Mozilla to sell New Tab page ads in Firefox

Post by sgk284 » Thu, Feb 13, 2014, 7:05 PM UTC

nnethercote wrote: post #39

sgk284 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mozilla has publicly stated that they make at least $300 million per year from Google (as of 2011) [1]. Although there are reports that this is closer to $1 billion per year now (including all search-related revenues). [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Foundation#Financing

Where are those $1 billion reports from? That's the first I've heard of a number anything like that large. Firefox's market share hasn't tripled recently, and the current deal with Google is the same one that started in 2011, so it sounds unlikely to me.

Yep, you're right. I had read something about Google paying Mozilla $1B, but upon trying to re-dig up the info all I'm getting is non-conclusive and/or misleading articles.

$300MM is still a giant number.

Post by chestnut-tree » Thu, Feb 13, 2014, 8:39 PM UTC

chris_wot wrote: post #11

The original blog post was on HN front page yesterday and it got voted down to oblivion. Or hit some sort of threshold. Frankly, I find the original blog post to be unbelievably weasily - especially this: "We believe that if you put the user front and center, you can make every experience for them richer and more meaningful. The Content Services team has embraced this, and today I wanted to share some of our thinking…

I think people would have (possibly) reacted a little less criticially to this news if the original Mozilla blog post simply got straight to the point i.e.

- Mozilla needs to raise money because it's a non-profit.

- We're going to place ads on the "directory tiles" page.

Questions the Mozilla blog post should have answered, but never did:

- Will these ads only ever appear once?

- Will these ads re-appear if you clear your cache or cookies?

- Can this feature be disabled or bypassed?

- What analytics or tracking will the ads use (if any)?

I understand that Mozilla needs to diversify its sources of funding. I just wish the Mozilla blog post was written in a plain, straightforward manner. There's far too much padding and "corporate-speak".

Phrases such as "publisher transformation", experiences that are "richer and more meaningful", promises to "transform the user’s content experience", and to provide "inherent value to our users" just sound over-inflated and meaningless.

Re: Mozilla to sell New Tab page ads in Firefox

Re: Mozilla to sell New Tab page ads in Firefox