Firefox lost 50M users since 2019 • Hacker News Board

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#451

Post by arepublicadoceu » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:22 PM UTC

alpaca128 wrote: post #48

totony wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, that and the other political commentary + dropping most of their projects (rust, ffsend) really isn't helping. Really wish they'd focus on one mission (making the web free) and not address anything else.

Instead of reworking the UI they should have just added an ad blocker out of the box (preinstall uBlock Origin for example). The main reason Brave is used and recommended is because a lot of people don't want to bother installing plugins. At least 90% of recommendations for that browser I've seen mention this as reason. Meanwhile most people either don't like the new Firefox UI or just don't care. And I agree, FF Sen…

> they should have just added an ad blocker out of the box (preinstall uBlock Origin for example).

Yeah, that’s not gonna happen. They would antagonize their biggest “donor” google.

And god knows they really need that huge yearly money influx to whatever the heck they do with that money.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#452

Post by gibba999 » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:29 PM UTC

granzymes wrote: post #345

gibba999 wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gosh, these sound just like Android, now that you're quoting it. My Android phone came with Chrome, gmail, Google Maps, uploads my photos to Google, and requires a Google account. But I think that's beside the point. Microsoft did a lot of anti-competitive things in a lot of markets. Limiting scope to one particular litigation isn't really helpful here. The phrasing, "THE compliant," makes it sound like there wasn't…

> Gosh, these sound just like Android, now that you're quoting it. Android is getting in trouble for it in the EU! >But I think that's beside the point. Microsoft did a lot of anti-competitive things in a lot of markets. Limiting scope to one particular litigation isn't really helpful here. The phrasing, "THE compliant," makes it sound like there wasn't a mountain of complaints. There was. This thread was about their…

> This thread was about their legal issues with IE.

Perhaps. I view threads more like human conversations.

> People complain about a lot of things, but that doesn't make them illegal.

Microsoft did a lot of illegal things in the nineties, which many people complained about. Some were litigated, most were not. Lack of litigation doesn't make it legal.

Google seems to be doing a few illegal things right now, although not nearly as many as nineties-era Microsoft.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#453

Post by creatonez » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:39 PM UTC

ohgodplsno wrote: post #307

hbt wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

true. their api is now a dumbed down version of chrome. I still remember the days of vimperator and treetabs in xul. firefox did this to themselves. they dont deserve support.

Tree Style Tabs exists: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tree-style-ta... Vimperator replacements exist: https://github.com/tridactyl/tridactyl Additionally, XUL was a steaming pile of shit, and there was no saving it. Multithreading was only possible by ripping out XUL.

> Multithreading was only possible by ripping out XUL.

Firefox still uses XUL, it's just not an exposed API

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#454

Post by chakhs » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:58 PM UTC

dietr1ch wrote: post #440

chakhs wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We use Google Meet at work, and I use Firefox. The "Change background" feature was not "supported" in Firefox, then suddenly I could use it so I thought they finally implemented it for Firefox as it was working perfectly. Two days later the feature disappeared, and I keep getting that "your browser doesn't support this feature" popup since.

That sucks, but take the time to imagine what might be going on on the other side. There's a dev running an experiment to whitelist more combinations of the huge space of (Device, CPU, GPU, OS, OSVersion, Browser, BrowserVersion) to use that feature. What would you do after seeing that the metrics show that most of the users on your experiment had a bad experience? In that case you'd want to rollback your experiment…

yeah I'm over fetching indeed :') A/B testing sucks, they should've let me know it was an experiment, I had high hopes

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#455

Post by JumpCrisscross » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 8:00 PM UTC

bluedevil2k wrote: post #111

freediver wrote: post #11

Fun fact: Under current conditions (200M users) it looks like Google is paying $2-2.25 per active user annually to be the default search engine in Firefox. "Mozilla renewed its search deal with Google in 2020 for three years. The organization will receive an estimate of $400 to $450 million per year from the deal alone. " https://www.ghacks.net/2020/12/10/mozillas-revenue-jumped-to...

Given how they make a minimum $450M a year in revenue, how on Earth is Mozilla not swimming in cash?! How high can their expenses be?

> how on Earth is Mozilla not swimming in cash?! How high can their expenses be?

Mozilla launches a new idiot side project like once a month. As a Firefox user, it's deeply frustrating to watch bug tickets go unfilled while a multimillion-dollar rebranding rolls out.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#456

Post by freediver » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 8:04 PM UTC

dmitriid wrote: post #164

judge2020 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> anti competitive behavior Have some examples? On Desktop, I don't see any, but I would get if you mean Mobile since Chrome is still the default browser there for Android.

This thread from a former Mozilla exec: https://twitter.com/johnath/status/1116871231792455686?s=20

Very instructive, thanks for sharing.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#457

Post by tswiszcz » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 8:14 PM UTC

Firefox has been breaking down on me the past few months. This inspired me to go back to Chrome.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#458

Post by remram » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 8:16 PM UTC

ohgodplsno wrote: post #325

remram wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am too, but I have telemetry disabled since their stunt with the Mr Robot extension they installed remotely for everyone [1]. I also run uBlock on both desktop and mobile. I am one of the 50M users counted as lost? [1]: https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/mozilla-back...

>Mr Robot extension they installed remotely for everyone Absolute bullshit. The Looking Glass extensions was installed through their SHIELD experiments program, only for people who had enabled it, and to a very small proportion of those, too. Additionally, it did not capture any data, as creepy as it was. https://blog.mozilla.org/en/products/firefox/retrospective-l...

It's certainly enough to turn off those optional settings, don't you think? But fair enough, I didn't phrase this right.

I'm wondering how they count users, and whether installations with telemetry disabled are counted at all.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#459

Post by chrisseaton » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 8:16 PM UTC

chiefofgxbxl wrote: post #316

csmpltn wrote: post #126

I've been using Firefox daily for over 15 years now. My experience with Firefox over the last 2-3 years in particular leaves me very disappointed and frustrated. The constant nonsense UI redesigns that come about with every new update. The instability, and ridiculous resources consumption. The slowness and slugishness. I want a browser that works, respects my privacy, stays out of my way and lets me get shit done. A…

I've been a Firefox user for at least 15 years as well, and the recent UI updates in v89 is the first instance of me refusing to update Firefox. I updated my user prefs file to permanently disable updates, so I'm remaining on pre-ProtonUI v88. Of course, I don't know how much longer I could sustain that because I'd also not receive security patches, but in the short term it's what I'm doing. The new Firefox UI is inc…

Some people prefer less clutter. You can’t satisfy everyone.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#460

Post by freediver » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 8:35 PM UTC

TheRealPomax wrote: post #284

hoppyhoppy2 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding of the current browser landscape is that you've got Firefox; browsers that build upon Google's browser engine (Chrome/Chromium/Edge/Brave/Vivaldi/Opera/etc); and Safari. There are a number of good options, but very few that don't further cement Google's control over the world's browser-engine code. (Yes, I know there are some other very minor players that lag behind on features and standards support.…

In terms of "browsers that actually matter", there's just Chrome/chromium at a combined 70% and Safari at a little over 18%. Everything else is a side mention at best and as a browser at least, is basically irrelevant on the world stage. Even if the companies behind them aren't (e.g. Mozilla or Samsung). [1] They are of course highly relevant for their user bases, but in terms of "browsers that might break the Chrome…

> You'd need to pull a Microsoft IE-on-Windows on Google

How about actually just making a good, competitive browser instead? Firefox is not failing because of Google's monopoly; it is failing because as a product it is unable to compete and beat Chrome where it matters. If not Mozilla, I am pretty sure somebody else will make such browser (and search engine, and email... ) eventually.