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Firefox Was Always Enough

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Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#381

Post by kaba0 »

AntiImperialist wrote: post #132

I had been using Firefox as the primary browser since before it was v1.0 until some time in 2016, which is when I switched to Chrome. The reason was mostly usability related. Chrome felt faster and easier to use. With the reach of Google, Firefox had to be that much better to keep up, like it was compared to any version of IE. Unfortunately, Firefox kind of remained the same while Chrome became better and better. In…

Brave is basically a chrome with preinstalled extensions, which would wither away the second chrome stopped being developed.

Firefox is a treasure we should keep alive, because otherwise the web would turn into the same closed source walled garden, as most other things do.

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#382

Post by atombender »

laumars wrote: post #318
terracatta wrote: post #26

I think Safari is going to have the market cornered on technology pessimism (aka privacy features) and browser performance per watt on macOS and iOS. Google is rapidly locking down enterprise by building in tight integrations with Google Workspace/G-Suite (see: context aware authentication). In 10 - 15 years the web should be better than it is today. The first step in their recovery is to convey what their vision of…

Firefox is a great deal more privacy focused than Safari when you start factoring in containers. I also wouldn’t trust Apple to stick to their privacy mission long term. It’s a marketing strategy that they seemingly care about at the moment but it’s supplementary to their core demographics so who’s to say they stick with this vision long term? I’m less concerned about the same happening with Firefox. > In 10 - 15 yea…

The problem with Firefox containers is that it requires micromanaging your web browsing.

I'm sure it's nice for people who obsess about privacy, but it's not something that the general user population is going to adopt.

I think the right approach, ultimately, would be compartmentalize all web sites, but that's not feasible right now.

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#385

Post by gravitas »

spacechild1 wrote: post #81
gravitas wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree - the feature they need is better calendar integration with Exchange based services and the Exchange address book (GAL). As a corporate user this is the Achilles heel and always has been for 20 years, like it or not Exchange is king of the hill in large sprawling companies and Thunderbird has always left it to 3rd party add-ons (some of which they just killed due to the extension redesign) to try and handl…

I recently had to buy an such an add-on (Owl), because my umiversity's IT department killed IMAP support and only offers Exchange (which is stupid, but what can you do?).

Solutions like Owl are actually kind of nice, I have been using a similar one on my phone (AquaMail) for many years and it's worked out great. Thanks for the tip, might give it a shot - I see it's by the same author as ExQuilla which has been around for awhile as well.

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#386

Post by inglor_cz »

kome wrote: post #179
lucideer wrote: post #146

It's curious that the 4 bullet points in the final section don't make any mention of open source (in fact, the article doesn't at all). I think Opera Software circa 2012 was doing all of the things we would hope for/expect from Mozilla & Firefox, and doing them much better than Mozilla could. Bar one: it was not open source. When I made the switch to Firefox in 2012, it was my belief that I would not have been forced…

I did exactly the same. I switched to Firefox after Opera changed direction, with Opera 13. It's incredible how much Opera 12 was advanced and snappy. It was 2012... I used Firefox since then. And I never had an issue with it. But, especially at the beginning, I really felt it was an inferior browser. But still better than chrome for sure. Just because I don't want google to know all my chronology.

Opera Mobile worked great on Symbian smartphones with very limited screen resolution and system resources, too. Much better than the built-in Web browser from Nokia itself.

Often, Opera Mobile was your only chance to get something done online on such a device. For example, purchase a ticket.

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#387

Post by wussboy »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #370
throw_m239339 wrote: post #271

Mozilla doesn't have a real sustainable business model right now. FireFox OS could have provided such model, in fact, its successor kaios is doing very well and one can imagine that in the future, it will be the primary OS of half the mobile users on the planet. 'Feature phones' aren't dead. They provide a cheap alternative to touch phones, are usually more robust, and allowing them to run web apps instead of MIDP st…

> Mozilla doesn't have a real sustainable business model right now. This is the meat of my problem with Firefox as it stands. I've not stopped using Firefox since the mid 2000's but come on, you need something more than just checks from Google. Charge me for a commercial version of FireFox that includes a VPN subscription and funds its development. Just do it ten years ago. Honestly, if they're not going to embrace R…

This most common thing I write on HN is that I can’t believe I can’t pay to use Firefox.

“How will we ever earn money here at Mozilla? All we have is this world class web browser that provides massive value to millions of people, but we refuse to directly monetize. Oh whatever will we do?”

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#388

Post by Narishma »

krmboya wrote: post #313
throw_m239339 wrote: post #271

Mozilla doesn't have a real sustainable business model right now. FireFox OS could have provided such model, in fact, its successor kaios is doing very well and one can imagine that in the future, it will be the primary OS of half the mobile users on the planet. 'Feature phones' aren't dead. They provide a cheap alternative to touch phones, are usually more robust, and allowing them to run web apps instead of MIDP st…

I can't understand how Mozilla failed to execute on Firefox OS. From where I am at it was a massive opportunity for Mozilla and Web developers all round the world. They didn't have to take on Android and iOS directly, but may have gotten there eventually thru 'worse is better'. Imagine a web developer learning just a few APIs and being being able to customize their web app for smart TVs

> I can't understand how Mozilla failed to execute on Firefox OS.

Wasn't it initially too slow and bloated for the hardware they released it on?

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#389

Post by kubanczyk »

dblohm7 wrote: post #363
kubanczyk wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Waterfox Classic is continuing to support the long-standing XUL and XPCOM add-on capability that Firefox removed in version 57. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfox

How well do they support it? Do they fix security bugs in the parts that are now effectively abandoned by upstream?

I see they port fixes from Firefox, but I doubt they patch the abandoned parts.

Re: Firefox Was Always Enough

#390

Post by wussboy »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #289
A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this may sound like a blasphemy and anachronism rolled into one, but why can we not return to purchasing a copy of software? All of a sudden, the incentives to deliver 'monetizable' product are gone, because you already got your money. Or that does not jibe with continuous rent seeking?

> why can we not return to purchasing a copy of software? Because your competitors are free and users expect free and we have a culture stuck in a rut of "everything is free" because ads don't have them taking money out of their wallet. Not every software is in a niche where they can flip the switch back into a premium model and have a good outcome. If Firefox did it, most of us would stop using it. Maybe Firefox is…

Huge businesses are built on the freemium model. Firefox would only gain from embracing the same.
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