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Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

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Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#91

Post by cassianoleal »

BlackLotus89 wrote: post #74
ssorallen wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chrome’s Profiles are the #1 reason I use it over Firefox. If Firefox had as complete of an implementation as Chrome then I would consider switching, but until then Firefox is a non-starter for me. I use all 3 of these profiles all day every day for work: * one personal profile logged into personal Google * one work profile managed by the company, logged into company Google * one development profile with all the debu…

Why not use the firefox profiles? I also use multiple profiles. My setup is as fallows. firefox -ProfileManager Create 2 profiles work and private. Change the theme of work to orange and private to black. Create two .desktop files and append to the Exec line -P work (or private) and the Name to include (work) I have work on desktop 5 and private on desktop 8 and 9. Works like a charme for me. Additional bonus. Use co…

Or, just open `about:profiles` and press buttons.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#92

Post by jjcm »

Here's my perspective on this - Chrome has established itself as the baseline. The baseline is no longer the W3C standard, it's Chrome due to all of the experimental future W3C spec items being in Chrome. Chrome leads the spec, and with its 70% market share developers allow it to.

Firefox will always be playing catchup because of this, regardless of their market share. This leaves three main reasons for using Firefox:

1.) decoupling from Google / ad privacy

2.) promoting browser ecosystem health

3.) familiarity / history of use

Unfortunately, these three items lead to a very narrow TAM, especially when talking purely about new users. The gap will continue to grow as sites that work in Chrome but don't work in Firefox, despite the site using things not in the W3C spec, will be seen as Firefox issues by non-technical users. These users will eventually default to Chrome.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#93

Post by tayo42 »

chockablocker wrote: post #61

Everybody is moving to mobile and almost nobody uses Firefox on mobile. However, Firefox mobile does support extensions. Is that something that could emphasized? However, Firefox speed on mobile is much slower than Chrome. That should probably be improved upon. For desktop there's not much of a distinguishing factor left. Chrome is good enough. I like Firefox for the privacy, but is that enough of a distinguishing fa…

I use firefox on android. Its frustrating at times. It doesn't integrate well with android stuff like opening up in apps I think. It takes me to the app store or doesnt even open in apps. Google stuff like looking at reviews doesn't work in firefox.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#94

Post by cassianoleal »

benjamir wrote: post #70
ssorallen wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chrome’s Profiles are the #1 reason I use it over Firefox. If Firefox had as complete of an implementation as Chrome then I would consider switching, but until then Firefox is a non-starter for me. I use all 3 of these profiles all day every day for work: * one personal profile logged into personal Google * one work profile managed by the company, logged into company Google * one development profile with all the debu…

headscratch I used profiles with Ff for ages... what is the difference to Chrome's?

In Chrome there's an icon you click to switch. Honestly, if someone would create a FF extension that was just that, it would probably cover 90% of what's considered superior in Chrome.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#95

Post by selfhoster11 »

loudtieblahblah wrote: post #66
selfhoster11 wrote: post #2

They should focus on saving Firefox. - Cut out all (or at the very least, most) initiatives that don't serve the goal of promoting Firefox's market share or sustainability going forward - Donate the major money drains that aren't Firefox to the Apache Foundation or another worthy custodian - Fire all inessential staff that don't want to work on Firefox. - Get a CEO/upper management that are in it for the passion, not…

If all that is left is chromium, then you can kiss what is left of web standards good bye. Google will set the standard, taking input from any other tech player big enough to have a seat at the table. Its bad enough ISO certification boards and official positions of the W3C can be bought or corrupted. Let there be only one engine, controlled by Google? And even the pretense of a open and fair playing field goes away.…

Exactly. This is why Mozilla, as the only credible custodian of the only credible Chromium/Blink/WebKit competitor, needs to wake up and die trying to stop that future, if needed. If they lose that war, there is no reason for them to exist over Brave or Vivaldi, for example.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#96

Post by zelphirkalt »

BlackLotus89 wrote: post #74
ssorallen wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chrome’s Profiles are the #1 reason I use it over Firefox. If Firefox had as complete of an implementation as Chrome then I would consider switching, but until then Firefox is a non-starter for me. I use all 3 of these profiles all day every day for work: * one personal profile logged into personal Google * one work profile managed by the company, logged into company Google * one development profile with all the debu…

Why not use the firefox profiles? I also use multiple profiles. My setup is as fallows. firefox -ProfileManager Create 2 profiles work and private. Change the theme of work to orange and private to black. Create two .desktop files and append to the Exec line -P work (or private) and the Name to include (work) I have work on desktop 5 and private on desktop 8 and 9. Works like a charme for me. Additional bonus. Use co…

They probably don't know, because Firefox doesn't bump your nose into the fact, that it has profiles.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#98

Post by selfhoster11 »

2Gkashmiri wrote: post #83
selfhoster11 wrote: post #2

They should focus on saving Firefox. - Cut out all (or at the very least, most) initiatives that don't serve the goal of promoting Firefox's market share or sustainability going forward - Donate the major money drains that aren't Firefox to the Apache Foundation or another worthy custodian - Fire all inessential staff that don't want to work on Firefox. - Get a CEO/upper management that are in it for the passion, not…

can we just eat the execs? on a more serious note, what if mozilla fires ALL execs? will it just crumble under its own weight or will that "industry linked remuneration" be replaced with more money for actual developers who get things done and are not in for the quick buck like address bar ads?

I'm hoping for the latter. Or if not, the that if the Firefox collapsed, it would re-emerge in some fashion as a grassroots community project with non-Mozilla governance.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#99

Post by thisisonthetest »

lovehashbrowns wrote: post #63

I want to be done with Firefox so badly. I just don't want to go to Google. There's this really obnoxious issue where search in the address bar has taken a complete dive recently. For example, if I want to go to reddit.com/r/videos and it's a page I go to often, I can't just type "videos" because the suggestions that come up are links to threads I've visited recently. None of the suggestions are to reddit.com/r/video…

I left long ago for Vivaldi. Glad I was gone for the ads in the search bar by default. That kind of behavior, to me, shows a change in priorities away from the user.

In Vivaldi you can set nicknames for bookmarks. So you could type

“Ctrl+L” to select the address bar

then

“rv” or “vid” or whatever you want, to take you to the bookmarked r/videos page, which you can also leave out of the bookmarks bar if you don’t want the clutter

I do this all the time now, since most websites I visit are my frequently visited (probably true for everyone). Optimize life’s most used code paths my friend and come on over to Vivaldi. This is not a paid ad lol.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?

#100

Post by bokchoi »

horsawlarway wrote: post #33

This is my personal opinion only, so take it with a grain of salt. ---- Mozilla can't save Firefox. It's not that Firefox can't be saved, but rather that Mozilla as an organization is not capable of doing so. My take is this - Despite a history of being relatively privacy friendly, the vast majority of funding for the organization comes directly from Google (To the tune of ~90% of their total funding, straight from G…

As far as paid products go, it seems like a no brainer to offer paid plans for privacy focused email or other g-suite-like collaboration services. It seems like Mozilla needs additional revenue streams.
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