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The Browser Monopoly

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Re: The Browser Monopoly

#41

Post by majewsky »

IggleSniggle wrote: post #36
mcv wrote: post #20

I recently ditched Chrome and switched back to Firefox, at home and on my mobile, only to discover that a surprising number of sites don't work in Firefox. In particular: Twitter doesn't work on Firefox Mobile. Most work fine, but still, I ended up switching to Safari, to discover that it's just not quite as good an experience as Firefox or Chrome.

I just tried Twitter on iOS in Firefox where I have the strict privacy settings enabled including with Safari Firefox Focus content blocking turned on, and Twitter worked fine. In what way does it not work for you?

Firefox on iOS uses Safari's rendering engine. Maybe mcv is referring to Gecko-powered Firefox on Android?

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#43

Post by jsutton »

basch wrote: post #3

>Chrome introduced a lot of neat new features (Porn “Incognito Mode,” multithreaded memory changes, tabs and more). Now chrome is getting credit for in private browsing and tabs? (Safari and Opera respectively. Phoenix/Firefox popularized them long before Chrome was a twinkle.) >It is mind-boggling that basic tools like these are not yet standard features in browsers. How long have browsers offered to save passwords?…

Password managers don't hold your password in plaintext, so the liability there only exists if you don't think the latest encryption methods are enough.

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#44

Post by jfk13 »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #34
aluren wrote: post #23

I don't get why people (I mean technically minded people who are aware of privacy issues and so on) don't just use firefox. They are pretty much at feature parity (Firefox may even get the edge due to the fantastic extensions ecosystem), except one spies on you and the other doesn't. Why do people find the switch so hard? In addition, Firefox + ublokc origin is pretty much the only option on mobile if you want to blo…

The biggest problem is the subtle frustrations if you use Google websites or services at all, since Google builds the Internet explicitly for Chrome, and sometimes works on other browsers okay-ish. reCAPTCHA harassment is particularly egregious too. I'm a Firefox user, but I've also already excised most of the rest of Google from my life. If you're still using Gmail, you're likely to stick with Chrome.

I use Gmail, but through Thunderbird and occasionally Firefox. Works pretty well for me. I keep Chrome around mainly for occasional compatibility testing.

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#45

Post by cameronbrown »

aluren wrote: post #23

I don't get why people (I mean technically minded people who are aware of privacy issues and so on) don't just use firefox. They are pretty much at feature parity (Firefox may even get the edge due to the fantastic extensions ecosystem), except one spies on you and the other doesn't. Why do people find the switch so hard? In addition, Firefox + ublokc origin is pretty much the only option on mobile if you want to blo…

I want to like Firefox, and I use it regularly, but I just veer back to Chrome. I still prefer the UI and extensions (which Chrome still has the 'edge' in).

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#46

Post by jfk13 »

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #35

Am I the only one that doesn't like chrome? There has always been a "weird feel" to it that I don't like. I used to really like Konqueror, so I guess its mostly the interface that gets to me. ...As I type this I look the sandwich menu, and lack of search bar in firefox and I die a little inside.

You want a separate search field? Just go to Customise and drag it to the toolbar.

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#47

Post by IggleSniggle »

sebazzz wrote: post #33
abtinf wrote: post #5

I was shocked to see the browser market share graph. Chrome appears to be collapsing on itself, dropping from from an all-time high of 65.4% to 55.4% in just 16 months, effectively losing all share gains since 2016. But then I looked closer at the data, noticing that only net 120 basis points of the change can be explained by share changes in the other browsers. The rest of the data seems to be missing, as the number…

I am also wondering why Opera (=Presto) is in that graph. Since the latest Opera is Chromium-based I would expect it to be counted as Chromium.

Importantly, implemented on top of Chromium does not mean feature parity with Chrome.

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#48

Post by The_rationalist »

abtinf wrote: post #39
basch wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently InternetWorks and Netcaptor came before Opera. I shouldnt be so cocky. https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-history-of-tabbed-browsing

> I shouldnt be so cocky. Off-topic, but I don't think its about being cocky. For me, the most difficult thing to keep in mind about information technology is that it is entirely a construct of the human mind and we haven't yet devised methods to validate it against reality. We see things as they are now and think "well, of course it has to be that way." That kind of view is true in a lot of fields--a rocket ship has…

The idea that computing can and should be fundamentally reinvented has been the most exciting discovery of my life. Sorry but you hype me but don't deliver. This seems fascinating but is far too vague to be actionable, could you exemplify what are computing reinvention?

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#49

Post by rsynnott »

HNcantBtrustd wrote: post #7
tannhaeuser wrote: post #2

> Firefox is a fine browser by itself [...] I have the comfort of knowing that my personal information is protected (to the extent possible) – and also that my portal to the web is not custom-built to track me and serve me ads FF is fantastic, but the uncomfortable question is, will it always be, given Mozilla has to found further development and is financed by Google's money as well? Apple's Safari actually has bett…

>Apple's Safari actually has better standing in terms of alignment of user and developer incentives. Apple gets credit for being aligned with users and developers? Out of any of the tech companies, I see Apple the most detached from their users and developers. Forcing proprietary software, hardware, and accessories is not "for users and developers". That's Apple's way of generating additional sales and data for Apple…

I assume they meant aligned _with respect to users and developers_. Google is primarily an advertising company, and Firefox's revenue comes mostly from Google. Apple has no interests in ads these days (and their old ad platform never did browser ads anyway), so you don't have the same sort of competing incentives.

Re: The Browser Monopoly

#50

Post by techntoke »

aluren wrote: post #23

I don't get why people (I mean technically minded people who are aware of privacy issues and so on) don't just use firefox. They are pretty much at feature parity (Firefox may even get the edge due to the fantastic extensions ecosystem), except one spies on you and the other doesn't. Why do people find the switch so hard? In addition, Firefox + ublokc origin is pretty much the only option on mobile if you want to blo…

First, a lot of technically minded people run Linux and want to have hardware-accelerated video decoding for performance and Firefox isn't focused on supporting this for Linux, but it does work on multiple distros for Chromium.

In terms of mobile, me guesses you haven't got the news about Mozilla doing away with extensions for newer versions. Plus there are other open source browsers with extension support, even based on Chromium.

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