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Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

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Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#51

Post by chrismorgan »

yoavm wrote: post #24
Meneth wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mozilla wasted most of its money on crappy features no one wanted. They should not be subsidized by anyone.

It's not clear what this claim is based on. Most of its money? Firefox is an excellent browser, and probably much less funded than Chrome/Safari.

Read through https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/11/21363424/mozilla-layoffs-...: six years ago, Mozilla laid off 250 people, about a quarter of their staff, in order to focus on… two specific services that they have since killed (Pocket, Hubs), one service completely unrelated to the browser (VPN, though they have recently decided to set more money on fire by integrating some VPN stuff into Firefox, where it never had any place and is frankly an affront), and new and unspecified “security and privacy” tools (probably things like Relay and Monitor) which are almost certainly completely unrelated to the browser.

They are focusing on things that are nothing to do with their core product, and have been acting so for a long time.

Mozilla is deeply unhealthy, and has been slowly collapsing for more than a decade at this point. I believe that the significant majority of its staff are doing things of no or negative value to Firefox.

I suspect that ten developers not beholden to Mozilla but with a mandate to make a good browser would be better custodians of Firefox. If you raised the budget to forty, I’m all but certain of it.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#52

Post by dralley »

throwaway27448 wrote: post #30
yoavm wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are they actively draining resources from people who want to protect the open internet?

? They make $680M a year and use it to shill for the very company responsible for destroying the open internet. Firefox hasn't been easy to recommend for over a decade now. Where on earth is that money going if not to drain money from projects that actually work for humanity? I'm aware that this very revenue is what Mozilla is complaining about. But the CEO could get off his fat ass and do his job finding an actual b…

> But the CEO could get off his fat ass and do his job finding an actual business model

HN would complain (and indeed has complained) every time they try to find a non-Google source of revenue. The advertisement for the Disney movie with a Red Panda got flamed despite being completely innocuous, Pocket and Mozilla VPN and Lockwise got flamed for being "distractions" or whatever, etc.

"Focus on the browser", everyone says, except that browsers are the most commoditized market you could possibly immagine, where their competitors (3 of the richest companies in the entire world) literally spend billions of dollars pushing their own browsers as loss-leaders, and also they come pre-installed on billions of devices by default. What kind of "business model" do you expect, exactly? Do like Brave and build a crypto scheme around in-page ad replacement?

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#53

Post by concinds »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #32
stackskipton wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strong disagree. These payments are clearly massive tent pole of maintaining the monopoly and I think it was right for competition authorities to appeal them. In fact, IMO, Metha ruling was way to favorable for Google. Basically like, well, they did the crime but it's too much to disrupt so I guess we will nibble at the edges accomplishing little.

Yeah, they should be forced to split Chrome into a separate business and stay out of the browser business permanently. Anything short of that either won't help or will further strengthen their monopoly.

> split Chrome into a separate business

Bought by whom? Another monopolist bigcorp that surely won't care to monetize it? That is not how you reason about antitrust issues.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#54

Post by chrismorgan »

malicka wrote: post #14
amelius wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU should heavily subsidize Mozilla, so that this is not necessary.

They definitely shouldn’t. Mozilla has talented engineers, but it’s been catastrophically mismanaged for almost 20 years at this point. Keep Firefox, but let Mozilla finally die.

I’m curious where you start it. I was thinking about it a couple of weeks ago and decided “more than a decade” was safe to say, but I was thinking towards fifteen years, not twenty.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#55

Post by devsda »

Chrome should be split, Firefox or its forks (if Mozilla continues to mismanage) should be able to receive funds from Google but Chrome should not be allowed to be paid for Google search engine placement at least for the next 5-6 years.

I'm sure many other players will play top dollar to be the default on a browser that virtually commands all the market. That'll let us discover the real price of search engine defaults because the Mozilla payout is partly due to antitrust reasons.

In that case, I think we'll also see a visible decrease in "bugs" affecting Firefox on Google's properties.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#56

Post by laristine »

irishcoffee wrote: post #31
freedomben wrote: post #25

Like many here, I think Mozilla has done a terrible job managing their money and they are largely to blame for the pickle they are in. However, I don't see who picks up the reigns if Mozilla dies. Like it or not, Firefox is essential for a somewhat (increasingly less) open web, and (at least for now) Mozilla is essential to Firefox. For those who want to see Mozilla die but Firefox live on, what are the more likely o…

How is firefox essential to the open web?

More competition is better than less.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#57

Post by ranger_danger »

sylens wrote: post #21

Mozilla should start exploring a subscription business and tout its continued support for the full uBlock Origin among other extensions. I would pay a small amount annually to support its development and I bet I'm not alone.

I think Mozilla asking people for more money is the last thing users want.

They have more than enough money to be better, and focus more on development, they just... don't.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#58

Post by devsda »

freedomben wrote: post #25

Like many here, I think Mozilla has done a terrible job managing their money and they are largely to blame for the pickle they are in. However, I don't see who picks up the reigns if Mozilla dies. Like it or not, Firefox is essential for a somewhat (increasingly less) open web, and (at least for now) Mozilla is essential to Firefox. For those who want to see Mozilla die but Firefox live on, what are the more likely o…

Lets flip the question, does it have to be at the break neck pace that nobody can catch up without spending huge money?

How many of those features were really organic, driven by actual pressing need and not driven by Google's needs.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#59

Post by hn_submit »

dralley wrote: post #41
hn_submit wrote: post #12

I love Firefox but feel little pity for Mozilla which receives $400+ million a year on search placement in their browser but spends only a tiny fraction on its development. The rest is wasted on greedy management and frivolous projects to give that same management an excuse to give themselves multi-million dollar payouts. Everyone's only in it for the money. There are no good or bad people anymore, only...unfortunate…

HN is incredibly inconsistent and two-faced about which Mozilla side projects are "frivolous" and which ought to be defended to the death. Rust was a side project, asm.js was a side project that turned into WASM, IIRC LetsEncrypt was a side project (or at least a side project of Mozilla engineers, if not official), significant parts of the initial R&D for AV1 and Opus came out of Mozilla, Servo was largely a side pro…

Mozilla should've finished rewriting Firefox completely in Rust to give them an Unique Selling Point. They didn't because of management's hubris to build their own mobile operating system to take on Google (its largest financier). Google probably warned them that it would pull back its money if FirefoxOS managed to grab any significant market share. So it was destined to fail from day one.

I'm surprised they didn't integrate their own internet search engine into Firefox. But the contract with Google probably prohibits it and Google would immediately pull the plug on Firefox if it got wind of it anyway.

Re: Mozilla says stricter antitrust measures against Google 'threaten Firefox'

#60

Post by ranger_danger »

ForHackernews wrote: post #11
alexdns wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why Mozilla in particular ? Or its that just what you like ?

Gecko is the only semi-mainstream browser engine that isn't controlled by Google.

Webkit is not controlled by Google and powers Safari as well as some smaller browsers and many other applications.
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