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From other comments here, it sounds like data shows that this one is good for users. You can argue that other extensions might help, but this one has had an act

From other comments here, it sounds like data shows that this one is good for users. You can argue that other extensions might help, but this one has had an actual investigation done proving its benefit.

JadeNB 11y ago
It seems likely that there are lots of other extensions that would also pass the bar of "users" (even 'lots of users'!) "like it in tests". (Also, not to be nit-picky but because I think it's an important distinction, I don't think the investigation here "proved its benefit", but rather showed only that those users tested liked it. I suspect every designer would agree that bundling everything a user wants leads, almost paradoxically, to an unuseable mess.)
- azakai 11y ago
  There might be more. But tests are time-consuming and can't be done on everything. Also, the number of addons you want to preinstall has to be quite small - past a certain limit, it's too much clutter in the UI, as you correctly said (and indeed the number is very tiny: Pocket, Hello, and Search if you count that). Given the data available, Firefox is a better browser with Pocket than without, on average, for Firefox users. That's justification for bundling it. Perhaps more data will be collected and other addons might be considered later, but again, the bar gets higher and higher since the total number has to remain small.
  - JadeNB 11y ago
    > Also, the number of addons you want to preinstall has to be quite small - past a certain limit, it's too much clutter in the UI, as you correctly said (and indeed the number is very tiny: Pocket, Hello, and Search if you count that). I think that the wording here is important: Pocket is not an add-on, at least in the sense that I understand it: when I go to Tools > Add-ons, nothing there allows me to disable or remove it. (I can't find it now, but I thought that one used to be able to manage search providers in a similar window.) Add-ons are by their nature trivial to disable or remove, and a solution involving going into about:config, where the user is explicitly warned of the dangers—in language far more frightening to a non-techie than any opt-in could be—is not trivial at all.
    - azakai 11y ago
      That's true. As mburns commented above, it looks like the goal is in fact to do the extra work in order to turn Pocket into an addon, for the reasons you mention.
  - zurn 11y ago
    Adding a useful feature that also does evil things behind the scenes can be seen a net positive for (uninformed?) users, but that is still not an excuse for piggybacking the evil things. You should let users have all the value from new useful features, instead of just keeping the balance barely positive after bundling some bad stuff.
  - Trombone12 11y ago
    Dude, an ad-blocker is a no-brainer for an addon that basically every user would love. For instance because your playlists on youtube no longer get interrupted by awful ads, and thus serve as a decent radio.
    - rockdoe 11y ago
      http://www.ghacks.net/2015/03/27/firefox-39-tracking-protection-for-private-browsing-mode/ http://www.ghacks.net/2015/03/27/firefox-39-tracking-protect...
- dingaling 11y ago
  There was an interesting observation on moz-dev last month: Firefox users like to download videos. A lot. 15 of the top 40 add-ons downloaded this week are video downloaders So they certainly know what users like... and then ignore that data. https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/firefox-dev/2015-June/002985.html https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/firefox-dev/2015-June/002...

JadeNB 11y ago

It seems likely that there are lots of other extensions that would also pass the bar of "users" (even 'lots of users'!) "like it in tests". (Also, not to be nit-picky but because I think it's an important distinction, I don't think the investigation here "proved its benefit", but rather showed only that those users tested liked it. I suspect every designer would agree that bundling everything a user wants leads, almost paradoxically, to an unuseable mess.)

azakai 11y ago
There might be more. But tests are time-consuming and can't be done on everything. Also, the number of addons you want to preinstall has to be quite small - past a certain limit, it's too much clutter in the UI, as you correctly said (and indeed the number is very tiny: Pocket, Hello, and Search if you count that). Given the data available, Firefox is a better browser with Pocket than without, on average, for Firefox users. That's justification for bundling it. Perhaps more data will be collected and other addons might be considered later, but again, the bar gets higher and higher since the total number has to remain small.
- JadeNB 11y ago
  > Also, the number of addons you want to preinstall has to be quite small - past a certain limit, it's too much clutter in the UI, as you correctly said (and indeed the number is very tiny: Pocket, Hello, and Search if you count that). I think that the wording here is important: Pocket is not an add-on, at least in the sense that I understand it: when I go to Tools > Add-ons, nothing there allows me to disable or remove it. (I can't find it now, but I thought that one used to be able to manage search providers in a similar window.) Add-ons are by their nature trivial to disable or remove, and a solution involving going into about:config, where the user is explicitly warned of the dangers—in language far more frightening to a non-techie than any opt-in could be—is not trivial at all.
  - azakai 11y ago
    That's true. As mburns commented above, it looks like the goal is in fact to do the extra work in order to turn Pocket into an addon, for the reasons you mention.
- zurn 11y ago
  Adding a useful feature that also does evil things behind the scenes can be seen a net positive for (uninformed?) users, but that is still not an excuse for piggybacking the evil things. You should let users have all the value from new useful features, instead of just keeping the balance barely positive after bundling some bad stuff.
- Trombone12 11y ago
  Dude, an ad-blocker is a no-brainer for an addon that basically every user would love. For instance because your playlists on youtube no longer get interrupted by awful ads, and thus serve as a decent radio.
  - rockdoe 11y ago
    http://www.ghacks.net/2015/03/27/firefox-39-tracking-protection-for-private-browsing-mode/ http://www.ghacks.net/2015/03/27/firefox-39-tracking-protect...
dingaling 11y ago
There was an interesting observation on moz-dev last month: Firefox users like to download videos. A lot. 15 of the top 40 add-ons downloaded this week are video downloaders So they certainly know what users like... and then ignore that data. https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/firefox-dev/2015-June/002985.html https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/firefox-dev/2015-June/002...