Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions • Hacker News Board

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#441

Post by 0des » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:12 PM UTC

xfitm3 wrote: post #398

jacquesm wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly that. If they got rid of their hobbies then this sort of scam wouldn't be necessary. Yes, it's a scam: bait and switch.

Remember Mozilla is ultimately a non profit and must spend a healthy percentage of their income every year. Mozilla is just representing the collective self interest of those it employs. People wanting to keep their cushy job.

I prefer they'd spend it on their browser engineers and whichever arm legislatively opposes existing browser monopolies.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#442

Post by teddyh » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:12 PM UTC

rglullis wrote: post #435

Aeolun wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me at least, all the language Brave uses seems to indicate something similar to a pyramid scheme to me. I dunno, something about the whole thing sets me on edge.

Really? That is quite odd. Users receive crypto if they join the brave rewards system. The rewards are directly related to Brave's revenue from their ad network - the notification ads. Advertisers put money for a known reason and a quantifiable investment. It's all opt-in. Users don't need to put any of their own money to be able to withdraw the rewards they receive. It's as much the opposite of a scheme as it can be…

Any system which involves money and is not immediately obviously simple to understand is almost always created in order to steal people’s money.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#443

Post by chrisweekly » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:13 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #196

samizdis wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. That is exactly the problem I have with it - weasel words and euphemisms; FF is scoring an own-goal here and eroding trust. Why not just tell it like it is. "We need funding and are lining up deals with third parties to display their ads/messaging in the address bar search. We vet these third parties by holding them contractually to these standard…

Exactly. No excuses - when you use such a language, you do it on purpose - you know you're going to fuck people over, and the language is there to keep them unaware that they're being exploited. I second your opinion - I'd be willing to entertain, or even support, this way of them making money iff they spelled out honestly what they're doing and why. In details. Talk with me like two adults that respect each other.

+1 for "iff" (if and only if), which I wish were more broadly used and recognized in written English

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#444

Post by soundnote » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:14 PM UTC

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #201

samizdis wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. That is exactly the problem I have with it - weasel words and euphemisms; FF is scoring an own-goal here and eroding trust. Why not just tell it like it is. "We need funding and are lining up deals with third parties to display their ads/messaging in the address bar search. We vet these third parties by holding them contractually to these standard…

> Why not just tell it like it is. Because the sad truth is every other company is doing exactly the same. We live in a world where the people who track you most will greet you with "we value your privacy".

Brave doesn't. "Sponsored images" and a huge subheading and toggle that say "Ads" speak pretty plain language.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#445

Post by gerbilly » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:14 PM UTC

For me, the most germane question becomes:

1. Can it be blocked without recompiling Firefox? 2. If so, how?

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#446

Post by nvr219 » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:15 PM UTC

Nextgrid wrote: post #221

hnlmorg wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're not talking about modern Linux though. Modern Linux isn't "coordinated by a (admittably singlularly competent) sole finnish guy in a bathrobe from home," , there's now a team of people involved. Sure there is a hierarchy with someone taking the lead but isn't that true for most operations? Even the Mozilla foundation has a Chair (Mitchell Baker) and Executive Director (Mark Surman). Linux hasn't been a single p…

The "guy in a bathrobe" is still the lead and has the final say. Is he compensated anywhere near what Mozilla's CEO is? In fact is the total comp of all the people significantly involved in Linux kernel development anywhere near the total comp of Mozilla's C-suite? I doubt it.

> Is he compensated anywhere near what Mozilla's CEO is?

Torvalds is at $2M and Baker is at $2.5M.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#447

Post by jeroenhd » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:15 PM UTC

my123 wrote: post #143

_8j50 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brave is based on Chromium, it lacks some of the privacy centric features that are found in Gecko browsers. 1st party isolation,tracker blocking, containers, anti fingerprinting measures and SNI encryption are some things I can think of right now (maybe chrome as caught up now?) Plus, Google controls Chromium and Firefox is literally the only alternative now. They push changes that are against or in in ignorance of o…

You also have Safari (and GNOME Web on Linux) using the WebKit engine, developed by Apple as an alternative... But that's not available on Android or Windows (the WebKit port exists there, but no good UI frontend as far I know)... which are the two big platforms. (because Apple doesn't care enough about those I guess?)

GNOME WebKit definitely isn't Safari. A lot of websites that work in Safari were broken in WebKit last time I tried it.

It does replicate a lot of buggy behaviour in Safari so from what I can tell you can be reasonably sure that your website works in Safari if it works in WebKit, but that's the only use I've found for it so far.

As for a good UI on Windows, I think you should be able to compile GNOME's WebKit browser for Windows. It'll look terribly out of place like any GNOME application in a different environment, but I think it should work well enough to use?

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#448

Post by nvr219 » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:15 PM UTC

gerbilly wrote: post #445

For me, the most germane question becomes: 1. Can it be blocked without recompiling Firefox? 2. If so, how?

1. yes 2. in about:config

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#449

Post by pbhjpbhj » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:17 PM UTC

morganvachon wrote: post #383

deepstack wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>(don't mention Brave, I'm gonna get mad) Just wonder the reason? Is it because it support the monopoly of google rendering engine? Or other reasons?

Not OP but I've avoided Brave from the beginning because of its reliance on an ad-fueled crypto scam to generate revenue. If you're trying to avoid Mozilla's new ad-based revenue scheme, moving to a browser that is wholly funded by tracking your browsing and showing you ads while pretending to "pay" you with cryptocurrency that they never actually pay out, seems like a step backwards.

Except that's not at all what Brave is doing. They tried to innovate a new way to pay for content. It's complex, but it's not a scam.

Brave seems more trustworthy than FF to me right now.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#450

Post by dageshi » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:17 PM UTC

Jenk wrote: post #437

dageshi wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people would pay for firefox so long as it supports their pet features and they all have their own pet features. And it would still be less than they'd get from advertising.

Invariably this is true, but I think had a payment model been adopted when Firefox itself was gaining traction, they wouldn't need to stray from that winning product model - privacy focused, user control, advertisement free, web standard honoring. As it stands now, they are obviously wanting to monetise their product but for whatever reason don't want to open up to the option of a retail/consumer grade price. Probabl…

I think back when firefox was gaining popularity there wasn't really a public awareness for the need for a privacy focused browser. In other words, even fewer people than right now would've been interested in buying it because they didn't really think they needed it.

Once someone gives away a roughly equivalent good enough product for free charging for a competitor becomes incredibly difficult and that ship sailed when MS bundled IE with windows.