Firefox Beta now integrates Pocket

It is not immediately obvious to me what a "pocket" is. It sounds like a bookmark, but I assume it is something else if they aren't calling it "bookmark".

Pocket is basically integrating a third party service in the user's default bar (you can remove it in customize)

It feels like its there for commercial purposes... Has mozilla lost its user centric values though? Theres enough ads and sponsored stuff on the web already.

This is another one of Mozilla's "Social API" clients.[1] There are about 18 such items, including Google+, LinkedIn, and Twitter connectors.[2] Roughly the same functionality used to be available as a standard add-on from Pocket [3] but that's been discontinued and replaced by a "social API" add on.

The "integration" seems to be that it now comes pre-installed, and cannot be removed. Users are complaining about being unable to remove it.[4] Anyone know how much the Mozilla Foundation was paid to stick it to their users like that?

Ghacks has an article about how to disable Pocket in Firefox.[5] You have to go into "about.config" and set "browser.pocket.enabled" to False, then restart the browser.

Disabling all of Firefox's "social" features has deliberately been made difficult.[6] You turn off "social.active" and "social.enabled" to False. Those variable may not exist in "about.config"; you may have to create them.

[1] https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Projects/So... [2] https://activations.cdn.mozilla.net/en-US/ [3] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/read-it-later... [4] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/read-it-later... [5] http://www.ghacks.net/2015/05/14/how-to-disable-pocket-in-fi... [6] http://www.trishtech.com/2015/01/disable-social-features-in-...

Does Mozilla publish their income sources? I know google was a large contributor in exchange for having their search on the initial page, but I'm no longer sure that's true.

Seamonkeyish?