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Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

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Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#31

Post by sametmax »

weinzierl wrote: post #25

I'd be happy to pay for Firefox, but I have a few points that are important to me. They are probably not very realistic but here they are anyway: 1. I would like my money to go into Firefox development and nowhere else. I certainly don't want my money spent on their content business, even if it is used as a leverage to generate more money for Firefox development. I'm torn about Rust development because I certainly wo…

I'm pretty sure you are right now paying a lot more money to companies doing a lot less efforts Mozilla is currently doing. And now you are asking even more of them, just as a condition for maybe giving them something day.

See, that's one of the weirdest problem in FOSS: the fans hold them to a way too high standard, making it twice as hard to thrive. Once because it's hard to make money as an open source, benevolent product in a world of free for all. And another time because the very people that should be supporting you will always say you don't do enough.

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#32

Post by sametmax »

Millennium wrote: post #28

Good luck to them, assuming they stick to their principles. But IIRC, experiments with paid browsers have typically not ended well. What makes them think they can pull it off?

Because:

- it's only an experimental additional source of revenue. They already got money covered, they are just trying to find new way to become more financially independent.

- they don't intend to sell the current state of Firefox. It will still be free. They intend to add stuff on top of the already awesome experience.

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#33

Post by [deleted] »

weinzierl wrote: post #25

I'd be happy to pay for Firefox, but I have a few points that are important to me. They are probably not very realistic but here they are anyway: 1. I would like my money to go into Firefox development and nowhere else. I certainly don't want my money spent on their content business, even if it is used as a leverage to generate more money for Firefox development. I'm torn about Rust development because I certainly wo…

[deleted]

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#34

Post by bambax »

Chrome crippling adblockers creates a huge opportunity for paid competition. I would gladly buy a browser just to be sure adblock will always work.

Of course, FF + uBO is free, and one can always make donations. But buying a product feels different.

Also, businesses can expense what they buy with an invoice -- usually not the case with donations.

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#35

Post by heinrichhartman »

weinzierl wrote: post #25

I'd be happy to pay for Firefox, but I have a few points that are important to me. They are probably not very realistic but here they are anyway: 1. I would like my money to go into Firefox development and nowhere else. I certainly don't want my money spent on their content business, even if it is used as a leverage to generate more money for Firefox development. I'm torn about Rust development because I certainly wo…

It's very unlikely that this will happen. Payed subscriptions to news-websites/magazines are also not advertising free. When you have demonstrated you are willing to pay money for a service, you are likely to also spent money on other goods. This only makes you more attractive as an advertising target.

Most likely we will see premium features like: - premium color themes - more cloud storage for settings and extensions - analytics on your browsing data (after you hand the data over to them) (??) - more customer support (???)

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#36

Post by coldtea »

sametmax wrote: post #31
weinzierl wrote: post #25

I'd be happy to pay for Firefox, but I have a few points that are important to me. They are probably not very realistic but here they are anyway: 1. I would like my money to go into Firefox development and nowhere else. I certainly don't want my money spent on their content business, even if it is used as a leverage to generate more money for Firefox development. I'm torn about Rust development because I certainly wo…

I'm pretty sure you are right now paying a lot more money to companies doing a lot less efforts Mozilla is currently doing. And now you are asking even more of them, just as a condition for maybe giving them something day. See, that's one of the weirdest problem in FOSS: the fans hold them to a way too high standard, making it twice as hard to thrive. Once because it's hard to make money as an open source, benevolent…

>I'm pretty sure you are right now paying a lot more money to companies doing a lot less efforts Mozilla is currently doing. And now you are asking even more of them, just as a condition for maybe giving them something day.

No, right now I'm not paying a dime to companies that don't provide me with the products I want.

Parent is talking about being a customer, not a charity.

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#37

Post by nallerooth »

Millennium wrote: post #28

Good luck to them, assuming they stick to their principles. But IIRC, experiments with paid browsers have typically not ended well. What makes them think they can pull it off?

My guess is that they won't be performing experiments with paying users, for two reasons:

1. Paying users are too valuable.

2. Free users can "opt out" of experiments by paying - and they'll get some nice features for "free" as they do so.

(Edit, formatting)

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#38

Post by pixelrevision »

weinzierl wrote: post #25

I'd be happy to pay for Firefox, but I have a few points that are important to me. They are probably not very realistic but here they are anyway: 1. I would like my money to go into Firefox development and nowhere else. I certainly don't want my money spent on their content business, even if it is used as a leverage to generate more money for Firefox development. I'm torn about Rust development because I certainly wo…

Just donate instead and let them know you want all your money to go straight into Firefox if possible: https://donate.mozilla.org/en-US/

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#39

Post by wyc »

There is a class of products with strong elements of charitable contribution. For example Plex Pass, endangered species chocolate, LWN subscription, and select blockchain tokens--and maybe this too. There are hard to pin down non-commercial benefits to purchasers mixed in with traditional value drivers.

With Plex, I purchased a lifetime membership not because I valued any of the added features (I don't use them to this day), but because I got so much value out of the project that I felt indebted and wished to express my gratitude. I wanted the project to live on, and I also got to brag about my deeds on tech forums. The incredible scaling characteristics of software allow me to already enjoy most of the benefit from the free/open base edition alone.

Here are reasons for my "charity-driven" purchases:

- Admiration for project vision and desire to ensure its longevity

- A sense of gratitude due to incommensurate value enjoyed for very cheap or free

- Wanting to belong to the community and feel like part of the journey

I find myself valuing these items as "real commercial benefit":

- Strong privacy guarantees

- Cost-plus models such as selling managed storage, bandwidth, etc.

- Subscription to updates backed by regular human labor

- Access to premium support/SLA

Re: Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall

#40

Post by jasonhansel »

Millennium wrote: post #27
nexuist wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it still FOSS if it's paid?

As long as all of the source is available under FOSS licenses, yes. Free as in speech, not free as in beer, remember? Question is, will Mozilla actually stick to that? What the paid features also be open-source, at least to whatever extent the concept of source code applies?

Ideally, Mozilla would let us pay to use their servers, while also providing an OSS self-hosted version with equivalent functionality.

(Firefox is available under the MPL, which is a sort of compromise between copyleft and MIT-style licenses. So it'd be difficult to make any new FF feature entirely closed source.)

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