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Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

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Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know they own Pocket right? Pocket is basically their version of Read Later, etc...And it’s completely optional whether you want to use it or not. So I’m not sure I understand this complaint. Mozilla’s first integration of Pocket was poorly done, and rightfully raised complaints. But since they have purchased it, a lot of those complaints have been resolved.

I've not seen any indication that users wanted it, I've also read that Mozilla developers agree that it should be an extension. Yet Mozilla buys this and puts it inside Firefox, where it can at best be disabled by going through about:config and changing parameters. Why Mozilla is hellbent on pushing this upon their users is beyond me, it just hurts their image in my opinon.

> Why Mozilla is hellbent on pushing this upon their users is beyond me

It's one of their many attempts at finding a revenue source that isn't Google. Their hope was that people would love it so much that they'd sign up for the pay version.

I have a huge amount of sympathy for Mozilla on this issue. They get slammed for being funded by Google, but pretty much every time they do something that could generate revenue and get them off of Google's wallet, they get roundly slammed for that, too.

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#222
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make it sound as if Brave does more than Firefox to provide an alternative to the Chrome quasi-monopoly. Let's not forget that Brave is a fork of Chromium in the first place which means that if you value competition Firefox is still a better bet, at least until Brave shows that they can maintain a deep fork of Chrome long term while resisting upstream changes they don't want and that's a very tall order. I do agr…

Not saying Brave is the answer, but I think they have at least identified the right problem - ie If, for example, an effective adblocking browser takes off, huge amounts of revenue to content providers will disappear. So content providers will start to resist in the only way they can - by blocking people with adblockers. If you want to avoid either massive reduction of content, or the blocking of ad blockers, then yo…

Yes, I want massive reduction of content. I am sorry, but if you haven't noticed, internet is a giant, steaming pile of garbage. Amount of usable content is 1:10000 and the reason for this are ads - you earn money regardless what crap you sell. It is no longer about content but about watching ads.

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#224

Ex-Mozillian Brendan Eich agrees that privacy is the battle for the future http://www.brave.com The question is - do you need to re-write the internet economy as Brave are trying to to achieve it, and not just block trackers? The third element is that governments are becoming addicted to the vast trove of information gathered - will they be willing to give that up if a technical/business model solution takes off. Int…

I want no part of Brave's weird cryptoish scheme. I know the feature is opt-in, but I don't see the point in supporting an organization unable to find a source of revenue I find agreeable. Even something as simple and obnoxious as donation nagging, like Wikipedia, seems preferable to what Brave has proposed.

Brave is just trying a system of micropayments to support your most visited websites. To the end user, the crypto part can be invisible.

The user just deposits something like $10/month from their credit card and spreads it across their favourite websites.

They can do that and be completely ignorant that everything is running on ethereum. Which is really the way it should be in the end. Ethereum is just a hidden value transfer backend that saves a company money.

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#225
post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One day I woke up to a chart showing browser market share of FF at around 4%, which surprised me - as I thought many people would understand the implications and directions. Its certainly low, but I also think FF usage is under reported due to built-in tracker blocking. For reference, FF uses the level 1 disconnect.me block list, which blocks StatCounter scrips from loading on 3rd party sites [1]. [1] https://githu…

> Its certainly low, but I also think FF usage is under reported due to built-in tracker blocking. Of course it's not perfect source, but CloudFlare for instance have client detection purely by SSL handshake fingerprint and it's show 6-7% for Firefox: https://malcolm.cloudflare.com/ Long ago Wikimedia also had own statistics that was pretty much relevant, but I guess it's discontinued.

Other takeways from that graph:

- Mobile internet use surpassed desktop.

- Tablets never caught on

- Windows 7 is more popular than MacOS

- Safari (mobile, undoubtedly) is the second most popular browser. IE(!) is third.

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#226

Ex-Mozillian Brendan Eich agrees that privacy is the battle for the future http://www.brave.com The question is - do you need to re-write the internet economy as Brave are trying to to achieve it, and not just block trackers? The third element is that governments are becoming addicted to the vast trove of information gathered - will they be willing to give that up if a technical/business model solution takes off. Int…

I want no part of Brave's weird cryptoish scheme. I know the feature is opt-in, but I don't see the point in supporting an organization unable to find a source of revenue I find agreeable. Even something as simple and obnoxious as donation nagging, like Wikipedia, seems preferable to what Brave has proposed.

Do you have a problem with Mozilla's revenue from Google?

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#227
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm on my waay BACK to Firefox, there was a strange period when I left, Firefox just seemed really heavy on my machine, and it was super intensive for some dev tools. Now I say the same about chrome and find FF much lighter and efficient. Delighted that FF are taking a bit of a stronger stand here in the privacy dept too .

Using Fedora Linux, last I tried a switch to FF (less than 6 months ago) it was way slower than chrome. I actually like FF functionality more and would prefer to use it but my laptop runs significantly hotter when I run FF on it.

Are you running Wayland? Make sure Firefox was running in Wayland mode. Fedora had a separate package for Wayland Firefox for some time, though it might be the default in 31. XWayland can result in a performance hit.

https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/Firefox_Wayland_By_De...

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#228

I'm using Firefox for years, after Chrome started to ask me for a login (at around version 40). Never looked back. One day I woke up to a chart showing browser market share of FF at around 4%, which surprised me - as I thought many people would understand the implications and directions. Maybe I'm too optimistic. Update: Loved chrome, used it for years, I also love most Chrome engineering and all the innovation they…

> I woke up to a chart showing browser market share of FF at around 4% I've used and loved Firefox from before it was called Firefox. I really, really, really want to like the modern Firefox, but I just can't. I find it limiting and irritating. So, sadly, I don't. I don't use Chrome either, though.

What do you find limiting about Firefox? How does your browser of choice free you from these limitations?

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#229
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I often forget how does the internet look like without the adblocker

Not using a dedicated ad blocker (just Firefox) and the article looks very clean to me.

OP is using Chrome and complaining about tracking.

Re: Mozilla’s plan to fix internet privacy

#230

> Mozilla lost the browser wars Honest question... who did they lose to? Google Chrome? For me personally, Firefox has been better than Chrome for several years now. The only reason I still load up Chrome is when I want to stream to my Chromecast.

Yep, everyone lost to Chrome, by a margin so large it can only be correlated to Android's formidable dominance.

See this other comment I made: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22299884

There's s link to a video by DataIsBeautiful which, if you think of OS market share (notably switch to mobile big time at the detriment of x86 in the early 2010s), is as clear as it gets. Mainstream users in their vast majority do not even think of using a different browser — there's one out-of-the-box, right?.. more pressing concern is getting on with one's life.

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