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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

#191
post #187
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not really that "out there", you just don't see it because the vast majority of companies take the money you give them, and spend it on one of two things: 1) operations, or 2) shareholder dividends/profits/etc. (with most going to #1 for normal companies). Operations, of course, includes employee salaries, building rent, utilities, but also new development/R&D, advertising, etc. (I might not be using the tot…

Your analogy is off, because (for example) the OP specifically said that they didn’t want the money to be spent on other things Mozilla does even if those things generate more money for Firefox in the end. That’s the analogy for spending the money on rent or advertising, or building a ball pit (be it called Pocket or VPN) in order to bring in more users.

I thought he was implying Mozilla Foundation's outreach and advocacy programs.

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

#192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. "Free as in freedom".

To be as charitable as possible to the grandparent, it may depend on whether there are any closed-source elements to the cloud services. We don't know for certain because it has yet to be announced. (Of course there's no realistic chance of that happening given Mozilla's foundational principles and solid track record thereof.)

Aren't all the server side components of Pocket closed source?

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

#193
post #71

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…

1. Rust _is_ helping Firefox development, and is a key part of why Firefox is remaining competitive. And they should have the flexibility to invest back into future R&D, and into supporting the open source projects that they depend on. That's part of what makes Mozilla so great as a company, and why many of us love it. 2. For the paid version that seems fine. But it seems fair that the free version of Firefox needs t…

> Rust _is_ helping Firefox development, and is a key part of why Firefox is remaining competitive.

You don't know that. What if all the money that went into Rust would have been spent on a new renderer in C++?

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

#194

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…

Adding my comment from the other thread since it also applies here. I agree, I'd be interested in this as well. Based on the replies you're getting, I'd also like to point out that I'm tired of this trend in discussions: Person A states their preferences regarding a product and says that they wish that the company would offer certain options. Person A says that they would be more likely to buy (or would only buy) the…

I would add to this that Person A's comment is almost always upvoted near the top of the post as it is in this case, which immediately disproves Person B's characterization of A's preferences as "niche".

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

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a default search engine and default first tab is fine as two examples where that list of demands is excessive. And depending on what “no network connections to third-party hosts unless I’ve explicitly opted in” means, this probably breaks CDNs, multi-host content serving, and lots of common js distribution mechanisms in ways that normal users will find confusing and result in “Firefox doesn’t work” if that’s…

I'm pretty sure the poster meant no 3rd party connections initiated by Firefox independently of what's in the actual HTML it's loading. No telemetry, in other words. I strongly agree that telemetry features should be excluded.

Really? Isn’t the telemetry in the HTML on most sites?

I assumed they were looking to block any cross-origin fetch that they hadn’t whitelisted.

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

#196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The OP is what I responded to. That idea is what I described as a train-wreck. And I stand by it. I agree it's not a train-wreck to have your browser offer the choice of Google, Ask Jeeves or Lycos upon performing the first search. What this is is pointless. Nearly everyone doesn't care and will just reflexively select Google. The remaining people will have changed the setting themselves anyway.

Not pointless. A step in the right direction. And a step we should all take in the software we develop, because defaults matter.

And your opinion trumps mine.

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

#197
post #104
post #80

Finally, a proper way to vote with my wallet in the browser wars. I'm sure Firefox can make more money from me individually by allowing me to pay them, rather than funneling me through Google for some eyeball $$$s, especially since I've personally switched to DuckDuckGo. Actually that makes me wonder - how does Mozilla currently make money off me if I've stopped using Google searches in Firefox?

How much would you pay for Firefox per year?

It depends on what other value adds they bolt onto their "Firefox Pro" offering.

Just for Firefox itself as it currently is, if there was some official way to pay for it, I think $5-10 (some small multiple of a cup of coffee deal) is fair to support development for what is essentially the only remaining competitor to Google.

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

#198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really hope there is a Paid Mozilla email service in there somewhere. That's what will get me to instantly sign up.

I've been donating to Thunderbird the past few years when it started accepting donations just for it (instead of being a donation to Mozilla though Thunderbird was spun off as a community driven project with some support from Mozilla). If Mozilla comes with a paid email service focusing on privacy that's not just a white label rebranding of ProtonMail (which I won't use) or another existing provider, I'd surely be on…

Why would you not use ProtonMail? Genuine case of out of the loop.

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

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why that is excessive, except that Mozilla made (maybe still does, I'm not sure) most of their money from getting paid to put search engines as their default. How hard is it to pop a dialog in the installer or on first run to let you pick? I don't think that is unreasonable. And the default tab just means loading a blank tab up. The last time I used Firefox, this was already a setting that you could pick…

When I last installed it, the default tab was the Firefox home page (or some other Mozilla landing page), which seems perfectly reasonable to me. I find a lot of open source software insufficiently opinionated. Can't decide? Make it an option. Want to be "fair" to all? Make it an option and prompt the user during installation! As a user, I like when I have options but when some kind of sensible default has been pre-s…

You may be surprised at what the default looks like now-

https://i.imgur.com/hGe837H.png

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

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not pointless. A step in the right direction. And a step we should all take in the software we develop, because defaults matter.

And your opinion trumps mine.

https://www.darkpatterns.org/
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