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Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#61

Post by mkenyon »

kodablah wrote: post #7

I'm confused about a couple of things. First, the tech. So my browsing history is sent over the internet to a third party who comes up with recommendations via some magic opaque system? Can some recommendations be prioritized by how much you pay this third party? I have all sorts of questions about Laserlike's use of the data, but I guess I can dig for myself. Sure, you can say "well, don't use it" but this is more a…

> Second, the reasoning. Why?

Given how they've positioned Pocket and how Firefox's new tab page contains "Recommendations from Pocket", Mozilla seems to want you to enjoy browsing. They want you to enjoy using the Web and to enjoy it using Firefox. It's an interesting play and I'm excited to try it.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#62

Post by O2F2 »

This can not realistically end up as a addon and also will not gain any traction as opt-in option, it needs to be opt-out. So it's either going to be abandoned or end up baked in.

So, unless a considerable part of the userbase is "throwing a tantrum", this will be yet another thing I have to remember to turn off on fresh installs.

Not fighting this kind of erosion tooth and nail at every step endangers the only viable, fully featured, alternative to the Googles browser. Yes, Mozilla needs to be held to a higher standard, the alternative is the inversion of what it stands for.

I have honestly no idea how one can look at this and go yeah, that seems like its in tune with our values.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#63

Post by forapurpose »

dgllghr wrote: post #2

If the privacy settings are right for this, I'm very excited. This is exactly the kind of feature I would like to use but don't because it involves sharing so much of my browsing.

There doesn't seem to be much privacy in the test, but they do say,

> we will not pursue this outside of Test Pilot if we can't do it in a way that's private and which adds genuine end-user value.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17717947

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#64

Post by Skunkleton »

htor wrote: post #60
tapoxi wrote: post #21

I don't get how this relates to Mozilla's mission, I especially don't understand how technologies that are core to their mission (open communication with Thunderbird, open identity with Persona) are left abandoned. I'm not offended by the extension, I'm more befuddled why they're wasting their time and money on something very few people want. My friends/social network are going to suggest cool stuff to read, not some…

agree, agree! mozilla have forgotten their root objective. someone should fork mozilla, remove unneeded features and publish a slimmer, focused version under a new licence.

There are plenty of forks of mozilla products. The real value that mozilla brings is their engineering organization.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#65

Post by cpeterso »

krantos wrote: post #28
StavrosK wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, thanks. Clicking that settings gear doesn't do anything in my browser, I'm afraid. It just looks like a static image, not a menu or an interactable element.

It seems to expand on mouseover so there's a number of things that could probably interfere with that.

The Advance extension disables itself (and its settings gear menu) if you have enabled Firefox's Tracking Protection or DNT.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#66

Post by autoexec »

mgbmtl wrote: post #17

The important bit: "[...] we want people to clearly understand that Laserlike will receive their web browsing history before installing the experiment. We have also included controls so that participants can pause the experiment, see what browser history Laserlike has about them, or request deletion of that information." So, this is basically a better Stumble Upon, where you can delete the data they have on you. How…

I never trust that I can delete my collected data from anyone.

At the point you hit the delete button your data has likely already been spread around to backups (including offline/offsite), been aggregated with other's data, shared with "partners" and sold to other companies and data brokers. The idea that a "delete" button can somehow undo all of that and keep your data out of others hands is absurd.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#67

Post by xg15 »

mkenyon wrote: post #61
kodablah wrote: post #7

I'm confused about a couple of things. First, the tech. So my browsing history is sent over the internet to a third party who comes up with recommendations via some magic opaque system? Can some recommendations be prioritized by how much you pay this third party? I have all sorts of questions about Laserlike's use of the data, but I guess I can dig for myself. Sure, you can say "well, don't use it" but this is more a…

> Second, the reasoning. Why? Given how they've positioned Pocket and how Firefox's new tab page contains "Recommendations from Pocket", Mozilla seems to want you to enjoy browsing. They want you to enjoy using the Web and to enjoy it using Firefox. It's an interesting play and I'm excited to try it.

Strangely, all their ideas to heighten our enjoyment of browsing seem involve giving third parties privileged access to the browser.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#68

Post by htor »

Skunkleton wrote: post #64
htor wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

agree, agree! mozilla have forgotten their root objective. someone should fork mozilla, remove unneeded features and publish a slimmer, focused version under a new licence.

There are plenty of forks of mozilla products. The real value that mozilla brings is their engineering organization.

i'm talking about the entire org, not their products. the org is not bringing in any value by making their engineers research and develop a website recommendation tool in their browser. it should be forked and re-booted by a community with new values and focuses.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#69

Post by tapoxi »

acdha wrote: post #46
tapoxi wrote: post #21

I don't get how this relates to Mozilla's mission, I especially don't understand how technologies that are core to their mission (open communication with Thunderbird, open identity with Persona) are left abandoned. I'm not offended by the extension, I'm more befuddled why they're wasting their time and money on something very few people want. My friends/social network are going to suggest cool stuff to read, not some…

> My friends/social network are going to suggest cool stuff to read, not some startup's bot reading by browsing history. Isn't that how we ended up with Facebook's ad targeting algorithms controlling most people's web experience? Running a cheap experiment testing how alternatives might work seems like important if you care about not having network effects giving a couple of companies significant control over the web…

> Isn't that how we ended up with Facebook's ad targeting algorithms controlling most people's web experience? Running a cheap experiment testing how alternatives might work seems like important if you care about not having network effects giving a couple of companies significant control over the web.

A social network doesn't mean Facebook. It could be an open platform like RSS or Mastodon (the latter I think is more closely aligned with Mozilla's mission, and could use the funding). Friends sharing content with me typically do so over Slack or Discord. I don't know how many people could be convinced to use an app that will algorithmically find something cool if you let it watch what you do all day. That's creepy and the value generated is pretty minimal.

> That was never generally true and it really hasn't been accurate for the last year or two, where performance has been very competitive depending on what you're measuring.

In my case, performance has been slow/stuttery on macOS to the point where I keep actively trying to use it, even enabling WebRender, and falling back to Chrome or Safari. I've also noticed the performance issues on Android. It seems fine on Windows, but not noticeably faster than Chrome or Edge.

Re: Firefox Offers Recommendations with Latest Test Pilot Experiment: Advance

#70

Post by xg15 »

dralley wrote: post #8

Since there are a lot of more hyperbolic articles from "ghacks" and similar ilk going around, I feel compelled to point out straight away that this is explicitly opt-in. You not only have to install the Test Pilot addon, which is not installed by default, but you then have to enable the experiment. The sky is not falling just because they're offering something like this locked behind two separate opt-in steps.

True. However, the fact that something nevertheless is driving even the company who brands itself privacy-first to still explore in this direction tells a lot either about Mozilla or about how strong the forces in the Web ecosystem are right now.
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