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Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

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Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#431

Post by baggachipz »

NothingAboutAny wrote: post #98
concinds wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't monetize a browser. They have to keep trying to create new products, but they inevitably fail. Pocket, FirefoxOS, Persona, all dead. This new stuff will fail too, because Mozilla has no USP and no way to create a best-in-class product in any market. So they rely on imitating what everyone else is doing, but with more "crunchy" vibes ("values", "trust", "we're a nonprofit") because that's the only angle they…

I'd pay $10 a month for a browser, I pay that much for music and TV shows and I spend more time in a browser. I'm sure the market doesn't agree with me but I pay more for things that are less useful.

Kagi and Orion have entered the chat.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#432

Post by skywhopper »

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…

I wish the CEO of Mozilla could have stated the commitment a little more strongly than “it feels off-mission”. Privacy, user control, and security of the web browsing experience are (or should be) the CORE of Mozilla's mission. This isn’t a decision to take lightly on vibes. Allowing ad-blockers (or any content manipulation plugins users want) should be a deep commitment.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#433

Post by toss1 »

staticassertion wrote: post #408
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…

People are absolutely somersaulting through hoops to try to make "I don't want to do that" into "I'm going to do it" in the comments lol

No, they are accurately observing that the "I don't want to do it" and "feels off mission" statements are FAR weaker than they can be and should be.

Such weak statements are either a real mistake or show movement away from those principles which should be bedrock for Mozilla and towards some justification to abandon those principles.

It's not like the industry has no precedents on this. "Don't Be Evil" was the motto of a company that is now one of the apex predators in the surveillance capitalism ecosystem.

Unwise to try to dismiss and laugh off legitimate alarms.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#436

Post by autoexec »

lifthrasiir wrote: post #280
shaky-carrousel wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like how he assumes that a free internet must be ad-supported. The ad-supported web is hideous, even with their ads removed. A long, convoluted, inane mess of content. On the other hand, the clean web feels more direct, to the point, and passionate. I prefer to read content written by passion, not by money seeking purposes.

If something is free (en masse), you are probably a product. If you don't want to be a product you need to give something out instead, like ads.

> If something is free (en masse), you are probably a product.

If something being free ever mattered to your privacy, it hasn't for a long time. Today no matter how expensive something is you are probably a product anyway. Unethical and greedy companies don't care how much money you paid them, they'll want the additional cash they'll get from selling you out at every opportunity. Much of my favorite software is free and doesn't compromise my privacy.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#437

Post by Ylpertnodi »

jstummbillig wrote: post #320

Let's assume that Mozilla is not doing super hot and that's why their CEO is contemplating this topic. Obviously we are not happy about ads, but we all understand that having money is pretty neat (if only to pay ones salary). Help the CEO fella: What great, unused options is Mozilla missing to generate revenue through their browser?

Adblocker.

Re: Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?

#438

Post by SoftTalker »

shaky-carrousel wrote: post #338
lifthrasiir wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If something is free (en masse), you are probably a product. If you don't want to be a product you need to give something out instead, like ads.

That's not correct. Linux is free, almost all open source is, many projects, websites are done out of passion. I contribute to open source projects and nobody "gave me something", as I did it because I wanted to make it better. Like me, there are many others. Nobody is "the product" there. What the saying you are misrepresenting means is "carefully check free things as you may be the product". Not "free things cannot…

Linux development is paid for either directly or in-kind by companies including Red Hat, IBM, Canonical, Oracle, and others. It's free to use and mostly open source but if it existed only on passion it would be something far less than it actually is.

People need to eat and have a roof over their heads.

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