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Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#231

Post by coldpie »

staticelf wrote: post #193
notsony wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care about Mozilla or Firefox. I used to, but not anymore. Two reasons why. First, copying Chrome's UI. Second, forcing Brendan Eich out. These days Mozilla comes across as a bunch of whiners and activists rather than a technology company. Maybe Rust will be successful but I don't want to be part of an ecosystem where straight talking and free thought is banned. Do you want to submit a pull request and be tol…

> Do you want to submit a pull request and be told not to use gendered pronouns or avoid using certain words because it makes people feel unsafe? Is that really true? Can you give an example of that?

Of course he can't, because he's talking out his ass.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#232

Post by byuu »

felipeerias wrote: post #201
brighteyes wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think reasonable criticisms were made regarding some of those, like Pocket. However, Australis for example was a large redesign of the UI. I'm not sure how you can support an opt-out, as that would mean supporting two codebases - two different and separate UIs, at once. Regarding bundling of DRM, it isn't bundled, but it is downloaded on demand. This is a sad thing even so, but Google, Microsoft and Netflix just le…

For some reason, everybody feels like they should have a say in the direction of large Free SW projects, even if they have never contributed. Some criticisms of Mozilla are fair (even if blown out of proportion, like the Pocket issue), but one can not expect a project to make development even more complex by adding a "revert it because this one guy doesn't like it" button for each change or feature.

I haven't contributed directly to Mozilla, no.

As a software dev that's received plenty of criticism as well, I'll just say that when I post detailed complaints about things I don't like, it's not because I want to harm or destroy their software. If I truly hated their software, I wouldn't be using it or talking about it at all. For all of Mozilla's faults, the only real cross-platform alternative (Chrome) is even worse. That one forces silent updates, won't let me download and run older versions, won't let me disable WebRTC, was the inspiration for the new Mozilla UI I dislike, sends a lot of data back to Google, etc.

The problem with not complaining is that when everyone does it, the developers have no idea why 30% of their market share is gone, yet everyone who remained is still happy with the changes.

Further, I think really major software projects like Firefox and Gnome are in a different category. People's livelihoods depend on these software programs. Totally changing things around can have serious effects on people, not just those who hate change.

It's one thing to be a single developer working on a solitaire game and deciding to redesign everything; it's quite another to be a multi-million dollar company with hundreds of employees and tens of millions of users and deciding to redesign everything.

When you care about your market share, have employees that depend upon your success, and so forth ... you really should make the effort to listen to your community of users.

And let's not forget the whole reason we're having this discussion is because Mozilla just berated Microsoft for removing user choice. If you're going to criticize someone for their faults that you're every bit as guilty of, you should expect to be called out on your hypocrisy.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#233

Post by LamaOfRuin »

zz1 wrote: post #229
LamaOfRuin wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation needed.

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox/Go_Faster

Ah, an actual response. Much appreciated. That does seem to address the concerns and at first glance seems to me like a better solution than any of the ones I had seen proposed.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#234

Post by byuu »

Silhouette wrote: post #161
girvo wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you'll also miss out on critical bug fixes and security updates for the old one within a few months? I'm not disagreeing with your point, but can't you use the Firefox LTS releases for that exact reason?

Sadly, I have discovered that Mozilla and I have very different ideas of what "long term" means. The irony of my previous post is that both Microsoft and Mozilla seem to be playing the same game now, right down to sub-year "long term" support. You can't really choose whether to have those updates any more, only to defer them for a short while. Anything more than that, and you just have to give up on updating altogeth…

Honestly with everything becoming web apps these days, I'm starting to feel it's more dangerous for the browser than for the OS. So many zero-day exploits like the recent Microsoft OpenType bug. And of course, Flash. Enough said there.

I'm already to the point where I don't web surf on my primary development box, outside of localhost (site dev work.)

As long as your firewall seals off all unrequested external traffic (easy with pf), and you don't run untrusted desktop applications, then the only real attack vector is through your browser.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#235

Post by Yoric »

dhimes wrote: post #226
Yoric wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a Firefox dev (but speaking only for myself). I believe that most people inside Mozilla agree that a number of choices made recently by Mozilla were pretty bad. And these "most people" includes the team who is now in charge of product development at Mozilla, and wasn't in that position at the time of, say, Hello or Pocket. We are making changes. I hope that the community will see the changes soon. Now, as usual,…

Your reply inspired me to make another donation to Mozilla. EDIT: The donation page fooled me. After putting in a credit card, there is a step called 'personal.' It is not. It is the billing address for the card. I put in personal info and was rejected. I put in billing address and it went through. (Company card) The rule for us little guys applies to big guys too: Re-inventing UI makes it harder for your customer, a…

I can file a bug. Is it that page? https://sendto.mozilla.org/page/contribute/givenow-seq?sourc...

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#236

Post by coldpie »

tdkl wrote: post #203
notsony wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care about Mozilla or Firefox. I used to, but not anymore. Two reasons why. First, copying Chrome's UI. Second, forcing Brendan Eich out. These days Mozilla comes across as a bunch of whiners and activists rather than a technology company. Maybe Rust will be successful but I don't want to be part of an ecosystem where straight talking and free thought is banned. Do you want to submit a pull request and be tol…

This is actually the common thing in tech now, you need to step carefully on eggshells everywhere to avoid someone being butthurt. I miss the Internet around year 2000.

Yes, I remember when we could sling racist, misogynistic, and homophobic slurs around without a thought for the feelings of non-whites, minorities, or an entire half of the world's population. Thanks to those slurs, the world was a better place because, uh... because... er, uh, hm...

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#237

Post by byuu »

gfosco wrote: post #165
slowmovintarget wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not going to defend Mozilla's hypocrisy. Microsoft is in a different league with Windows 10, however. This was what they dreamed of 15 years ago. Once you install Windows 10, it's no longer your PC, it is Microsoft's. You can't choose to avoid an update. Think about that. This means Microsoft can do anything it wants to with your computer: * change your settings * farm your compute cycles * put in advertising * i…

No, they can't legally do any of the negative things you've listed, and they aren't an organization with a history of criminal action against customers. This brings the OS in line with the behavior of many applications (Chrome for example) in keeping things always up-to-date & secured, and it's done because most users are incredibly lazy and ignorant.

> it's done because most users are incredibly lazy and ignorant.

I don't know why it's acceptable for software to treat all of its users as lazy and ignorant, even if most actually are. All that's going to do is encourage them to find ever new and amazing ways to be even more lazy and ignorant.

Sure, botnets suck, but it's not worth giving up control over our desktops to stop them.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#238

Post by dhimes »

Yoric wrote: post #235
dhimes wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your reply inspired me to make another donation to Mozilla. EDIT: The donation page fooled me. After putting in a credit card, there is a step called 'personal.' It is not. It is the billing address for the card. I put in personal info and was rejected. I put in billing address and it went through. (Company card) The rule for us little guys applies to big guys too: Re-inventing UI makes it harder for your customer, a…

I can file a bug. Is it that page? https://sendto.mozilla.org/page/contribute/givenow-seq?sourc...

yes, thank you.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#239

Post by nova »

coldpie wrote: post #236
tdkl wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is actually the common thing in tech now, you need to step carefully on eggshells everywhere to avoid someone being butthurt. I miss the Internet around year 2000.

Yes, I remember when we could sling racist, misogynistic, and homophobic slurs around without a thought for the feelings of non-whites, minorities, or an entire half of the world's population. Thanks to those slurs, the world was a better place because, uh... because... er, uh, hm...

So, free speech is great as long as you don't strongly disagree with it.

Re: Open Letter to Microsoft’s CEO: Don’t Roll Back the Clock on Choice and Control

#240

Post by DonHopkins »

notsony wrote: post #172
Animats wrote: post #74

I am writing to you about a very disturbing aspect of Firefox 38.0.5. Specifically, that the update experience appears to have been designed to throw away the choice your customers have made about the Internet experience they want, and replace it with the Internet experience Mozilla wants them to have. When we first saw the Firefox upgrade experience that strips users of their choice by effectively overriding existin…

I don't care about Mozilla or Firefox. I used to, but not anymore. Two reasons why. First, copying Chrome's UI. Second, forcing Brendan Eich out. These days Mozilla comes across as a bunch of whiners and activists rather than a technology company. Maybe Rust will be successful but I don't want to be part of an ecosystem where straight talking and free thought is banned. Do you want to submit a pull request and be tol…

Stop trying to rewrite history. Brendan Eich decided to leave on his own, in spite of the fact that they tried to get him to stay.
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