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Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

bleepingcomputer.com

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Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#11

Post by ilikepi »

sandyarmstrong wrote: post #3

I noticed this yesterday. I've been using Mozilla/Phoenix/Firebird/Firefox as my primary browser for over 20 years. They've made some questionable calls, sure, but most of the recent things that have bothered people (like Pocket integration) haven't really irked me. This is the first time where I got a visceral feeling that maybe this isn't the browser I knew and loved anymore. It's not like I'm uninstalling and swit…

Did you miss the episode in 2017 in which they used an internal control to force the installation of an add-on as part of a promotion for a television show?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15941302

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15940144

I feel similarly to you...long-time user, bummed out by stuff like this. Sometimes it feels like Firefox would be a lot better off without Mozilla occasionally making deals like this.

Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#12

Post by ionioniodfngio »

sandyarmstrong wrote: post #3

I noticed this yesterday. I've been using Mozilla/Phoenix/Firebird/Firefox as my primary browser for over 20 years. They've made some questionable calls, sure, but most of the recent things that have bothered people (like Pocket integration) haven't really irked me. This is the first time where I got a visceral feeling that maybe this isn't the browser I knew and loved anymore. It's not like I'm uninstalling and swit…

It's not that I like Firefox so much as that all the competition is unusable. Firefox has gone downhill, but at least it's extensible enough that I can largely reverse the decay.

Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#15

Post by comice »

it's a bit unclear what they intended here but I see a lot of people assuming the absolute worst intent.

That Firefox would fully intend to insert full page unskippable adverts of it's own into unrelated websites is a major accusation and there is evidence this was an accident.

Looks more to me like bleepingcomputer purposefully sensationalized the issue as clickbait.

Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#16

Post by super256 »

walrus01 wrote: post #9

The particularly terrible thing about this is that the Mozilla VPN product is actually Mullvad underneath, one of the better and more ethical VPN providers. Then they have to do this popup ad bullshit pushed by the browser and take a dump all over it.

What is the value proposition of using Mozilla VPN over Mullvad directly, other than adding a layer of USA on top of it (which is a bad thing imo)?

Also, has Mozilla VPN also a windows client, or is it more like the Opera Proxies (which were called VPN for some reason)?

Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#17

Post by the_duke »

sandyarmstrong wrote: post #3

I noticed this yesterday. I've been using Mozilla/Phoenix/Firebird/Firefox as my primary browser for over 20 years. They've made some questionable calls, sure, but most of the recent things that have bothered people (like Pocket integration) haven't really irked me. This is the first time where I got a visceral feeling that maybe this isn't the browser I knew and loved anymore. It's not like I'm uninstalling and swit…

Firefox at least exposes an endless amount of toggles to tweak pretty much every behaviour the browser has.

This is includes settings for removing or disabling all the integration with Mozilla services and their ads.

See for example: https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js

Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#18

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

wlesieutre wrote: post #2

Makes you wonder how someone thought this was a good idea in a browser that was an early pioneer of popup blockers. Imagine if Firefox in the 2000's had seen popup ads and said "Yeah let's get in on that action!" At least it was a small scale experiment and not something that rolled out to the whole install base, I use Firefox on a couple of computers and didn't see it myself. But should you really need user feedback…

>Makes you wonder how someone thought this was a good idea in a browser that was an early pioneer of popup blockers.

Two reasons: clueless management who chases short term returns, and a rabid fanbase that will constantly make excuses for them no matter how much they decline, because "at least they're not Google/Microsoft"

Re: Mozilla stops Firefox fullscreen VPN ads after user outrage

#20

Post by flohofwoe »

comice wrote: post #15

it's a bit unclear what they intended here but I see a lot of people assuming the absolute worst intent. That Firefox would fully intend to insert full page unskippable adverts of it's own into unrelated websites is a major accusation and there is evidence this was an accident. Looks more to me like bleepingcomputer purposefully sensationalized the issue as clickbait.

Did you even read the article? There's a screenshot which shows that this "feature" even got its own config items (browser.vpn_promo.*). This hardly looks like an "accident".

Also note the weasel language of their statement: "We’re continuously working to understand the best ways to communicate with people who use Firefox. ...".

"Communicate" my *ss. It really makes my blood boil how the Mozilla management hijacked Firefox for their unethical bullshit (because it happens again and again, as soon as the dust has settled over the last 'accident').

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