Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

infosec.press

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 851 posts

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#291

Post by lifthrasiir »

simiones wrote: post #272
lifthrasiir wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The estimate does sound reasonable if it's an one-off payment. I agree that no one would pay that amount of money each year to keep adblocking from Firefox.

It's not impossible that people would pay Firefox that much yearly to keep their current user-base from using ad blockers. However, what is impossible is to imagine Firefox would have anything close to their current user base if people were prevented from using ad blockers. Most likely they would shrink to almost 0 users overnight if they did this. There are very few reasons to use Firefox over Chrome or Safari (or e…

That doesn't explain the apparent market share of 2--3%, which is still quite large if you think about.

I believe most non-techie users are just lingering, using Firefox just because they used to. Since Firefox doesn't have a built-in ad blocking and the knowledge about adblocking is not universal (see my other comment), it is possible that there are a large portion of Firefox users who don't use adblockers and conversely adblocking users are in a minority. If this is indeed the case, Mozilla can (technically) take such a bet as such policy will affect a smaller portion of users. But that would work only once; Mozilla doesn't have any more option like that after all. That's why I see $150M is plausible, but only once.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#293

Post by skrebbel »

fijuv wrote: post #105

I think it's too late for Mozilla, since it seems they already squandered most of their good will, userbase and money. At any rate, I think their only good path of to get rid of Gecko. The best would be to replace it with a finished version of Servo, which would give them a technically superior browser, assuming Google doesn't also drop Blink for Servo. It may be too late for this, but AI agents may perhaps make fini…

I don't think it's too late at all. I mean, there's recurring outrage whenever Mozilla does something silly again but all through that Firefox is still a fantastic browser. Don't under-value the many quieter parts of Mozilla who just keep kicking ass day in day out.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#294

Post by baxtr »

lxgr wrote: post #41

>> He says he could begin to block ad blockers in Firefox and estimates that’d bring in another $150 million, but he doesn’t want to do that. It feels off-mission. > It may be just me, but I read this as “I don't want to but I'll kill AdBlockers in Firefox for buckerinos ”. Yes, that does seem like a pretty uncharitable interpretation of that quote. I read it as "we won't do it, even though it would bring in $150M US…

"It feels off-mission" is very different from "It's absolutely off-mission and against everything we stand for".

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#295

Post by adornKey »

lcnmrn wrote: post #212

I use AdGuard DNS. AdBlockers are too CPU and memory intensive anyway.

With DNS over https Firefox has the answer against you already built in. And back then they were very keen on implementing it as soon as possible. They even sold it as helping against censorship. It's maybe just a question of time how long good old Firefox will allow you to censor ads...

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#296

Post by MindDraft »

mrtksn wrote: post #46
herobird wrote: post #17

It's kinda frustrating that Mozilla's CEO thinks that axing ad-blockers would be financially beneficial for them. Quite the opposite is true (I believe) since a ton of users would leave Firefox for alternatives.

The whole web ecosystem was first run by VC money and everything was great until every corner was taken, the land grab was complete and the time to recoup the investment has come. Once the users were trapped for exploitation, it doesn’t make sense to have a browser that blocks ads. How are they supposed to pay software salaries and keep the lights on? People don’t like paying for software, demand constant updates and…

while i may agree with the first line, rest are little skewed perspective.

> People don’t like paying for software, demand constant updates and hate subscriptions.

hate subscription?? may be. if it's anything like Adobe then yes, people will hate.

that constant update, is something planted by these corporates, and their behavior manipulation tactics. People were happily paying for perpetual software, which they can "own" in a cd//dvd.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#297

Post by OvervCW »

robbie-c wrote: post #269
Krasnol wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any prove for Googles influence on their development you outline here?

There's proof of financial dependence, here's a recent report https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-202... In 2021 they got $500M "royalties" (this is their payment from Google) with only $75k revenue from all other sources, including $7.5k donations.

The document you linked mentions $50M in advertising/subscription revenue.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#298

Post by vdfs »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #271
saubeidl wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they switch to Chromium, they'll just become yet another Chrome rebrand. It'll kill what makes their browser special.

They keep redesigning their UI to be more like Chrome, might as well go deeper.

What makes their browser special really? Just chasing profits and google handout and not caring about their user base

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#299

Post by einr »

TurboSkyline wrote: post #49
major505 wrote: post #9

Well, is no mistery that today the best versioins of Firefox are the non official versions like waterfox and zen. NObody trusts mozilla anymore, specially after they turned into an add company and started paying their CEOs exorbitating ammounts, considering what was being invested in their core business (supposedly making a better browser).

I'm not familiar with Zen, but how do you reconcile that Waterfox frequently lags behind upstream Firefox in terms of security fixes? Yes, you get a perceived gain in privacy, but is that worth potentially exposing yourself to additional vulnerabilities?

Yes, you get a perceived gain in privacy, but is that worth potentially exposing yourself to additional vulnerabilities?

Speaking only for myself, and regardless of whether this is actually true (see sibling comment): yes. Absolutely. A non-privacy focused browser like Firefox has vulnerabilities/data leaks by design that are worse than hypothetical ones that I probably will not be subject to browsing my usual benign set of websites.

(Posted from Waterfox)

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#300

Post by throwaway613745 »

JoeJonathan wrote: post #226
nialv7 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The interpretation is not the problem. Whether he will do it, is actually secondary to the fact that he thinks cutting adblock can bringing in money. No, it will just kill the browser. The fact he thinks otherwise tells me how out of touch he is.

Like many others, the ability to run uBO is the main reason I use Firefox. Otherwise I'd use Chrome or Safari.

I have used Firefox as my default browser through thick and thin for damn near two decades.

If Mozilla killed andblocking extensions I’d switch to Helium Browser in a heartbeat since they’re maintaining manifest v2 support for uBO and even ship it OOTB.

The web is unusable without a proper Adblock.

Post reply on HN