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I would love for Mozilla to find other means of funding online content besides advertising. In either case I'd love to see them take a hard stance on privacy an
by bobajeff 11y ago
I would love for Mozilla to find other means of funding online content besides advertising. In either case I'd love to see them take a hard stance on privacy and against tracking.
They should block trackers that have no effect on website features and restrict and monitor the ones that do effect features.
...and this is another reason Mozilla needs to have their own search engine. They could have much greater influence on these this things if they had the ability to punish bad behaving websites.
- aroch 11y agoApple is supposedly getting into the search engine business. It'd be great if they and Mozilla got together, both companies believe in user privacy and could complement each other in getting things down
- bsder 11y agoApple believes in user privacy. Your naïveté is touching.
- matthewmacleod 11y agoAnd your condescension is irritating. Apple seems pretty solid on the protection of users' privacy. Devices are encrypted by default, for example, and there are robust protections from rogue applications in place. Is there are specific practice that Apple engage in that makes you think they are particularly reckless regarding users' privacy?
- lern_too_spel 11y agoHe's comparing Apple to Google. In that respect, Apple comes out looking pretty bad. Google's devices are also encrypted by default and have much more robust protections against rogue applications in place (both static and dynamic automated analysis of apps for malware, vs. just a human eyeballing it).
- IBM 11y agoAndroid devices aren't encrypted by default, Google backtracked on that. http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/03/google-quietly-backs-away-from-encrypting-new-lollipop-devices-by-default/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/03/google-quietly-backs-...
- mike_hearn 11y agoNew ones are, I think. The Nexus 6 is. Older devices don't necessarily get upgraded. It's a hardware/software issue, not a philosophical issue.
- lern_too_spel 11y agoGoogle devices are, as I said. Mentioning that other Android devices aren't is like saying other Linux distros don't use RPM in response to a statement that Redhat does.
- x0054 11y agoSo are iOS devices that have a passcode and are running iOS 8, and with fingerprint scanning a lot more people have password locked devices. Good article on the subject is here: http://www.darthnull.org/2014/10/06/ios-encryption http://www.darthnull.org/2014/10/06/ios-encryption
- x0054 11y agoAnd yet, with all that wonderful "automated" malware checking Google is also now manually reviewing App. http://blog.lifars.com/2015/03/18/google-now-manually-reviews-apps-in-its-android-play-store/ http://blog.lifars.com/2015/03/18/google-now-manually-review...
- lern_too_spel 11y agoHow does the addition of manual checks against the distribution policies change the fact that Google's malware checking is better than Apple's?
- bhayden 11y agoInstead of condescension, please provide some sources and state your beliefs in a productive way.
- jacquesm 11y agoI think that was more or less the point of the GP minus the condescension bit. Making unqualified statements about what you believe about a large corporation is roughly on par with contesting that particular belief.
- ddebernardy 11y agoThen again Apple has a track record and APIs to put forward. Just about every API in iOS puts privacy first. If you want e.g. location data, the API asks the user's permission -- including with Apple's own apps.
- Menge 11y agoHow do I install any API from apple without providing Apple (and whoever else) with my credit card? The OsX machine at my office is mystifying, am I supposed to provide my personal credit card to apple to get security updates? That is more secure and insures more of my privacy than not entering my credit card into a system I don't trust? I view Apple as insulting my intelligence with promises of "convenience" that amount to being able to give them money on impulse.
- acdha 11y agoApple accounts are free. You can't use iTunes with a free account or get the premium developer offerings (i.e. iOS developer certs) but you don't need to pay to use the OS or get updates.
- pdkl95 11y agoYou seem to be under the impression that you can create one of those "free accounts" without apple tracking those activities. Privacy is not having anybody be able to log your activity, not "everybody but one company I like". Apple's walled garden approach to everything makes apple one of the worst offenders with regards to not just privacy, but freedom as well.
- solarexplorer 11y agoWell, Apple makes most money with hardware. Unlike Google who makes most money with ads. So at least in theory Apple can more easily invest in privacy. EDIT: Check their last quarter's results, Apple makes only 6% of their revenue with online services: https://www.apple.com/pr/pdf/q1fy15datasum.pdf https://www.apple.com/pr/pdf/q1fy15datasum.pdf
- angersock 11y agoI think they actually get most of their revenue from the App store and iTunes--and in neither of those cases is privacy good for business.
- ama729 11y ago> Huberty said that Apple's online services are underappreciated by investors because they accounted for less than 6 percent of the company's revenue over the last 12 months. http://appleinsider.com/articles/14/05/28/apples-app-store-revenue-set-to-overtake-itunes-store-by-the-end-of-this-year http://appleinsider.com/articles/14/05/28/apples-app-store-r...
- digitalzombie 11y agoThere was a reddit post where OP works for a third party company that Apple send Siri voice to. People complained that users didn't read the EULA or whatever. Anyway OP said it was very specific too and crazy. So it doesn't sound like Apple being the champion of privacy.
- gurkendoktor 11y agoWell then be cynical, and let's say that Apple is greedy but believes user privacy is a selling point for its hardware products, just like its accessibility efforts. The result is the same. My iPhone randomises its MAC address when scanning for Wi-Fi, Apple's APIs to ask for user permissions are improving with every release, and iMessage is as secure as a closed-source IM platform can be.
- click170 11y agoIMO DuckDuckGo is the obvious choice of who to partner with. DDG already focuses on privacy as a defining feature, its why I use then as my primary search engine. Seems like a win win for both Mozilla and DDG.
- emilsedgh 11y agoDo you think Mozilla has the resources to compete in that space, regarding Google's dominance? It seems that even Bing is unable to gain meaningful market share.
- bobajeff 11y agoNo. (At least not the way Google and Bing do it.) But they don't have the resources to compete with them in operating systems either and yet they are still trying because they see it as integral to their strategy to strengthen the Web.
- forrestthewoods 11y agoHuh? Mozilla has $307 million a year in revenu. Of that $300 million comes from Google in exchange for being the default search bar. So I'm not sure what you're talking about exactly. Edit: ok, revenue is from Yahoo now. That doesn't make me any less confused as to what parent reply meant though.
- moogly 11y agoThat deal is over. It's Yahoo! now.
- kibwen 11y agoThat $300 million is coming from Yahoo now, actually.
- x0054 11y agoDoes it really take $300 million dollars per year to develop a browser? Ok, fine, a browser, an OS, and a programming language? I am more curious than anything, are there other things that Mozilla does that I am missing?
- glass- 11y agoThey have over 1000 employees.
- PhantomGremlin 11y agoI've also struggled with understanding what Mozilla does with that much money. It's a staggering amount. As for someone else's reply to you, same question. What in the world do they do with 1000 people? And yet they can't develop something useful, like e.g. an improved alternative to Certificate Patrol? That way TÜRKTRUST Bilgi İletişim ve Bilişim Güvenliği Hizmetleri A.Ş. (first certificate in my browser) can't compromise my browsing in the USA. Fine to use them for someone browsing to a website in Elbonia, not so fine for anything that I would ever do. Edit: just to be clear, Turktrust actually did abuse their privileged position, and Mozilla did get rid of them. But why were they there in the first place, and what about the 100 or 1000 other certificates that Firefox comes with?
- j_s 11y agoI must have missed the HN discussion when Mozilla announced they plan to sell [ads based on] browsing history... I'm not sure how that fits in with putting privacy first. It sounds like user info is the only things worth selling!
- LukeShu 11y agoMy understanding of how the ads work is that the browser downloads a list of ads tagged by category, and chooses one to display based on browsing history that never leaves your computer.
- ams6110 11y agoThere is already a privacy respecting search engine, DuckDuckGo
- bobajeff 11y agoWhat does that have to do with my post? (Other than the phrase "search engine") Unless, DuckDuckGo plans on punishing websites that heavily use tracking cookies and/or they're a nonprofit that aims to advance the web they aren't actually relevant to what I was saying.
- mousetraps 11y agoI believe ams6110 meant that there is no need for Mozilla to build their own search engine from the ground up when they could simply partner with DuckDuckGo.
- rossjudson 11y agoWhat is this "content" you speak of, that must be funded through advertising? I checked the internet, and have been able to find very little worthwhile ad-supported content.
- paulryanrogers 11y agoYou must be very selective. I'm curious how you'd feel if it turned out most of Ycombinator's successful ventures depended upon advertising; thereby supporting this very site and community.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- sukilot 11y agoDropBox? AirBnB?
- onewaystreet 11y agoWhat content do you consume that isn't funded through advertising? Unless you don't read any blogs, news websites, use any free services etc.