Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the other hand, advertising doesn't do much to help Mozilla if it removes the main differentiator Firefox has from vastly more popular competitors. Firefox with "privacy respecting advertising" sounds an awful lot like Chrome with compatibility issues.
Yes. There is no such thing as privacy-respecting advertising. If they mess with extensions like Chrome did, they're going to lose their user base. A much higher proportion of us are only using Firefox because it's not connected to AdTech.
Actually, all 3 major browser engines are directly funded by Google's Ads. And while you may have noticed that Mozilla and Apple have been singing the privacy tune, you should've also noticed that they never did anything to upset their cash cow.
Mozilla diversifying their revenue would be an improvement IMO. But whatever they did in the past, people got mad, because many imagine that such a complex piece of software could be developed for free or from the donations of individuals that ad-block YouTube instead of paying for Premium.