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Firefox search update

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Firefox search update

#211

Post by [deleted] »

exitzer0 wrote: post #107
poszlem wrote: post #37

One thing that annoys me more than data collection is corporations pretending they do it for my benefit while "respecting my privacy." Stop with the gaslighting, it's absolutely insufferable. Not to mention, the way the text is written makes me think it's ai generated and that makes it somehow even worse.

This. I invite everyone to go and look at the amount settings that must be turned OFF in Windows 10/11, Firefox, Chrome, whatever app from companies that claim to respect user privacy. For Windows it is literally dozens of toggles, and unsoliticed apps. Then there are the so called security features like malware scanning of URLs/file downloads, etc. Then the DNS replacements which, ya know, still see the URLs that yo…

[deleted]

Re: Firefox search update

#212

Post by dralley »

immibis wrote: post #189
deprecative wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ironic that ads are what Google uses to pay Mozilla so you(we) can use Firefox.

You assume that Firefox can't exist without Mozilla. Thunderbird got a lot better after divorcing from Mozilla.

A) Firefox is vastly bigger and more complicated than Thunderbird

B) Email protocols aren't a moving target to the degree that the web is

C) Thunderbird has the benefit of being able to freeload off the base platform development that Firefox continues to do, although of course it's a lot of work even to adapt to those changes.

Re: Firefox search update

#213

Post by Barrin92 »

bobthecowboy wrote: post #148
Barrin92 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has nothing to do with mental gymnastics. Consent isn't a meaningful concept when it comes to each individual setting of a piece of software. You'd have to make 500 decisions every minute if you had to actively consent to everything your software does. In fact cookie banners show this. People hate them because they force meaningless choices on them. If you make a website with tracking as an opt-out option, almos…

> In fact cookie banners show this. People hate them because they force meaningless choices on them. If you make a website with tracking as an opt-out option, almost everyone clicks "accept all". If you make a website with tracking as opt-in, almost every one clicks accept all. That shows that opt-in/out or consent does literally nothing ot reflect people's preferences, the act of making a choice completely dominates…

> It's not a shock that people when confronted with this will click the easy button, and that doesn't mean it reflects their actual interests.

Yes, but that was my actual point. If one simple UI design trick is enough to completely flip the choices of users, then consent forms aren't a robust way to collect preferences at all. In fact if you wanted to genuinely and in good faith provide access to granular preferences, giving a more complicated set of choices would be the only way to go about it, and that fatigue is still real even if the design has a legitimate purpose.

What you're saying is true, the only way for the choice to be representative would be to have like a binary yes/no choice because that's simple, but that's not even necessarily what the user wants either. You're going to get a significantly more accurate view of people's real preferences by collecting data, like what Firefox is doing here, and then setting defaults accordingly.

Re: Firefox search update

#214

Post by riedel »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #197
JeremyNT wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with this take. It's not like the power users who currently use Firefox and yet dislike this stuff are going to switch away from Firefox, since there's nothing to switch to other than Chrome, which is clearly worse. Personal anecdote, I didn't like Pocket being added to Firefox, but eventually I did start using it - only because it came from Mozilla. And I currently pay Mozilla money for Relay (along with VPN…

> not like the power users who currently use Firefox and yet dislike this stuff are going to switch away from Firefox Not a Firefox power user, but also not a fan of having to learn through HN that I need to disable some random opt-in to not have my browsing leaked by my browser. Was genuinely on the fence about deleting it and simplifying to Safari.

I am a happy user of LibreWolf: they do the opt out for me. On android I use mull. I have to say that I am quite happy and really do not understand everyone moving to chromium based browsers.

Re: Firefox search update

#215

Post by mead5432 »

kjkjadksj wrote: post #147
not2b wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Antitrust actions in the US and EU may force Google to cut off those payments (to Mozilla and Apple), and if that happens, Firefox needs to survive somehow.

Somehow open source browsers still get made without a $600 million “rich uncle.” Mozilla is pretty bloated. This can buy like 1200 good engineers. People make browsers with a couple people sometimes.

Sorry - was looking at an older version of the page and didn’t realize there were already a bunch of the same comment. My bad.

———

Will they though? Maybe some toy ones but the distribution of other browsers are largely built on chromium with a few on Firefox and one or two on WebKit.

Beyond that, there’s Arc that’s made a splash with the HN crowd but IIRC, it’s VC funded so a whole different set of concerns.

There will be other browsers but almost the entire browser market is essentially funded by Google.

Re: Firefox search update

#216

Post by philistine »

saurik wrote: post #205
ragnese wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the pitch "we're slightly more private" is a hard one that they aren't even doing well... if they want to make a commitment to 0 data storage with no suggestions or analytics, that would be one thing, but they refuse to do that and so can't hold this narrative. Or... they can, because they are still more private and respectful than Chrome and Edge, at least.

And yet, every time this comes up people come out to bash Firefox for not going far enough on privacy. The top comments on this HN post are all in that category, as the people who care about privacy actually care about privacy and Firefox's half-assed attempts to walk the line are falling flat for that audience. Meanwhile, as can be seen in these very comments, people seem to have found alternatives: any of the now m…

If I didn’t know any better, I’d presume Firefox is waiting for Google to get in real bad trouble with the FTC so it has to sign a deal to promote other browsers or something. I would not hold my breath.

Re: Firefox search update

#217

Post by [deleted] »

saurik wrote: post #185
aquova wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I constantly see this take and I'm afraid I don't agree with it. Firefox is continuing to lose market share, and I think it's less anything they're doing and due simply to the fact that Google is a household name while Mozilla is not. When the user is already using a Google phone, email, search, maps, drive, and document editor, it follows to also use their browser. Simply being a solid browser isn't enough to motiva…

I just feel like they should be concentrating their time into adding features to Firefox which Google either will not or doesn't care to add to Chrome, not trying to compete with Google's entire business suite: that's a losing uphill battle and the pitch "we're slightly more private" is a hard one that they aren't even doing well... if they want to make a commitment to 0 data storage with no suggestions or analytics,…

[deleted]

Re: Firefox search update

#218

Post by JohnFen »

kjkjadksj wrote: post #177
camkego wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s possible to repackage Chromium with a couple people. It’s not possible to build a browser from the ground up with a couple people.

Using existing code is fine, that's how most software is built anyhow. Only masochists build from complete scratch. EDIT: I've been getting a lot of down votes for this stance, surprisingly. Why not share your position if you don't agree? There must be a bunch of hardcore people on here who are writing directly on the metal in machine code. Short of that, you are in fact using someone else's code in all your projects…

This seems to conflate two entirely different ways of "using existing code". Using tools written by others is technically "using existing code", but that's an entirely different thing than incorporating existing code into your projects.

I think that when most devs hear "using existing code", they're thinking of the latter, not the former.

Re: Firefox search update

#219

Post by JohnFen »

cflewis wrote: post #29
mtmail wrote: post #4

"list of categories we’re using: animals, arts, autos, business, career, education, fashion, finance, food, government, health, hobbies, home, inconclusive, news, real estate, society, sports, tech and travel." "This helps us [...] providing a browsing experience that is more tailored to your needs" How would my browsing experience be different in any of the categories? Unless it's about showing me ads yet again.

Yeah, this is the rub of it. I don’t want my browser to know about me. It’s not necessary. What are they gonna do, release a gaming-aesthetic browser like Opera did? Can’t this data be gleaned some most definitely not identifiable way like download number for particular platforms (“hey, we’re getting a lot of use on Steam Deck”) or something? Mozilla is supposed to be better than this. I don’t really see anywhere els…

> I don’t want my browser to know about me. It’s not necessary.

This. It's not necessary, and I consider it dangerous. Even if the browser maker is 100% on the same privacy page as I am, browsers are too complex to trust with personal data.

Re: Firefox search update

#220

Post by JohnFen »

lxgr wrote: post #210
kjkjadksj wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All you have to do is keep up with web standards. Most people don't use 99% of the browsers features I'd guess. About all I need are tabs and bookmarks and a history and thats it, same stuff since netscape basically, my three features for a complete browser experience that would make me very happy. I'm sure other users feel the same.

Some things technically not part of the core feature set of a browser (at least not the one you've mentioned), yet even just one of them missing would make me immediately drop Firefox: - End-to-end encrypted tab, history, and bookmark sync across devices - Content translation, as mentioned above ideally in a privacy-preserving way - Plugin support - Cookie-jar-per-tab and proxy-per-tab support (Firefox allows doing b…

And I don't want or use any of those things.

It's almost like a "one size fits all" browser can't actually exist. I'm hoping for a more minimal, but excellent, browser to come around to meet the needs of the sort of user I am.

I think this is one of the adverse effects of Firefox changing how extensions work. In the Good Old Days, Firefox was a reasonably minimal browser and you could pick and choose which advanced functionality you wanted by choosing which extensions to install. But since extensions have been largely neutered now, a whole lot of that advanced functionality has to be built into the browser proper. This is fine if you want that stuff, but it's really uncomfortable if you don't.

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