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

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#601

Post by throwaway2037 » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

protomyth wrote: post #507

xfitm3 wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Remember Mozilla is ultimately a non profit and must spend a healthy percentage of their income every year. And Harvard has a multi-billion dollar endowment that they hoard. Mozilla is doing it wrong.

A quick Google search tells me the rule in the United States IRS is: >

Harvard endowment is so huge for two reasons: (1) fundraising, (2) earning more than 5% per year for long, long, long time. But they still must spend 5% per year of their massive endowment.

Running a non-profit with only an endowment (no fund-raising) for more than 20 years with is hard to do.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#602

Post by 0des » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

The-Compiler wrote: post #581

0des wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but I'm not sure if you'd be comfortable Oh I like this. It's subtle in a way that flies under the radar but still blesses someone's little heart effectively. On a side note: I love qutebrowser, even as someone who doesn't prefer Vim or Vim keybindings in things. I like it because it is slim up top, and does what you tell it to and not a stitch more. If it got paywalled tomorrow, but everything else remained the sa…

FWIW you can donate (via my GitHub Sponsors profile), I'd rather not force people to pay for it, though ;) One thing I would perhaps consider is having more "proper" releases for macOS and Windows (with things like code signing, automatic updates, etc. - perhaps even via the Windows and macOS stores) for a small one-time fee. But that's mainly because supporting those platforms properly costs me additional money (and…

Thanks, hopefully github just emailed you about a new $10 monthly supporter :)

edit: I am not a windows or mac user, I just like the thing you make.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#603

Post by tomrod » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

funerr wrote: post #591

I really wouldn't mind paying for Firefox. Why can't I pay for not having ads?

Ultimately this model proves untenable in almost every space where folks try for the freemium model. It is especially apparent in cable and online streaming, where you have no ads to start with but as people grow to like they service ads are added for additional revenue. Eventually, the user pays for ads in addition to the service or product.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#604

Post by y4mi » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

stickfigure wrote: post #559

y4mi wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

they generally get more then 400 million yearly revenue, though there was one outlier with over 800 million. this is money they generally don't have to pay taxes on because of their status as a non-profit. mozilla employs at the moment around 800 people. according to their FAQ > https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2015/f... > More than 75% of Mozilla spending is on people-related investments to prod…

> this is money they generally don't have to pay taxes on because of their status as a non-profit. Minor nit here - they don't have to pay taxes because they don't make a profit, not because of their status. If a for-profit corporation doesn't make profit (and few tech companies do), they won't have to pay income taxes either. $375k per employee for a pure technology company doesn't seem outrageous? That has to inclu…

> That has to include facilities too

does it? whats the remaining 25% (100 million) for in that case?

> It's hard not to read into your message the suggestion that you'd like Mozilla to outsource development to lower-wage countries

i do not want them to do that particularly. i just pointed out that not all 800 employees will be getting the $137,000 with a $54,800 bonus wage to point out that i'm being extremely generous in my calculation of how much they're likely paying to actual employees.

there are no conclusive numbers i know of, but if you just look at their open positions portal (https://careers.mozilla.org/listings/) you will surely agree that few of these will be getting that $190k...?

this is quite offtopic but what i find especially disheartening about mozilla is that almost all of its revenue comes from google.

every nation i know of is trying to build up their online/web presence, and yet we have only one mega corporation sponsoring web browsers to a significant degree. why isn't every nation like the USA, Canada, Australia etc each investing at least 10 million into a fund to build an open source web browser or contribute to one? why is every nation fine with that situation?

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#605

Post by errantmind » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

Google pays Firefox $450 million dollars a year. Why do they need to keep adding ads and tracking features?

Yes, they want to diversify in case that valve gets shut off but they should be 'set for life'. They have been making hundreds of millions a year on average for over a decade. Why does it take that much to make a web browser and how much of that money goes to Firefox?

We need an ad-free open-source alternative that is focused on speed and encourages an extensive plugin ecosystem.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#606

Post by oceanview » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:45 PM UTC

vadfa wrote: post #329

maleldil wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being a Conservative is one thing, but he was/is (he hasn't publicly gone back on his stance AFAIK) homophobic. Eich had to go.

Many people misunderstand the meaning of the word "conservative", which is proof of how much the overton window has moved. If you want to progress on social issues, you are not a conservative, but a progressive. Those two things are completely incompatible. If you support gay marriage, you cannot be a conservative. You want to "progress" on social issues, which makes you a progressive. He did not support gay marriage…

>If you want to progress on social issues, you are not a conservative.

What a ridiculous statement. What point of history are you wishing to conserve? Do black people have rights? Do women have rights? Is public education OK? By your logic, the following argument is valid: “I don’t think blacks nor tables should the right to vote. Including the table proves it’s not a race issue for me. There’s a big difference between not wanting blacks to vote and being racist.”

Judging by your past comments, it looks as if politics are an emotional topic with you. It’s best to up/down-vote and move on than clutter the boards with this dribble.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#607

Post by Adrig » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:46 PM UTC

deepstack wrote: post #309

Adrig wrote: post #34

Meh, the feature is easily deactivable, the settings are clear and extensive. As far as ads go, it's one of the best implementations. Firefox still has no alternative in the privacy / user-centric space (don't mention Brave, I'm gonna get mad). Mozilla has done a lot for the web, I can give them some slack for exploring different revenue models. Still, I'm going to keep on eye for this kind of practices in the future…

>(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?

Running on chromium is one thing, since I believe having a monopoly on what's essentially the new global operating system would not be healthy.

But Brave have just proven to be an unethical, borderline scammy project. And I'm saying this as someone who owns crypto and can see the value of advertisement in some cases.

Here are a few cases documented on wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_(web_browser)#Controvers...

And I'd add that having a business model where you put your own adds on top of ad-blocked ones is the most hypocritical thing to do.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#608

Post by adontz » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:46 PM UTC

I honestly do not understand why people hate this idea.

Mozilla have found perfect place to put ads, they do not cover screen space, are not annoying or always visible. Not that different from Google paid search results, honestly even better.

YouTube has 1,500,000,000 monthly users and 50,000,000 YouTube Premium subscribers.

    1,500,000,000 users
       50,000,000 subscribers

That is how much people want to pay for what they use vs. ready to watch unskippable ads.

How many of 200 million Firefox users who do not like ads are ready to pay as little as $1 per month? I am pretty sure even 10%, i.e. $20M/month will help Mozilla a lot. But people love free things and whine.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#609

Post by errantmind » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:47 PM UTC

elcapitan wrote: post #598

Stupid question, but with FF being open source, would it be possible to provide alternative builds without much of the recent bullshit? It seems the browser gets more and more useless or user-hostile "features" with every new version.

There is a 'de-Googled Chromium' so there probably could be a 'de-Mozillad Firefox'

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#610

Post by soundnote » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 1:47 PM UTC

leodriesch wrote: post #107

Adrig wrote: post #34

Meh, the feature is easily deactivable, the settings are clear and extensive. As far as ads go, it's one of the best implementations. Firefox still has no alternative in the privacy / user-centric space (don't mention Brave, I'm gonna get mad). Mozilla has done a lot for the web, I can give them some slack for exploring different revenue models. Still, I'm going to keep on eye for this kind of practices in the future…

This just makes me worry a little bit that Firefox will take a similar route to Brave and introduce multiple streams of revenue into the browser, disguised as features that the user would want. E.g. Brave Rewards, Brave VPN, Sponsored Wallpapers. These just clog up the interface and make it feel sketchy. I just want a normal FOSS browser, but I also understand the whole financing issue.

And they do need to do that. Browser makers having alternative revenue streams and reasons outside the browser-as-a-window to exist is necessary. One reason Firefox was losing market share is that it was just a window. Google, Apple, MS all provide a competitively good window but have other footprint on the web and can provide integrated services as a result.

One of the best parts about Brave is that they are trying to build independent revenue streams from things like integrated Jitsi features, an independent search engine and the like. Vivaldi builds in things like mail clients, RSS readers and a rudimentary notetaking tool.

In that vein, Pocket is a really good thing, and also helps combat link rot. The vocal Firefox userbase is moronically hostile to add-on services though, even if they are the ultimate key to Firefox's health.

http://dpldocs.info/this-week-in-d/Blog.Posted_2021_09_06.ht...