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Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

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Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#241

Post by SergeAx »

yojo wrote: post #74
4bpp wrote: post #53

If I understand the timeline correctly here, it seems that gorhill overreacted, and I say that as someone who is usually harshly critical of everything Mozilla has done in the past 5+ years. It's hardly practical for Mozilla to manually review every add-on revision for safety in a timely manner, so they had the choice between automation and delays that would make add-on development a slog; automation though inevitabl…

I think it’s reasonable to expect that one of Firefox’s most popular extension publishers gets a higher tier of review service. Gorhill (and other top extension devs) are providing real value to Firefox, and have demonstrated good behavior for years. This doesn’t mean they should get to publish whatever they want, but if a reviewer is about to reject a high profile plugin, they should get a second set of eyes on it.…

uBlock Origin is THE reason I am using Firefox Mobile. The moment it gone - there's no sense in keeping the browser.

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#242

Post by shadowgovt »

yojo wrote: post #198
munch117 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this is not about a high profile plugin. The high profile plugin is "uBlock Origin", and this is about "uBlock Origin Lite", which is a big thing for Chrome, but not for Firefox. Why would anyone want to use uBOL, when they have the option to use uBO? Perhaps Mozilla does have a higher tier of review, but it's for specific plugins, not for specific authors.

Generally, anything published by the guy who maintains your most-installed plugin is by definition high profile. That’s why we’re talking about this case on HN. If Mozilla is providing tiered support by plugin rather than publisher, this latest kerfuffle is evidence that they should reconsider the approach. But if I were betting, I’d guess there’s no one at Mozilla whose job responsibilities include keeping their mar…

And, in contrast, that job (or parallel jobs for different 'online stores') definitely exist at Google and Microsoft. At Google, there's a whole army of open-secret glad-handlers for liaising between high-profile or high-relevance Cloud customers and the development teams inside Google that work on Cloud (because sometimes a customer comes up with a novel way to use the tool that exposes the cracks in the abstraction and lets the underlying implementation leak out undesirably). Customers don't get to choose to be handled that way (though they can, of course, indirectly signal it by how much money they spend); it's Google's decision to maximize company value / security.

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#243

Post by akira2501 »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #190
open-paren wrote: post #117

I manage a medium-sized browser extension at work. We also offer(ed) it on Firefox. But I have spent the past year struggling to get back into Mozilla store after a manual review. As far as I can tell, there are maybe two reviewers that are based in Europe (Romania?). The turn around time is long when I am in the US, and it has been rife with this same kind of "simple mistake" that takes 2 weeks to resolve. "You need…

> that's because you didn't follow instructions and are in the wrong directory. You just need to have a shell script in the root directory that assumes the person running it has 0 clue about your extension. Also some of this reminds me of Apple. They clear something up, then bring it up again the next time review is needed.

> that assumes the person running it has 0 clue about your extension.

I would tend to assume that a person given responsibility for reviewing this software, supposedly to protect end users, would not be this clueless.

What value is the "Firefox Store" actually offering then?

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#244

Post by rightbyte »

jjice wrote: post #157
open-paren wrote: post #117

I manage a medium-sized browser extension at work. We also offer(ed) it on Firefox. But I have spent the past year struggling to get back into Mozilla store after a manual review. As far as I can tell, there are maybe two reviewers that are based in Europe (Romania?). The turn around time is long when I am in the US, and it has been rife with this same kind of "simple mistake" that takes 2 weeks to resolve. "You need…

Also had these issues when working on my previous job's extension. The Firefox review process was a real nightmare to work with. Same heavy delays and misunderstandings your mentioned. Eventually the company just stopped updating the Firefox extension as often since usage was low and the review process was such a pain. Unfortunate for me, as the only engineer (maybe employee) at that company that used Firefox.

The whole extension change Mozilla forced on Firefox seems like some sort of sabotage.

Mozilla sneaking in more and more spyware and ad friendly functionality seems in line with the same conspirators.

And given how high profile all these changes are, it runs to the top of the company.

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#245

Post by ethbr1 »

akira2501 wrote: post #243
giancarlostoro wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that's because you didn't follow instructions and are in the wrong directory. You just need to have a shell script in the root directory that assumes the person running it has 0 clue about your extension. Also some of this reminds me of Apple. They clear something up, then bring it up again the next time review is needed.

> that assumes the person running it has 0 clue about your extension. I would tend to assume that a person given responsibility for reviewing this software, supposedly to protect end users, would not be this clueless. What value is the "Firefox Store" actually offering then?

> What value is the "Firefox Store" actually offering then?

That anyone dumber than such a reviewer cannot sneak malicious extensions in.

Which, sadly, is probably a non-trivial number of submissions.

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#246

Post by shadowgovt »

chimeracoder wrote: post #228
EasyMark wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To have a reviewer under your employ that doesn’t know what UBO is or it’s dev, makes me feel pretty confident in siding with gorilla on this, but I hope that he does calm down a bit and put the extension back up.

> To have a reviewer under your employ that doesn’t know what UBO is or it’s dev, makes me feel pretty confident in siding with gorilla on this, but I hope that he does calm down a bit and put the extension back up. FYI, it's UBlock Origin Lite that is affected here, not UBlock Origin. Same developer account, but a tiny fraction of the installation base. I think I still have an extension that has more users than UBlo…

I must have missed that update; I haven't seen any aggression directed at users of the plugin.

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#247

Post by akira2501 »

lol768 wrote: post #52

Why does this extension even exist on AMO? The article says it's the "Lite/Manifest v3 version" - why would you ever install the inferior edition meant for legacy browsers, instead of the one that blocks ads properly that's meant for Firefox?

> why would you ever install the inferior edition

It's my computer. I paid for it and I maintain it. I'll do whatever I please with it.

> instead of the one that blocks ads properly that's meant for Firefox?

I have a better question. Why even use Firefox if it refuses to do what I want?

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#248

Post by stainablesteel »

open-paren wrote: post #117

I manage a medium-sized browser extension at work. We also offer(ed) it on Firefox. But I have spent the past year struggling to get back into Mozilla store after a manual review. As far as I can tell, there are maybe two reviewers that are based in Europe (Romania?). The turn around time is long when I am in the US, and it has been rife with this same kind of "simple mistake" that takes 2 weeks to resolve. "You need…

this seems like the kind of place where user-based reviews would be more efficient, better, and more open

having the makers of a browser do this is bound to create both efficiency and political problems for extensions. im remembering dissenter now

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#249

Post by akira2501 »

poincaredisk wrote: post #8

>The last message from the developer in a now-closed GitHub issue shows an email from Mozilla admitting its fault and apologizing for the mistake. However, Raymond still pulled the extension from the Mozilla Add-ons Store, which means you can no longer find it on addons.mozilla.org. This seems pretty harsh. Mozilla made a mistake, Mozilla apologized, Mozilla fixed the mistake (maybe even improved their processes), an…

> author took this a bit up personally

Yea, those pesky unpaid developers, letting their emotions get mixed into their personal projects. Why can't they be cold and unfeeling, like the people who run the firefox "store?"

Re: Gorhill pulls uBlock Origin Lite from Firefox store

#250

Post by rightbyte »

SergeAx wrote: post #241
yojo wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it’s reasonable to expect that one of Firefox’s most popular extension publishers gets a higher tier of review service. Gorhill (and other top extension devs) are providing real value to Firefox, and have demonstrated good behavior for years. This doesn’t mean they should get to publish whatever they want, but if a reviewer is about to reject a high profile plugin, they should get a second set of eyes on it.…

uBlock Origin is THE reason I am using Firefox Mobile. The moment it gone - there's no sense in keeping the browser.

Mozilla knows that. Which is why they excempted Ublock Origin from their user hostile all but that one extension ban on mobile. (In practice it was a ban. I think they called it something else.)
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