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Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

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Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#621

Post by dabockster »

cjpearson wrote: post #489
viraptor wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can't charge for it They could try. I just keep hearing people who would pay for no extra features as long as it paid for actual Firefox development and not the random unrelated Mozilla projects. I would pay a subscription. But they don't let me.

You can't effectively paywall it because not only is it open source, but there are many nearly equivalent competitors all of which are free. Any subscribers would essentially be donors. There are people like yourself who would be happy to donate, but not nearly enough. Replacing MoCo's current revenue with donors would require donations at the level of Doctors without Borders, American Cancer Society, or the Make-a-W…

> You can't effectively paywall it because not only is it open source, but there are many nearly equivalent competitors all of which are free.

You're forgetting that people will buy a product on brand identity alone. If the Firefox brand is solid enough, those forks won't matter.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#622

Post by dabockster »

autoexec wrote: post #587
macspoofing wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What Mozilla is good at ... Firefox - the one thing they do not want to work on is the only thing that makes them special.

I might be in the minority here, but I actually like Thunderbird.

I've daily driven Thunderbird for over a decade. You have very few options for having a single program manage multiple email accounts outside of Outlook and Thunderbird anymore. Maybe Apple Mail on Mac (and whatever Microsoft is preloading on Windows these days), but that's it.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#623

Post by jmyeet »

Mozilla has been in a dire place for years. Notably someone years ago posted a chart showing how exec salary keeps going up while marketshare keeps going down [1].

In the Microsoft antitrust trial in the 1990s, the court established that having a browser monopoly was anticompetitive. Sadly, we've allowed this situation to repeat on mobile so Chrome and Safari now dominate. Windows has a lot of default Edge installs (and set as the default browser, particularly in corporate settings) but it's really just a Webkit skin at this point.

Now iOS does technically allow third-party browsers but they're just Safari skins and they're not as good (eg at different times they have more limited features like not havintg the latest Javascript engine).

I really think we need to end the bundled exclusive apps on mobile for certain things.

Until then I'm really not sure what Mozilla's path forward is. They've tried to pivot on things like privacy but I don't think any of these make sense or at least won't produce a revenue source to justify the investment. How do you fund something like Mozilla? And how do you create value for users?

[1]: https://itdm.com/mozilla-firefox-usage-down-85-but-why-are-e...

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#624

Post by dabockster »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #313
gkoberger wrote: post #275

Having worked at Mozilla a while ago, the CEO role is one I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. Success is oddly defined: it's a non-profit (well, a for-profit owned by a non-profit) that needs to make a big profit in a short amount of time. And anything done to make that profit will annoy the community. I hope Anthony leans into what makes Mozilla special. The past few years, Mozilla's business model has been to just m…

The job was always very easy, fire all of the pure managers and sock the google money into an endowment before it runs out. Then focus on privacy as you mentioned. They’ve taken in several billion dollars by now. Let that sink in. They're supposedly a non-profit, so this plan is the well-trodden playbook. But of course no Manager instance could imagine such a thing. Cue Upton Sinclair quote.

Yep. Mozilla is effectively just a tax dodge for Google anymore.

Heck, this AI first announcement was probably strongly influenced behind the scenes by Google to create an appearance of competition similar to Microsoft's and Apple's relationship in the 1990s.

Also, ironically, I just switched full time to Brave only yesterday.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#625

Post by autoexec »

m463 wrote: post #424
gkoberger wrote: post #275

Having worked at Mozilla a while ago, the CEO role is one I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. Success is oddly defined: it's a non-profit (well, a for-profit owned by a non-profit) that needs to make a big profit in a short amount of time. And anything done to make that profit will annoy the community. I hope Anthony leans into what makes Mozilla special. The past few years, Mozilla's business model has been to just m…

> I'd focus on privacy. I would love that. that said, right now firefox unstoppably and constantly phones home

Does this not work anymore? https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-stop-firefox-making...

I've been perfectly willing to spend an hour making countless changes using about:config to beat Firefox (or its forks) into submission on every install, but that only works while they continue to give us the ability.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#626

Post by holowoodman »

slau wrote: post #547
CarbonJ wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you like to see from Firefox to make it more headless and scriptable? Are there specific usecases you're interested in supporting?

I'd love to be able to modify JS at runtime on random websites. Too often there's a bug, or a "feature" that prevents me from using a service, that I could fix by removing an event or something in the JS code.

That's what development tools are for. Or Greasemonkey/Violentmonkey.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#627

Post by dabockster »

mmooss wrote: post #590
hamdingers wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a great question, honestly, and I like your framing of trust. I do not trust Mozilla to keep a product alive. I was frustrated by Firefox OS and more recently Pocket, but everything they've tried or acquired aside from the browser itself (and Thunderbird I guess?) has failed and been shut down. That has burned a lot of people along the way. For this reason I can't see myself becoming a user of any future Mozil…

That makes much more sense. I wonder what the non-HN public thinks - most of those products, like Firefox OS, were essentially unknown outside HN-like populations. Pocket was better known. But yes, that is part of trust and I'd like to see them address it.

Firefox is still heavily used by Linux OSes as the default browser. But I think that's mostly momentum at this point. If more people knew about Mozilla's organizational challenges, then I think Firefox would get ditched.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#628

Post by dabockster »

Sailemi wrote: post #431
tsoukase wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firemail should be the name of a free and privacy oriented email client wholly owned by Mozilla with a web and mobile app. I would sign up instantly and gradually migrate from gmail, while being assured for its sustainability.

Maybe not exactly what you’re looking for but Thunderbird is working on a paid email service: https://www.tb.pro/en-US/

They were also supposedly working on mobile apps. I'd pay some solid money for Thunderbird mobile if it was a good product.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#629

Post by ethbr1 »

pseudalopex wrote: post #485
ethbr1 wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1000% The two places it's mind boggling that Mozilla doesn't have a product are (1) identity (especially as a provider to 3rd parties) and (2) instant messaging (especially on mobile). They were important 10 years ago, they're more important today, and the existing providers all have huge privacy concerns.

What would be Mozilla's revenue model for instant messaging?

Ads?

Nothing says you have to track users, if you're not looking to optimize ad monetization per user.

And I daresay there are a fair number of companies who would love to get even blind exposure to Mozilla's userbase.

Re: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo

#630

Post by dabockster »

netdevphoenix wrote: post #118

I love Mozilla but this feels like marketing imo. From the article: "AI should always be a choice — something people can easily turn off" and "Firefox will remain our anchor. It will evolve into a modern AI browser". I highly doubt you will be able to turn of the transformer tech features in an AI browser imo. And they won't make a separate browser for this. This really feels like the beginning of the end for Mozilla…

I switched to Brave. Even with its cryptocurrency stuff bundled, it's easily disabled and not in your face at all. And their adblock tech is an amazing uBlock successor.
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