizations have the right incentives in place to push people with those values to the top.
  • littlecranky67 11mo ago
    for it to be considered, somebody must have offered to pay that 150M. Or he considered going to somebody (we all know that somebody is Google) and asking them for that money in return for killing ad blockers.
    • grayhatter 11mo ago
      That was my read too, he's making a public offer, and setting the minimum negotiation price.
  • takluyver 11mo ago
    I agree with all the people saying it would drive a lot of the remaining users away, and I hope they don't do it. But I'm not remotely surprised that they considered following what their biggest competitor (Chrome) already did.
• xenator 11mo ago
  Imagine you are in a marriage and your spouse say: "I can sleep with other people, doesn’t want to do that. It feels off-mission". I don't understand context, but my honest reaction will be: "WTF, you just said? What type of relationship you think we have if we discuss such things?" I definitely understand why people worry. This is just crazy to weight trust in money. If this is on the table and discussed internally, then what we are talking about? 'T' in Mozilla Firefox means 'Trust'.
  • Joker_vD 11mo ago
    Yeah, I've once said in a relationship "Look, sure, she maybe pretty, but I want to be with you, so no, I am not going to reach out to her, don't worry". Apparently, it was a poor way to word this idea.
    • speed_spread 11mo ago
      "Fucking her brains out would feel off mission"
      • Joker_vD 11mo ago
        Yes, people tend to try to dig out additional information from the particular wording (talk about a hidden channel) based on how they would phrase the same message themselves. That's why communication is hard.
• nialv7 11mo ago
  The interpretation is not the problem. Whether he will do it, is actually secondary to the fact that he thinks cutting adblock can bringing in money. No, it will just kill the browser. The fact he thinks otherwise tells me how out of touch he is.
  • p-e-w 11mo ago
    Firefox has a market share around 3%. Even most technologists stopped using it long ago. Many banks and government websites don’t even support it anymore and loudly tell people to use Chrome instead, especially in developing countries. Nothing can kill Firefox, because it’s already dead for all practical purposes.
    • sharken 11mo ago
      Given the current state of the Chrome family of browsers and the anti adblocker stance from Google, i'd think that alone would guarantee Firefox a steady user base. Not sure how users cope with Chrome-based browsers and intrusive ads.
      • lifthrasiir 11mo ago
        That's just a wishful thinking. Too many ordinary users accept ads as inevitable annoyances and don't even know about the very existence of adblockers.
        • yupyupyups 11mo ago
          Maybe because they don't know any better.
          • lifthrasiir 11mo ago
            Of course, but how would you convince them to switch? Not just your friends, but as a whole.
• torben-friis 11mo ago
  “I wouldn’t sell sexual services. I’ve spent an evening checking the going market rate for someone my age in my area and it’s 2k! Can you believe that? That’s a ton of money! Totally not going to do it though”. It’s an eyebrow raising comment at the very least.
  • rblank 11mo ago
    https://xkcd.com/463/ https://xkcd.com/463/
  • animuchan 11mo ago
    The OP doesn't even say "Totally not going to do it", merely "it feels off-mission", so a vibe check away from doing it.
• hsbauauvhabzb 11mo ago
  I’d happily pay $100 a year for Firefox WITH an adblocker as long as part of the money is put towards ongoing internet freedom and preventing attestation
  • arealaccount 11mo ago
    Orion browser is a thing
    • saubeidl 11mo ago
      A closed source thing.
    • orphea 11mo ago
      There are operating systems other than macOS.
      • handedness 11mo ago
        https://help.kagi.com/orion/faq/faq.html#other_os_support https://help.kagi.com/orion/faq/faq.html#other_os_support
        • orphea 11mo ago
          I'm aware. What does it change?
          • handedness 11mo ago
            It directly addresses your complaint, a confusing complaint to make if you were already aware that Linux and Windows versions are coming soon. Unless, of course, you're holding out for, I don't know, a BeOS version.
            • orphea 11mo ago
              I just don't think one can seriously say "Orion browser is a thing" if it is definitely not a thing for 95% desktops out there (the exact % may be different depending on the source of data, etc.). And Windows (around 70% of the market share) version is not expected until late 2026.
• RossBencina 11mo ago
  > It feels off-mission. That's supposedly The Verge paraphrasing the CEO (Unfortunately I can't verify because the full article requires subscription.) I would like to know what the CEO actually said because "it feels off-mission" is a strange thing for the leader of the mission to say. I would hope that they know the mission inside out. No need to go by feels.
  • autoexec 11mo ago
    Here's that part of the article: > In our conversation, Enzor-DeMeo returns often to two things: that Mozilla cares about and wants to preserve the open web, and that the open web needs new business models. Mozilla’s ad business is important and growing, he says, and he worries “about things going behind paywalls, becoming more closed off.” He says the internet’s content business isn’t exactly his fight, but that Mozilla believes in the value of an open and free (and thus ad-supported) web. > At some point, though, Enzor-DeMeo will have to tend to Mozilla’s own business. “I do think we need revenue diversification away from Google,” he says, “but I don’t necessarily believe we need revenue diversification away from the browser.” It seems he thinks a combination of subscription revenue, advertising, and maybe a few search and AI placement deals can get that done. He’s also bullish that things like built-in VPN and a privacy service called Monitor can get more people to pay for their browser. He says he could begin to block ad blockers in Firefox and estimates that’d bring in another $150 million, but he doesn’t want to do that. It feels off-mission. > One way to solve many of these problems is to get a lot more people using Firefox. And Enzor-DeMeo is convinced Mozilla can get there, that people want what the company is selling. “There is something to be said about, when I have a Mozilla product, I always know my data is in my control. I can turn the thing off, and they’re not going to do anything sketchy. I think that is needed in the market, and that’s what I hope to do.”
    • shaky-carrousel 11mo ago
      I don't like how he assumes that a free internet must be ad-supported. The ad-supported web is hideous, even with their ads removed. A long, convoluted, inane mess of content. On the other hand, the clean web feels more direct, to the point, and passionate. I prefer to read content written by passion, not by money seeking purposes.
• csomar 11mo ago
  > It feels off-mission. He didn't say it is off-mission. But just that it feels. My guess is that he is looking at a higher number.
• dizhn 11mo ago
  That's peanuts. Google would pay them a lot more to disable adblocking for good. And it sounds like this guy would do it for the right amount. That said, it is kind of a lackluster article.
• tokai 11mo ago
  Oh no, we're not supposed to actually parse the words a CEO spew forth. Get out of here.
• kristjank 11mo ago
  Do you really harbor so much charity towards tech CEOs that you can't see its other meaning as at least equally as likely? It costs Mozilla literally nothing to reassure its privacy and user-controlled principles. Instead we got a jk...unless... type of response. This is cowardice and like another commenter has said, a negotiation offer disguised as a mission statement.
• Brian_K_White 11mo ago
  "feels off mission" exposes how little conviction there is behind this position. That is a flimsy tissue paper statement about a concept that should be a bedrock principle. It's irrationally charitable to give it any credit at all. Especially in context where anyone who's awake should understand they need to be delivering an unquestionably clear message about unquestionably clear goals and core values, because this ain't that. Or rather, it is a clear message, just a different message to a different audience.
  • asddubs 11mo ago
    yeah, it reads to me like "we probably shouldn't do it"
    • Lutger 11mo ago
      which is just prep talk for "if we need it, we could do it"
  • bagacrap 11mo ago
    It's definitely testing the waters.
• kgwxd 11mo ago
  Mentioning it is just the first of many softening phases. Its abuse 101. At some point we'll have "made him do it".
• prmoustache 11mo ago
  It isn't even true that it would bring $150M. This is a calculation accounting on users staying on Firefox. If they do that, most of the remaining users would flee and goodbye to your millions if you don't have any userbase anymore to justify asking money to anyone.
• baxtr 11mo ago
  "It feels off-mission" is very different from "It's absolutely off-mission and against everything we stand for".
• Ensorceled 11mo ago
  I mean, that's also exactly what you would say if you had a $150M offer on the table, had received a lot of push back and were now just checking the waters and waiting to consolidate your position.
• Raed667 11mo ago
  I have seen these discussions in companies where privacy is the selling point. These kind of questions usually come from non-engineers, people in product or sales who see privacy as a feature or marketing point, and if the ROI is higher they don't give a fuck and would pitch anything that would make a buck
• tziki 11mo ago
  "Uncharitable interpretation" is putting it mildly. I don't know the context for the quote but imagine being the CEO. You might give one hour interview outlining the tradeoffs you need to do to keep things running, and a random blogger takes a 5 second clip, makes an absurd interpretation and ends up on hackernews.
  • glenstein 11mo ago
    Right, I was ready for the headline to be this like deep dive into the history of letting go of several engineers, or assessing the costs of purchasing pocket, or a deep dive into source code changes related to dabbling in ad tech or something. You know, actual reporting sourcing something new. But in truth, it was just extrapolating a bunch of sweet nothings from the freezing of a quote already published in The Verge. It reminds me of Boston media market sports reporting. You're a sports writer, you have a deadline, and you have to take Curt Schilling's press conference and try and turn it into a story. So take something he said and squeeze it dry, trying to extract some implication of clubhouse drama, to drive the next new cycle and survive to your next paycheck as a reporter. That's the grift, that's the grind.
• tschumacher 11mo ago
  Can someone explain how banning ad blockers from Firefox would bring in money for Mozilla? I can see how it would bring in money for other actors such as news outlets, YouTube, etc., but Mozilla doesn't have a big website where they are showing ads.
• deleted 11mo ago
  [deleted]
• mossTechnician 11mo ago
  OpenAI CEO Sam Altman once boasted that the company hadn’t "put a sexbot avatar in ChatGPT yet." Two months later, they did[0]. Interpreting the Mozilla CEO the same way may not be charitable, but it is certainly familiar. [0]: https://futurism.com/future-society/sam-altman-adult-ai-reversal https://futurism.com/future-society/sam-altman-adult-ai-reve...
• grayhatter 11mo ago
  CEOs are well known for turning down money, and always resisting the urge to squeeze every last drop of good will from an acquired property, right? I think it's an apt warning, I'd have to read the literal interview transcripts to really draw a conclusion one way or the other. But the simple fact that this is on his mind, and felt like mentioning killing ad block was something Mozilla could do, and is considering doing, was a safe thing to say to a journalist... There's not a chance in hell I'd say anything remotely like that to a journalist. When someone tells you who they are, believe them.
• staticassertion 11mo ago
  People are absolutely somersaulting through hoops to try to make "I don't want to do that" into "I'm going to do it" in the comments lol
  • toss1 11mo ago
    No, they are accurately observing that the "I don't want to do it" and "feels off mission" statements are FAR weaker than they can be and should be. Such weak statements are either a real mistake or show movement away from those principles which should be bedrock for Mozilla and towards some justification to abandon those principles. It's not like the industry has no precedents on this. "Don't Be Evil" was the motto of a company that is now one of the apex predators in the surveillance capitalism ecosystem. Unwise to try to dismiss and laugh off legitimate alarms.
    • jajuuka 11mo ago
      This is just tone policing. "we won't do this" But you didn't say you'd never do this. "okay we'll never do this" But you didn't say you'd never ever do this. "fine we'll never ever do this" But you didn't say that it's never entered your mind once. They said they won't do it and your interpretation is to demand they said it with more words? Come on, let's stop this nonsense. Can Firefox users ever be happy?
    • glenstein 11mo ago
      Instead of criticizing an actual contract to engage with a third party or a code push or an affirmative statement, you're attempting to parse a random combination of tea leaves and chicken entrails to indict Mozilla for a hypothetical thing that they explicitly said they're not doing. If that's not scraping the bottom of the barrel, it's only because you're able to imagine an even lower bottom than that that you're willing to reach for.
      • toss1 11mo ago
        >>you're attempting to parse a random combination of tea leaves and chicken entrails It is exactly the opposite — it is reading the actual language used for its intended meaning. Every CEO is expected to not only understand the issues he faces and is managing, but to ALSO carefully choose the words to describe the situation and the intentions of the organization he leads. When a CEO makes a statement about what should be a core fundamental principle of an organization, we can certainly expect that CEO to choose their words carefully. Those words are, or at least should be, the exact opposite of "tea leaves and chicken entrails". If the CEO is sloppy and the chosen words should actually be considered "tea leaves and chicken entrails", that is a different problem of a less-than-competent CEO. If those words were actually chosen carefully, consider these two statements: The actual statement: "[I don't] want to do that. It feels off-mission" A different statement: "This is a core fundamental principle of Mozilla and I will not lead the company in that direction — not on my watch". One could technically say "they both say 'Not today'". But that would be absurd, and stupidly throwing out significant meaning in what the CEO chose to say and how he chose to say it. He made the first vague statement with weasel words instead of something resembling the bold and unambiguous statement resembling the second statement. The statement he did make is "I don't want to", which type of statement has often preceded an eventual "sorry, we had to". There is a lot to make Firefox users nervous, and his choice of statement here did not help matters.
• pnt12 11mo ago
  I'm concerned about the original quote which has a very weak sentiment. "it feels off-mission". Not something strong like "I'm completely against it" or "we'll never do that". Even better would be similar to the article sentiment: "we could get 150 million now but degrade one of our few features that distinguishes us from other browsers + break a lot user trust, which would bring greater losses in the long term".
  • glenstein 11mo ago
    That just seems like an ordinary case of purity test syndrome. What they said is they don't want to do it, but they're being convicted of a hypothetical belief in wanting to hypothetically do it maybe, maybe which is the last refuge of scoundrels who have no stronger sourcing for more well-grounded accusations. But in internet comment sections there's no need for accountability or charitable interpretation, and so you can accuse someone of practically anything and it's their job to bend over backwards against the most skeptical interpretations to pass the purity test. So there's a metagame not just of indicating your values but of extrapolating as to all the possible permutations of uncharitable interpretation that could lead to accusations so that you have to artfully construct your phrasing to get out ahead of that. It's never on the internet trolls making the accusation to be accountable to ordinary norms of charitable interpretation.
• skywhopper 11mo ago
  I wish the CEO of Mozilla could have stated the commitment a little more strongly than “it feels off-mission”. Privacy, user control, and security of the web browsing experience are (or should be) the CORE of Mozilla's mission. This isn’t a decision to take lightly on vibes. Allowing ad-blockers (or any content manipulation plugins users want) should be a deep commitment.
• jajuuka 11mo ago
  Standard Firefox users looking for anything to be mad about. Even when it makes zero sense.
• KurSix 11mo ago
  The issue isn't the explicit "we won't do it," it's that it was framed as a concrete, priced option at all
• OkayPhysicist 11mo ago
  It costs the CEO of Mozilla nothing to make hard, convicted statements that all their users agree with. If it was me, the quote would be something like "but then they'd need to find a new CEO, because I'd be in prison for what I'd do to anyone who even suggested it". Literally the only people who talk about Mozilla, or read things about what Mozilla is up to, are unusually motivated power users who really, really care about ad blocking and privacy. They may still have other users, but those people are coasting on momentum from when their grandkid installed Firefox on their computer years ago. They're not reading interviews with the new CEO. Yet Mozilla seems to consistently fail utterly at messaging to their only engaged users. It's not even that they're doing evil shit, they're just absolutely terrible at proclaiming that they are committed to not doing evil shit.
• matheusmoreira 11mo ago
  "It feels off-mission" is incredibly weak opposition to something that would go against core values. It just means this guy's price is higher than 150 million dollars. Everybody has their price. I'm ideologically opposed to advertising but if someone put 150 million dollars on my table and told me to stop making an issue out of it I think I'd take the money. Being set for life trumps being called a hypocrite.
• ikrenji 11mo ago
  I only use Firefox over Chrome because it has adblock. So where does the $150 million comes from if people won't use it without adblock? Seems comrade didn't think this through...
• LtWorf 11mo ago
  It would bring users leaving.
• adverbly 11mo ago
  I'm not sure it's that uncharitable... The original quote was apparently said without an understanding of the customer base as if ad blockers were not a core piece of their value proposition. This person doesn't understand their customer if they think it's going to bring in more money to cut ad blockers... It would bring in far less money because they would lose most of their customer base. It's not off mission: it's off Target.
  • xedrac 11mo ago
    I would go as far to say that ad blockers are the primary value proposition of Firefox at this point. If they lose that, I have little reason to use it on my phone or my workstations.
• cgfjtynzdrfht 11mo ago
  [dead]
• caycep 11mo ago
  Ah, instead of AGILE, it's MAFIA nowadays