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Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#351

Post by llsf »

Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #345

That's sad, many of them would have joined Mozilla not just for money but genuinely believing they are working for social good and they did. I understood how bad Mozilla, for lack of a better term 'sucked' at making money when I saw how the small team of KaiOS picked up the remains of Firefox OS and not only turned it to be a viable business but did so in the ruthless, hyper-competitive market of Smartphone OS ecosys…

I could have seen Mozilla build an enhanced email service like Hey! Actually, they could still probably do it, it would align with their focus on privacy and experience with email reader.

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#352

Post by echelon »

They were doing fine until Chrome ate up all the market share.

Google shouldn't have been allowed to do that. It's very anti-competitive for them to have a browser that defaults to Google search and disables plugins that support adblocking.

Google is destroying Mozilla. Their monopoly is making the web worse.

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#354

Post by ytpete »

jacquesm wrote: post #347
barrkel wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counterpoint: Apple when Jobs came back. Sometimes the answer to a company which is trying too many things at random is to drastically reduce the dispersion of effort, and focus ruthlessly. It's very hard to do psychologically, though. IMO Mozilla would probably be better served, business-wise, as being "the customizable Chrome". It would be a much smaller business (i.e. less IP under development), but it could be pr…

> And at the end of the day, that's mostly Tree Style Tabs, uBlock and a menu bar. Amen. And not send each and every keystroke to Google.

> And not send each and every keystroke to Google

Is there evidence Chrome does that? I've never heard this claim before.

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#355

Post by searchableguy »

Maybe it's a cultural problem but many of their products are aimed at consumers when they have the opportunity to tune them for enterprise (lockwise?). They could make more money with better and paid consultation projects. Many open source projects they own can be sassified (voice project?).

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#356

Post by shajznnckfke »

gfodor wrote: post #176
jacquesm wrote: post #95

Mozilla management has me puzzled. They have a position that is incredibly strong, lots of dedicated users that would rather quit the web than switch to Chrome or Edge. "But we know we also need to go beyond the browser to give people new products and technologies that both excite them and represent their interests" Is exactly what they should stay away from. Work on the bloody browser, forget about the rest. There a…

A common refrain, but is anything but obvious. Focusing on the browser could be a losing strategy. I'd argue it probably is. The trajectory is terrible: the tech is being commoditized (WebKit, Chromium) and the market share picture is bleak. The opportunity cost is huge: maintaining a web engine, one which basically just tries to keep up with the others put out by Google et al, takes armies of people that could perha…

Making a browser is Mozilla’s purpose. If Mozilla can’t do that, it doesn’t have a reason to exist and will fail. If the Feed the Children charity decides that feeding children is too hard and decides to water plants instead, I expect it will fail too.

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#357

Post by dragonwriter »

gfodor wrote: post #176
jacquesm wrote: post #95

Mozilla management has me puzzled. They have a position that is incredibly strong, lots of dedicated users that would rather quit the web than switch to Chrome or Edge. "But we know we also need to go beyond the browser to give people new products and technologies that both excite them and represent their interests" Is exactly what they should stay away from. Work on the bloody browser, forget about the rest. There a…

A common refrain, but is anything but obvious. Focusing on the browser could be a losing strategy. I'd argue it probably is. The trajectory is terrible: the tech is being commoditized (WebKit, Chromium) and the market share picture is bleak. The opportunity cost is huge: maintaining a web engine, one which basically just tries to keep up with the others put out by Google et al, takes armies of people that could perha…

> What you're saying here presumes to be the answer to the most important question Mozilla is struggling with: in 10 years, is a browser-focused Mozilla viable?

No, I think it presumes that given the Mozilla Foundation's mission, if a browser-focussed Mozilla Corporation is no longer viable, the parent Foundation has utterly failed, and neither it nor the Corporation that supports it has a reason to exist.

Now, one can argue both sides of that, but I think there's a very good argument they the center of the open consumer internet is the browser, and that soloing functionality off of that (even if the particular thing you are promoting happens to be an open solution) ends up just reinforcing the trend toward balkanization of the internet into domains of disconnected functionality mostly ruled by proprietary apps and services.

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#358

Post by GordonS »

Chirael wrote: post #324
jacquesm wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it is a losing strategy because this is a rearguard action. There are only losing strategies, nothing will turn Mozilla around to be some kind of powerhouse besides what it already is. And that's fine . It doesn't need to be the next singing, dancing platform with bells and whistles. It's a tool. It should do one thing and do that one thing well. FireFox is not a failing product, it is the only product they have…

I loved Firefox Send and really hope they can find a way to address the malware problem [1]. It was the only large file sharing service I fully trusted both because of the encrypted zero-knowledge aspect of the system and the organization behind it; I used it several times a month personally and told others about it. To me it was a "win" under the Mozilla/FF brand. [1] https://www.zdnet.com/article/mozilla-suspends-f…

I tried to use it recently and found it had been taken down. I was puzzled as to why they would do that, but didn't dig into it - now I know, thanks!

Re: Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on commercial products

#360

Post by yamrzou »

kvark wrote: post #2

That's the last call for anybody who thinks "it's good that Mozilla exists, and its mission is important, but I'm still using Chrome and derivatives". Mozilla can't exist solely because people think it has a good mission: it needs products that can pay the bills, or at least a large population of active users.

I would pay for firefox if that's what it takes for it to continue existing and to be as good as other browsers.
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