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In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

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Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#231

Post by drevil-v2 »

thristian wrote: post #207
avip wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Possibly because affirmative diversity could be seen as incompatible with meritocracy.

"Meritocracy" is an unattainable goal, like "utopia". It sounds good in the abstract, but "merit" is such a subjective concept that it's useless for any practical purpose. Every person's life is as much a product of random chance as innate potential, so there's no objective measure of merit by which a meritocracy could be judged. I'm sure there's reasonable arguments against affirmative diversity in general or Mozill…

How do you define diversity though? How do you slice and dice and at what point do you say it is done?

Say I am a hiring manager at Mozilla and I hire a college graduate from Rwandan not because he is best but because of a diversity quota. What if there is also a Sudanese grad who is looking for a job or a Nepalese transgender MtF? How do I decide at that point?

Is it my call and only my call or should there be regulation and legislation to deal with situations like this? I have one spot and many diverse candidates. How do I choose?

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#232

Post by Insanity »

ecmascript wrote: post #126
Insanity wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Javascript is not the kind of diversity I want! But on a more serious note, from the little I know he got fired because he supported banning same-sex marriage. Which is not just about 'opinion'. That's about discrimination and he should be called out for it.

He funded such a campaign, yes. With his private money on his free time. That is not discrimination. He even wrote sorry for causing hurt and pledged to promote equality at Mozilla. Your comment is a prime example of what's wrong with the tech industry in my opinion.

Happy to be an example against discrimination. :)

People should be held accountable for such views. It should be clear to anyone that having "an opinion" which discriminates a whole group of people is not that same as sharing an opinion about Star Wars..

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#233

Post by Grumbledour »

hanniabu wrote: post #36

A big reason why I stick with Chrome is because Firefox's menu pisses me off how it's this popup box with huge icon rather than Chrome's more traditional list of text. Sounds stupid, but that's a big enough reason for me.

I guess it just shows your privacy is not that important to you, which seems always to be the point with many posters here who, while complaining loudly about google, present rather minor reasons why they can't use firefox ever.

That being said, while I vaguely remember there being huge icons at some point for a few versions, there aren't any now in my Firefox. Just a normal looking menu with small icons on the left and text on the right. I can't promise this is true for every platform, but maybe you want to take another look.

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#234

Post by RobertRoberts »

oarsinsync wrote: post #221
RobertRoberts wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what if you want to only support software development and not social development? I think this is the crux of this thread of discussion.

I'm not sure that's a compatible position to be having, especially in the context of wanting a privacy-focused browser alternative to Chrome. It's inherently a social development in the form of software.

Development of code is a technical action. Can you explain why a secondary action outside of writing code is required simply based on the results of the code?

Surely you aren't suggesting that for Google to develop anti-privacy code would require them to have anti-privacy social development?

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#235

Post by mcv »

avip wrote: post #175
interactivecode wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yikes why would you not want companies investing in diversity? Especially if they are the interface to our online world?

Possibly because affirmative diversity could be seen as incompatible with meritocracy.

But a lack of diversity is a sign of a lack of meritocracy: clearly not all talent gets an equal chance to flourish. Trying to get more talent on board is valuable.

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#236

Post by sciurus »

martin_a wrote: post #156
sakisv wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no way to ensure this, so I will not give any money at all. Please keep in mind that this is not a personal attack as I don't know you and I don't find it particularly constructive to engage in this kind of attacks, so please only focus on my argument: I cannot understand this way of thinking. On one hand we have the option to give Mozilla some money to use them however they see fit. This means that from t…

> I cannot understand this way of thinking. I want Mozilla to build a browser and a mail program. Nothing else. It's easy as that. And if I have to "fear" that they will use my money to build something else, I will not donate to them. Think of them as a company with several products. People would buy Firefox, they would buy Thunderbird, but probably nobody would buy the aforementioned "moz://" product or Pocket. In a…

FWIW people do buy Pocket.

https://getpocket.com/premium?ep=1

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#237

Post by [deleted] »

newscracker wrote: post #55

Those who want a world where Firefox has a higher market share and mind share, please consider doing the following: 1. Evangelize Firefox to people you know any chance you get and show them all the reasons why its better than Chrome (focus on privacy as an important point). Show them how great browsing can be with a few key extensions (like uBlock Origin, Containers, Privacy Possum, etc.). This does not imply that Mo…

[deleted]

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#238

Post by TeMPOraL »

IanPBann wrote: post #230
TeMPOraL wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the necessity of insurance salesmen . It's a particular way the industry decided to organize itself, but it isn't prima facie necessary for insurance - the valuable part - to function. As for taxes and traffic stops, these help me and people around me. Advertising is made to hurt me, to rob me of my money by subtly manipulating my consumption choices. It's a malicious act.

While some advertisements may be dishonest, I don't feel that that can be said of advertising. Advertising is absolutely designed to part you of your money, but that isn't necessarily bad for you. If I see an advertisement for a good or service which I purchase because of the ad and which subsequently benefits my life, yes the advertiser has profited, but so have I. If I make a product which benefits humanity (say so…

> While some advertisements may be dishonest, I don't feel that that can be said of advertising.

I believe that it's not some, but upwards of 90% of advertisements that are manipulative and dishonest, and that's before talking about methods of delivery. Therefore, I feel justified in accusing the whole industry.

I've expanded on the topic at length here: http://jacek.zlydach.pl/blog/2019-07-31-ads-as-cancer.html.

> If I see an advertisement for a good or service which I purchase because of the ad and which subsequently benefits my life, yes the advertiser has profited, but so have I.

That's arguably a rare case. Of most product categories that are advertised you're already aware of, the goal of the advertising is to make you choose one option over other for reasons other than the value you'll get for your money.

> If I make a product which benefits humanity (say something that's a better quality, more environmentally friendly alternative to a popular product) is it not more selfish not not advertise and spread the word?

The word about that product being on the market should be spread, and it could be without getting into all the negative aspects of advertising iff everyone's attention wasn't already saturated by all the other companies advertising indiscriminately. When everyone's shouting through the megaphone at each other, you have to pick a megaphone too just to have a chance of being heard. What I'm arguing is to take everyone's megaphones away, so that we could all talk to each other.

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#239

Post by ckosidows »

iforgotpassword wrote: post #170
a254613e wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To offer a bit of an opposite view here on HN: I give firefox a shot from time to time. I switch all devices to it, and then I use it exclusively all the time. My most recent attempt failed few days ago, after a bit more than a month with it. Firefox performance just doesn't feel the same as chrome, from constant small freezes, to using 100% CPU pretty often. And just overall experience on some platforms - especially…

On desktop I just don't feel any difference. There might be one but it's not perceivable to me. I haven't found a site that doesn't work there in ages. And I have an old fire tablet from 2012 at home that I don't really use anymore, but chrome is unusably slow on it while Firefox still works, which I found interesting. Only thing is that touch recognition on Firefox is worse than chrome. Chrome somehow gets stuff lik…

I've had a Google conferencing app fail before on FF when it worked fine on Chrome. That's about my only experience though. I've been on FF on my laptops for over a year now and they've been fine otherwise. Mobile, on the other hand, will probably always be chrome. I just hate the FF mobile app.

Re: In a swipe at Chrome, Firefox now blocks ad trackers by default

#240

Post by alfromspace »

brianpgordon wrote: post #147
richthegeek wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose if he wanted to donate to a diversity campaign, he'd donate to one directly. Wikipedia is a big one for this: the donation campaign is all about 'keeping our servers running', and then huge chunks of the spending goes on community feelgood stuff. I've nothing against diversity campaigning but if you were to treat donation like any other 'purchase' you'd be pretty miffed if you thought you were ordering a ch…

> I suppose if he wanted to donate to a diversity campaign, he'd donate to one directly. This interpretation of his comment is... generous. I agree that there's a legitimate point around wanting your donation to go specifically to browser development and not overhead or other side-projects, but it's pretty clear that he was using the word diversity contemptuously.

I can't speak for the OP, but just so we don't a priori pin opposition to diversity campaigns as indefensible, I really loathe them. It's a real position people have!
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