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Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

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Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#51

Post by username223 »

hn92726819 wrote: post #47
username223 wrote: post #40

If accurate, this strikes me as something like malicious compliance. > Translations, which help you browse the web in your preferred language. Machine translation can be useful when you want to get the gist of something in a language you don't know. > Alt text in PDFs, which add accessibility descriptions to images in PDF pages. OCR? Okay... > AI-enhanced tab grouping, which suggests related tabs and group names. Wha…

> The AI features can be disabled entirely or individually, so users can pick and choose what they want to use It sounds like you would want to switch off two of them and leave two of them on, no? How is that malicious compliance? The master AI switch is for people that have moral issues with all AI, so they want all future features turned off.

Mozilla is grouping a bunch of unrelated stuff in with the one thing people don't want.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#52

Post by bxparks »

rc_kas wrote: post #37

I keep meaning to make a guide "how to make firefox not suck" but I never get around to it. It's a great browser, but I always forget the default settings are super stupid. Myself and power users all have it customized to the hilt. It takes some serious work to get a new new FireFox install working nicely.

No kidding. I had to create a Google Doc document to remember all the little things that I have to clobber in Firefox to make it behave reasonably. Here is an excerpt of how I clobber the defaults:

  - Enable pixel-perfect smooth scrolling (Linux): MOZ_USE_XINPUT2=1 (why do we still have to do this??)
  - Enable: Ctrl-Tab cycles through recent used order
  - Disable: "Show an image preview when you hover on a tab"
  - Disable: "Use AI to suggest tabs and a name for tab group"
  - Disable: "Enable Picture-in-Picture video controls"
  - Disable: "Control media via keyboard, headset, or virtual interface"
  - Disable: "Recommend extensions as you browse"
  - Disable: "Recommend features as you browse"
  - Disable: "Enable link previews"
  - Homepage and new windows: Blank page
  - New tabs: Blank page
  - Disable: Web Search
  - Disable: Weather
  - Disable: Shortcuts
  - Disable: Recommended stories
  - Disable: Support Firefox
  - Disable: "Save and autofill payment info"
  - Disable: "Save and autofill addresses"
  - Disable: "Ask to save passwords"
  - Locations: Select "Block new requests asking to access your location"
  - Notification: Select "Block new requests asking to allow notifications"
  - Autoplay: Select "Block Audio and Video"
  - Virtual Reality: Select "Block new requests asking to access your virtual reality devices"
  - Default Search engine: DuckDuckGo
  - Disable "Suggest search engines to use"
  - Disable "Quick actions"
  - Disable "Suggestions from Firefox"
  - Disable: "Title Bar"
  - Default Zoom: 110%, 120%, depending on the laptop
I probably forgot a few things.

And I install the following extensions:

  - uBlock Origin
  - Privacy Badger
  - Facebook Container
  - Firefox Multi-account Container

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#53

Post by mook »

esperent wrote: post #41
drnick1 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Since Firefox claims to be a privacy-first browser, it should, by default, use the Arkenfox settings (report spoofed values for language, screen size, fonts, and many other attributes that aid fingerprinting), and include uBlock Origin out of the box. But it should go even further; the ultimate goal should be for all Firefox users to basically look the same from the point of view of third parties and put an end…

> report spoofed values for language, screen size, fonts, and many other attributes that aid fingerprinting How much do these break functionality? If I spoof language, am I going to start seeing websites in German? If I spoof screen size, am I going to get weirdly zoomed websites?

If anything, it might unbreak things.

I have my browser set to request, in order, English, a different English, then a non-English language. Some sites (Android docs, Gitlab, F-Droid) will send me the non-English content; Google even preferentially does their AI translation thing instead of the original English.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#54

Post by QuiEgo »

chillfox wrote: post #25

I am tired of turning features off. At this point I just want a boring browser that handles html/css/js, bookmarks, tabs (should sleep inactive tabs), plugins (for my chosen password manager and ad blocker), and page zoom. Those are the only features I actually use regularly. That's it, I would be willing to make a one time purchase for that, no subscriptions... Ok, I could maybe be convinced for a subscription if it…

Safari is 90% this, and maybe before they changed how extensions worked it was like 99% this. I weep for how close it was.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#55

Post by eukara »

GCUMstlyHarmls wrote: post #35
heavyset_go wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brave comes with its own branded "Leo"[1] AI assistant built into the browser lol [1] https://brave.com/leo/

Every time brave gets walked out as some good alternative I cant get past the vc / crypto coin / brave-reward holding garbage. Maybe they're ok now but they had some really gross mistakes (?).

[flagged]

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#56

Post by Washuu »

mook wrote: post #53
esperent wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> report spoofed values for language, screen size, fonts, and many other attributes that aid fingerprinting How much do these break functionality? If I spoof language, am I going to start seeing websites in German? If I spoof screen size, am I going to get weirdly zoomed websites?

If anything, it might unbreak things. I have my browser set to request, in order, English, a different English, then a non-English language. Some sites (Android docs, Gitlab, F-Droid) will send me the non-English content; Google even preferentially does their AI translation thing instead of the original English.

Then for some web sites it won't matter and display the dominant language of the country that you're accessing from. My Firefox sends US English as the only preferred language, but a ton of US tech companies default to showing web sites in Japanese without a way to change it because I access them from Japan. It's pretty typical of American companies that don't understand localization and accessibility.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#57

Post by beautron »

hn92726819 wrote: post #45
crabmusket wrote: post #10

Why are there controls to turn off AI features, but no controls to turn on AI features?

In the parallel universe where Firefox defaults to ai features being off, there's a snarky comment like yours about why it isn't on by default. It is really tiring to hear this stuff. People (rightfully) complained there was no switch. One was added. In Chrome, you can't turn off Google's ai unless you install a third party extension that hasn't yet been blocked by Google. Not a lot of companies allow disabling their…

> Not a lot of companies allow disabling their garbage, but FF does. > > Can't we be happy with this nice switch?

I want my tools to keep working the way they have been working. I don't want to be paranoid that "garbage" (as you put it), or any other controversial changes, are going to be slipped into my tools while I'm not looking.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#58

Post by lstodd »

mook wrote: post #53
esperent wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> report spoofed values for language, screen size, fonts, and many other attributes that aid fingerprinting How much do these break functionality? If I spoof language, am I going to start seeing websites in German? If I spoof screen size, am I going to get weirdly zoomed websites?

If anything, it might unbreak things. I have my browser set to request, in order, English, a different English, then a non-English language. Some sites (Android docs, Gitlab, F-Droid) will send me the non-English content; Google even preferentially does their AI translation thing instead of the original English.

Most infuriating is when they do it based on GeoIP. So what I'm in Istanbul currently, I know maybe a dozen words in Turkish. But no, and also they insist on having broken language switchers.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#59

Post by GuestFAUniverse »

I hate FF since some random morons decided it's a good thing on mobile to use the last used folder for bookmarks, instead of the mobile bookmarks folders.

I have several thousand curated bookmarks. And I only discovered too late the new "feature". Disrupted my former flow (mark on mobile, sort/categorize on desktop)

They could have made this configurable, but no... those smart asses knew better.

I have that GitHub issue where they initially discussed it for iOS bookmarked and screenshoted, to remind myself how utterly stupid some people are. I hate every sucker involved.

Re: Firefox Getting New Controls to Turn Off AI Features

#60

Post by em-miyamoto »

bxparks wrote: post #52
rc_kas wrote: post #37

I keep meaning to make a guide "how to make firefox not suck" but I never get around to it. It's a great browser, but I always forget the default settings are super stupid. Myself and power users all have it customized to the hilt. It takes some serious work to get a new new FireFox install working nicely.

No kidding. I had to create a Google Doc document to remember all the little things that I have to clobber in Firefox to make it behave reasonably. Here is an excerpt of how I clobber the defaults: - Enable pixel-perfect smooth scrolling (Linux): MOZ_USE_XINPUT2=1 (why do we still have to do this??) - Enable: Ctrl-Tab cycles through recent used order - Disable: "Show an image preview when you hover on a tab" - Disabl…

Or you could just use user.js and not have to change every setting manually each time you start from scratch.
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