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Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

calpaterson.com

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Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#431
post #48
post #13

There's a quote from the CEO saying that they looked at the market and felt like they were being underpaid. And they can't reduce their salary now because it'd be unfair on their families. Firefox has a problem. It gets most of its revenue from Google. They need a different revenue stream but their ideas haven't worked. Their executives are clearly failures. But with such high pay, they're cashing out. Buying themsel…

The problem is not that they get most of their revenue from Google. The problem is that they have 5% share of the web now.

13% of desktop use. Given Chrome and Safari are hard to get rid of on phones (especially iphones) that's key.

My phone browser is like a snack, my desktop browser is what I care about.

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#432
post #428
post #253

> Mobile browsing numbers are bleak: Firefox barely exists on phones, with a market share of less than half a percent. This is baffling given that mobile Firefox has a rare feature for a mobile browser: it's able to install extensions and so can block ads. This is true, and indeed very strange. I use FF on mobile and it works perfectly. So Mozilla's problems aren't only technical, there's also a question of market aw…

Personally, I use Firefox on PC and would love to use it on my phone. Literally the only reason I use Chrome instead is because of the flow ui tab switching. I just can't stand the Firefox mobile UI for tab switching. I with there was an extension or something to change it. It's a huge shame.

What's wrong with it?

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#433

The hardest thing to see here is that we don't have a solution. Firefox makes money by setting google as the default search. Google is its biggest competitor. There are no obvious other revenue stream. Also, let's not pretend chrome sucks. Chrome is on top because it is an amazing browser (and you are googling stuff anyway). Firefox needs to change it's strategy, it needs to pull an Amazon. Amazon is the type of busi…

Bezos didn’t set out to build AWS, nor did he build AWS “to fund the business”. It was a somewhat-lucky turn of events. Amazon is fundamentally a distribution company that noticed some of their internal services could be sold to others, and it turned out that the market for that was bigger than expected.

I agree that Mozilla needs to get a similar lucky break somehow, but it’s not easy to get lucky on that scale.

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#434
post #13

There's a quote from the CEO saying that they looked at the market and felt like they were being underpaid. And they can't reduce their salary now because it'd be unfair on their families. Firefox has a problem. It gets most of its revenue from Google. They need a different revenue stream but their ideas haven't worked. Their executives are clearly failures. But with such high pay, they're cashing out. Buying themsel…

The Mozilla execs could all make more money at FAANG companies just down the road from Mozilla HQ. If they left, it would probably be pretty hard to replace them with anyone capable of saving Firefox who would settle for less. The same is true for most of the engineers at Mozilla. They could go to FAANGs and increase their compensation quite a bit. So while I agree that the leadership has been bad, executive pay was…

I think you highlighted another problem. Why Mozilla HQ is located in such an expensive place? There are plenty of cheaper places in the world (even US...).

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#435

Firefox market share is certainly down but is usage really down 85%? I thought the market share was down partly because of smart phones and the browser market has expanded a lot of the last 10 years, especially in poorer countries were more and more people get internet access.

Yes, it would be interesting to see estimates of absolute number of user, not relative market share. Ideally broken down on desktop and mobile.

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#436
post #275

Can't speak for others but I stopped using Firefox for the following reasons, pretty much in the order of priority. 1. When I learnt about the corporate structure at Mozilla. I simply don't drust any large corporation with matters related to privacy. 2. What happened with Brendan Eich. That just wasn't cool. What someone does in his personal time is non of my business. Virtue signalling of any sort, to me, is a hallm…

He donated money to a political cause directly against some of his employees, got called out on it and refused to compromise. I'm sure those are admirable characteristics in some situations, as the CEO of an organisation like Mozilla they're suicidal. He doesn't seem to get that even to this day, based on some tweets linked to in this chat and in the article. "Don't be an asshole" is a pretty good philosophy if you'r…

Thank you for shedding the light on this part. I didn't know it before! (even though it doesn't look like news)

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#437

> And they can't reduce their salary now because it'd be unfair on their families. That must be a real comfort to all the people they laid off. This CEO needs to go, needs to be replaced by someone who is well versed in technology instead of in law.

Yeah but at least they got rid of Brendan Eich /s

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#438
I've been using Firefox for more than a decade now. In fact, I switched from IE to Firefox and never made Chrome my main browser. At times, it was difficult as Firefox was really slower than Chrome before Quantum release but I think in recent years it's gotten better. Why did I keep using it? Privacy and open-source.

But after reading this, I think I will switch to Safari. It'll be a tough change after all these years but I believe Apple is more capable of enabling me to keep my privacy more than Mozilla Foundation. I don't regret the donations I made there but it's really sad to see that I paid that money to that CEO guy.

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#439
post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He donated money to a political cause directly against some of his employees, got called out on it and refused to compromise. I'm sure those are admirable characteristics in some situations, as the CEO of an organisation like Mozilla they're suicidal. He doesn't seem to get that even to this day, based on some tweets linked to in this chat and in the article. "Don't be an asshole" is a pretty good philosophy if you'r…

The question is whether there was any prejudice or he mistreated his employees based on their sexuality. If did he absolutely should have been fired and fired sooner. If he didn't, he seems to have kept his personal beliefs out of his professional life which is also an admirable quality. In that case, he was judged and forced to resign purely based on what he did in his own time with his own money. If we, for a momen…

Yeah, it might be too much politics, and yeah, it sets the tone...but he was the CEO! This culture at least partially came from him as well - give me an example of a CEO with no impact on company culture.

The point is not that he mistreated them, or that making a political donation was wrong, the point is he made a personal decision which is unstandably engraging to his employees affected by that decision. They called him out and he failed to come up with any reasonable remedy.

Re: Firefox usage is down despite Mozilla's top exec pay going up

#440
post #428
post #253

> Mobile browsing numbers are bleak: Firefox barely exists on phones, with a market share of less than half a percent. This is baffling given that mobile Firefox has a rare feature for a mobile browser: it's able to install extensions and so can block ads. This is true, and indeed very strange. I use FF on mobile and it works perfectly. So Mozilla's problems aren't only technical, there's also a question of market aw…

Personally, I use Firefox on PC and would love to use it on my phone. Literally the only reason I use Chrome instead is because of the flow ui tab switching. I just can't stand the Firefox mobile UI for tab switching. I with there was an extension or something to change it. It's a huge shame.

The UI received a big update a few weeks ago, maybe it is to your liking now?
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