4 ms·

The current pattern in software is, sadly: 1. Innovate 2. Dominate 3. Enshitify to cash in. You can't skip step #2. Right now, Firefox's market share is a

by beloch 10mo ago

The current pattern in software is, sadly: 1. Innovate 2. Dominate 3. Enshitify to cash in. You can't skip step #2. Right now, Firefox's market share is a rounding error compared to Chrome. Users are starting to switch away from Chrome because it's currently in step 3 (in spades). That trend will not continue if Firefox beats Chrome to the bottom of the pig-pen. Firefox's current focus on AI is concerning enough, but mirroring Chrome's shift to Manifest v3 (i.e. What killed full-blooded ad blocking in Chrome) would be outright suicide. Mozilla needs to listen to their users. Most don't particularly want "let me run that through an AI for you" popups everywhere. Practically nobody running Firefox wants to be cut off from effective ad blocking. Monetization is hard, for Mozilla in particular. It was always weird that most of their funding came from Google. Now that Google is yanking it, Mozilla needs to find alternative sources of filthy lucre. However, if they destroy their product's only competitive advantages, there will be nothing left to monetize. If Firefox remains a browser that can provide decent privacy and ad-blocking then Mozilla has a chance to find alternative revenue streams. If, instead, Mozilla throws those advantages away to make a quick buck, that's the last buck they'll ever make.

logifail 10mo ago
> Now that Google is yanking it, Mozilla needs to find alternative sources of filthy lucre How do Mozilla's costs look?
glenstein 10mo ago
> Now that Google is yanking it Can you elaborate? Are they winding down their their participation in search licensing deals?
- beloch 10mo ago
  Looks like I was a little out of date. https://itsfoss.com/news/mozilla-lifeline-is-safe/ https://itsfoss.com/news/mozilla-lifeline-is-safe/ Google pays Mozilla, basically to make Google the default search engine for everything in Firefox. Previously, it looked like an antitrust case was going to force them to stop doing that, but it didn't turn out that way. Mozilla is still getting most of their money from Google and they shouldn't need to kneecap themselves to pay the rent. Still, you can't help but wonder what might happen if Firefox starts eating too much of Chrome's market share. Mozilla should be trying to branch out, but in a user friendly way.
  - glenstein 10mo ago
    I definitely heard there was a risk of that happening, but you're right that it seems not to have materialized. I'm honestly not sure what remedy they landed on or if they are still deliberating but I think a fascinating option that follows precedent would be a pop-up browser picker in Android instead of rolling Chrome as default, as that has precedent in other antitrust cases and could potentially change the market share issue overnight. Another interesting one would be truly spinning off Chrome, but paying a search licensing fee to them, too. Actually, that's fascinating to consider in this context, because I know that option (spinning off the browser into its own company) has been criticized on the grounds that it would be unrealistic to assume a browser can simply monetize itself. Ironic given the Mozilla criticism.
prmph 10mo ago
Indeed, Mozilla has a particular bad habit of not listening to customers. It shows even in the UI design. Features like tab pinning and tab groups work in ways that are sub-optimal to how users want to use them. A pinned tab should not be tied to a specific URL. If you go their forums you see a lot complaints, and weird thing is all the nonsensical arguments that their reps advance as to how these features should work the way they currently are. I as a longtime Firefox user can immediately see what is wrong with these features as implemented, but the devs won't listen. I wonder if they use FF themselves. Firefox is also the only app on my MacBook that consistently brings the system to a crawl. Almost every single time my machines slows down, the solution is to kill Firefox. It's got to the point I don't even need to use Activity Monitor, I just kill Firefox and and system recovers. It's gotten to the point I'm seriously looking at alternatives, trying out Orion and Helium browsers.
- immibis 10mo ago
  Try Zen Browser - it's reskinned Firefox.
- tadfisher 10mo ago
  I'm confused, because I desperately want pinned tabs to stay on their URL, but that's not what happens, and I end up with random URLs in these tabs because I click links. Is there a config flag I flipped without thinking?
  - prmph 10mo ago
    It seems they have listened to users and allow pinned tabs to navigate to any url. Initially this is how pinning worked, and along the way they changed it so that if you navigated to a different domain from the one you pinned, it opened in a new (unpinned) tab, which was jarring. Now it seems they have reverted that change. So they seem to vacillate on the implementation.
  - saghm 10mo ago
    Yeah, I don't get why I'd want to pin a tab and then change the url (which I do accidentally for a pinned tab every couple of weeks or so). When it's not the site I pinned, it's just...a tab?

by beloch 10mo ago

logifail 10mo ago

> Now that Google is yanking it, Mozilla needs to find alternative sources of filthy lucre How do Mozilla's costs look?

glenstein 10mo ago

> Now that Google is yanking it Can you elaborate? Are they winding down their their participation in search licensing deals?

beloch 10mo ago
Looks like I was a little out of date. https://itsfoss.com/news/mozilla-lifeline-is-safe/ https://itsfoss.com/news/mozilla-lifeline-is-safe/ Google pays Mozilla, basically to make Google the default search engine for everything in Firefox. Previously, it looked like an antitrust case was going to force them to stop doing that, but it didn't turn out that way. Mozilla is still getting most of their money from Google and they shouldn't need to kneecap themselves to pay the rent. Still, you can't help but wonder what might happen if Firefox starts eating too much of Chrome's market share. Mozilla should be trying to branch out, but in a user friendly way.
- glenstein 10mo ago
  I definitely heard there was a risk of that happening, but you're right that it seems not to have materialized. I'm honestly not sure what remedy they landed on or if they are still deliberating but I think a fascinating option that follows precedent would be a pop-up browser picker in Android instead of rolling Chrome as default, as that has precedent in other antitrust cases and could potentially change the market share issue overnight. Another interesting one would be truly spinning off Chrome, but paying a search licensing fee to them, too. Actually, that's fascinating to consider in this context, because I know that option (spinning off the browser into its own company) has been criticized on the grounds that it would be unrealistic to assume a browser can simply monetize itself. Ironic given the Mozilla criticism.

prmph 10mo ago

Indeed, Mozilla has a particular bad habit of not listening to customers. It shows even in the UI design. Features like tab pinning and tab groups work in ways that are sub-optimal to how users want to use them. A pinned tab should not be tied to a specific URL. If you go their forums you see a lot complaints, and weird thing is all the nonsensical arguments that their reps advance as to how these features should work the way they currently are. I as a longtime Firefox user can immediately see what is wrong with these features as implemented, but the devs won't listen. I wonder if they use FF themselves. Firefox is also the only app on my MacBook that consistently brings the system to a crawl. Almost every single time my machines slows down, the solution is to kill Firefox. It's got to the point I don't even need to use Activity Monitor, I just kill Firefox and and system recovers. It's gotten to the point I'm seriously looking at alternatives, trying out Orion and Helium browsers.

immibis 10mo ago
Try Zen Browser - it's reskinned Firefox.
tadfisher 10mo ago
I'm confused, because I desperately want pinned tabs to stay on their URL, but that's not what happens, and I end up with random URLs in these tabs because I click links. Is there a config flag I flipped without thinking?
- prmph 10mo ago
  It seems they have listened to users and allow pinned tabs to navigate to any url. Initially this is how pinning worked, and along the way they changed it so that if you navigated to a different domain from the one you pinned, it opened in a new (unpinned) tab, which was jarring. Now it seems they have reverted that change. So they seem to vacillate on the implementation.
- saghm 10mo ago
  Yeah, I don't get why I'd want to pin a tab and then change the url (which I do accidentally for a pinned tab every couple of weeks or so). When it's not the site I pinned, it's just...a tab?