Please, Firefox; just give me a way to pay you $10/month. Call it "Firefox Pro" and you get some new color themes or whatever, I don't care. I'm standing outside your window in the rain, waving cash at you, and you're still selling your body on the street-corner for quarters.
Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
621–630 of 721 posts
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#622Earlier quoted context omitted.
But the Web we have is not a monolith. If freedom/ethics/privacy/etc. are important to a browser user, they should realize that there's a subset of the Web that they need, and one they can do without. "I need to be able to discover and consume every work in every medium from everyone immediately and have it be secure and efficient" is the unspoken mindset that enables this kind of decay in the browser world. Essentia…
There is no need to "do without". Firefox should adversarially interoperate with the web. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interopera... Today that means it should actively subvert the business interests of the web. Advertisers want to show ads? Block them and make no exceptions. Surveillance capitalists want data? Give them fake data or no data at all whenever possible. Sites start detecting Firefox…
We agree in that we wish Firefox prioritized each user's privacy and agency more. But what I'm saying is that users' demand for ubiquitous and frictionless media consumption is something that will always be abused, and to try to satisfy that need and also not become corrupt or destroyed by your competitors seems pretty impossible at the moment. I want there to be a space for a browser that doesn't need millions or billions to maintain.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#623As someone who has used Firefox since v0.* I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. > relevant suggestions from our trusted partners The suggestions are not relevant to, and the partners not trusted by, me.
They also, on the last update, prompted some color scheme adjustments "for a limited time" - what? That isn't something you tend to see in open source software. I wonder if they think it will increase engagement with the browser?
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#624Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How can they make _relevant_ suggestions without spying on my browsing history, profiling it and phoning back to the mothership? If you search for "hotels", they'll show you suggestions that match "hotels". Doesn't seem that complicated to me.
They didn't ask how can they make relevant suggestions. They asked how can they make relevant suggestions WITHOUT SPYING ON MY BROWSING HISTORY. Try again.
I answered that already.
If you search for "hotels", they'll show you things related to "hotels".
That doesn't require access to your browsing history - it's right there in the search term.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#625Earlier quoted context omitted.
Damn it would be nice if this meme would die. The first of its sins is the tacit agreement that Mozilla is doing this because, as the parent comment says, they "need funding". Mozilla needs funding now like Wikipedia needs funding: they have more of it than they've ever had, but by all appearances, you'd think they're really strapped for cash or something, because their pleas have gotten steadily more intrusive and d…
> A well-funded contender in the browser wars could almost certainly appear tomorrow and grab as much market share in the next 3 to 5 year period as Firefox currently has and do it on total operating costs that measure half of Mozilla's marketing spend (in actual dollars). This is true but it also has nothing to do with anything Mozilla is currently doing. It is actually a business maxim of Jim Barksdale [1] (and oth…
This is worded like a contradiction or a correction, but that is in fact exactly my point. On offer is the implicit suggestion that Mozilla needs half a billion a year to maintain its current position. But Mozilla's numbers are so low and Barksdale's maxim is well-founded enough that you don't have to take a huge leap in logic to see that that argument doesn't hold up. That it would be possible for a nobody to appear and get the same results means that Mozilla's costs aren't justified.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#626Earlier quoted context omitted.
The blog seems pretty clear they will be asking for permission? Tho not in the best way, I feel, but at least this is opt-in?
It was turned on by default for me. I had to uncheck the settings.
Oh I see - the consent screen shown in the blog post is for something different. I stand corrected.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#627Probably unpopular opinion: Firefox should not be managed and lead developed from Silicon Valley.
There's too much overlap with the VC crowd plus the salaries are huge.
Mozilla should be a regular, frugal non-profit.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#628Earlier quoted context omitted.
Outsider here: whats wrong with brave? I haven’t touched it but have no reason to distrust it, happy for you to change that for me though
Try just installing base Brave - "Sponsored" backgrounds (often crypto ads or credit cards!) - "Cards" with more weird Crypto ads! - Brave "news" - Brave "rewards" Yes I can turn all that of, and I have, but hard to recommend to normal users that dont spend 10min turning all the shit off. They also did some weird link shit a while back.
Not my favorite browser and since I only use it on iOS my response may be a bit biased:
- Sponsored Backgrounds: just random places of the world like tropical beaches, Buddhist temples or mountains.
- Cards? Nothing at all.
- Rewards and news are under the settings menu and seem to be off.
Maybe Apple's App Store conditions prevent Brave to do a lot of its crypto stuff.
On Android, Linux or Windows I'm a happy user of Vivaldi.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#629Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I just want a well-functioning and secure browser that people can trust. You can't trust any of them. The real question is, who do you trust more ? Google, Microsoft, Mozilla, Opera, Brave. You can't trust any of them, but you have to pick one.
Mozilla might be the best out of this, but they're also in the weaker position. Ads, whether they respect privacy or not, give off a scummy feel to users. The clean Chrome UI, even if it tracks you in a hundred ways, "looks" more trustworthy to users than a browser riddled with ads. It's bad enough to have to instruct people how to disable the New Tab ads, now you have to add one more step. At this point it becomes p…
You're not wrong.
This is why I use Ungoogled Chromium and build it myself.
Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions
#630I hate that I have to actively check every other update for new settings to opt-out of these ad-based invasions.