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Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

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Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#171

Post by ecshafer »

cycomanic wrote: post #121
bachmeier wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been using Thunderbird for decades, I've donated in the past, and am likely to donate again. With that out of the way, the lack of transparency as to what happens to my money kills the incentive to donate. "How will my gift be used?" "Thunderbird is the leading open source email and productivity app that is free for business and personal use. Your gift helps ensure it stays that way, and supports ongoing develop…

I find that a weird sentiment. Why do people demand to know and control how every one of their donations goes, while nobody questions how corporations use their money. Ironically, the demand for this increased transparency significantly increases compliance cost, which means more and more money is driven away from the actual cause toward the administrative costs. Exactly what people don't want to support.

Mozilla and Wikipedia for example are causes I support. But why would I give money to them if they are going to turn around and give money to some cause I don't support (OR am actively against)? These non-profits love to shuffle money around to unrelated causes. As a non profit, supporting open source software, I think expecting a large percentage of the donation to go to engineering and not admin, social causes, etc. is a reasonable expectation.

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#172

Post by throw384949 »

smarnach wrote: post #75
upofadown wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are an entity separate from Mozilla: * https://blog.thunderbird.net/2020/01/thunderbirds-new-home/

They are not entirely separate from Mozilla. The MZLA Technologies Corporation is a for-profit subsidiary of the Mozilla Foundation. They have access to some of Mozilla's common infrastructure, but are otherwise entirely funded by donations. Donations to MZLA only fund Thunderbird and no other products.

Mozilla also runs hiring and HR for MZLA. They control who gets hired and fired.

It is more like money laundering, than independent entity.

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#174

Post by antiframe »

ecshafer wrote: post #171
cycomanic wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find that a weird sentiment. Why do people demand to know and control how every one of their donations goes, while nobody questions how corporations use their money. Ironically, the demand for this increased transparency significantly increases compliance cost, which means more and more money is driven away from the actual cause toward the administrative costs. Exactly what people don't want to support.

Mozilla and Wikipedia for example are causes I support. But why would I give money to them if they are going to turn around and give money to some cause I don't support (OR am actively against)? These non-profits love to shuffle money around to unrelated causes. As a non profit, supporting open source software, I think expecting a large percentage of the donation to go to engineering and not admin, social causes, etc…

Yes that's all reasonable but the comparison is paying for (or giving them other revenue) corporations who also love to shuffle money around and can support causes you are actively against. The point being made was that people give causes trying to improve society more scrutiny than they give for-profit mega corporations who have in the past shown that they use their money for a lot of things detrimental to society.

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#175

Post by mghackerlady »

rambambram wrote: post #37

Just donated. Have been using Thunderbird for years. I once donated to Wikipedia - and they have billions I heard - so might as well donate to another important piece of software for my digital life. Now that I read the comments I find out Mozilla might have enough money and a CEO taking in millions. Any recommendations for a good email client on Linux? Just as a backup for now...

The reason Wikipedia has so much is that the end goal is for it to be self sustaining through interest iirc

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#176

Post by roysting »

LamaOfRuin wrote: post #170
bachmeier wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been using Thunderbird for decades, I've donated in the past, and am likely to donate again. With that out of the way, the lack of transparency as to what happens to my money kills the incentive to donate. "How will my gift be used?" "Thunderbird is the leading open source email and productivity app that is free for business and personal use. Your gift helps ensure it stays that way, and supports ongoing develop…

The most recent report/breakdown I see: https://blog.thunderbird.net/2025/10/state-of-the-bird-2024-...

It is not my domain, but I was quite surprised at the 10% processing fee expense. That’s ~$1M at their ~$10 income.

Isn’t that quite a bit high? Or am I looking at something incorrectly. Maybe someone has some suggestions for them on how to lower that amount.

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#177

Post by antisol »

mb_thd wrote: post #108
OhioMan2943 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mozilla doesn't have the willpower or vision to do anything with anything.

Don't be so harsh on them. (\s) They show lots of willpower and some sort of vision when talking about AI in Firefox.

Don't forget telemetry! The makers of the "privacy-focused browser" were super strong-willed about that, too.

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#178

Post by vovavili »

amiga386 wrote: post #48
latexr wrote: post #17

If you press the browser’s back button on the donation page, they send you to a page pestering you for your email address so they can send you a reminder to donate later. Talk about a dark pattern. Mozilla has really gone off the rails. An organisation who claims to work on behalf of the user and who makes a web browser, actively hijacking the user experience to peddle for a few dollars? Why the heck is Thunderbird “…

> Where do the billions of dollars from Google go? They go to the Mozilla Corporation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Finances The Mozilla Corporation then picks and chooses what it finances within the Mozilla Foundation. Their financial statements don't break down how they spend on software development within the Foundation, it only lists out employee salaries, specific directors' salaries and gra…

>- $163,516,000 on manager salaries

>- $20,258,000 on consultants (e.g. branding consultants)

>- $9,573,000 on travel

I am very glad to be using Brave at the moment of reading this.

Re: Help Keep Thunderbird Alive

#179

Post by dizhn »

prmoustache wrote: post #84
Foobar8568 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't remember (+quick check) Firebird for the email client, do you have source for this?

Firebird was the browser's name, after phoenix and before rebranding to firefox.

Firebird was actually the database whose name they hijacked when they had access to AOL's legal army.

Also K9Mail is now Thunderbird for Android.

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