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Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

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Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#601

Post by JohnFen »

Hayarotle wrote: post #189
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…

At least we can override UI redesign changes with userChrome.css and userContent.css. I'm sticking with Firefox as long as its problems have workarounds, because the only options left are Chromium and Safari (or forks like Librewolf), and I find its pros still outweigh its cons.

> At least we can override UI redesign changes with userChrome.css and userContent.css

Not entirely, unfortunately.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#602

Post by BrendanEich »

camjohnson26 wrote: post #51
soperj wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>only Safari is able to stop this madness now Safari is usable on less than 20% of machines, it absolutely will not be stopping anything. It's also the bane of my existence as a web developer.

I’m guessing a huge percentage of the lost users switched to Brave since it had 25 million as of February and is affiliated with Brendan Eich. https://brave.com/25m-mau/

34.4M this past month, now.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#603

Post by pabs3 »

CRConrad wrote: post #579
pabs3 wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One way to help Firefox would be to spend some time on Firefox bug reports or patches.

But aren't Firefox bug reports known mainly for being ignored (or if not ignored then viciously denied)?

They wouldn't be ignored if more people such as GP, you, me etc put work into fixing them.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#604

Post by soperj »

tarsinge wrote: post #547
soperj wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with their comment is that they're too busy dunking on people. I do deal with different browsers, hence why I get headaches from Safari. If I didn't, I wouldn't complain about it. I've been a web developer for a long long time. I know what a pain IE was, and I'm just experiencing it all over again with Safari, although they've gotten better lately.

My comment was maybe a bit provocative but you didn't just say Safari had a few quirks (like the slow release cycle for bugs like the recent ones with LocalStorage and IndexedDB that is a pain), you said it was your bane. That usually mean using Chrome as the main development browser and waiting years for new experimental API to be (sometimes) implemented in other browsers, particularly Safari. In that case like the…

No, it's the bane of my existence because of bugs, on stuff that people actually use, like flexbox. I use firefox for the record. IE devs didn't give a shit about any other browser, and never had a problem with using the IE specific features because of that.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#605

Post by dakial1 »

And it will become worse as Chrome will be (even more) key to Google Business after the death of 3rd party cookies, as FLoC will be running out of it so they will need you to use it to be able to segment you.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#606

Post by account42 »

Hayarotle wrote: post #189
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…

At least we can override UI redesign changes with userChrome.css and userContent.css. I'm sticking with Firefox as long as its problems have workarounds, because the only options left are Chromium and Safari (or forks like Librewolf), and I find its pros still outweigh its cons.

You can override things with userChrome.css and userContent.css for now. Mozilla has made it clear that this will be removed in the future by already putting it behind an additional about:config flag - it is only a matter of time till they are axed once their privacy-disrespecting analytics tell them that "noone uses those features".

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#607

Post by account42 »

gifnamething wrote: post #568
Nextgrid wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don’t need in-browser telemetry to see that uBlock Origin is one of the most downloaded add-ons, and it’s yet to be built-in to the browser despite its license allowing it. They also don’t need telemetry to read threads like this one and there’s been plenty of those on HN (and I’m sure elsewhere) and the general consensus is always that Mozilla is letting power users down in favour of trying to copy Chrome. Give…

Reading threads is a poor metric. People are bad at reporting their usage and only the most vocal people post on tech fora.

People are better at reporting their usage than devs are at reading telemetry.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#608

Post by freediver »

jonathansampson wrote: post #598
freediver wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To my understanding there is no data sent from my Brave client to any Brave servers. That would be wrong. By Brave's own confession, there are 70 requests it sends "home" on startup [1]. Regardless of request payload, each of them contains your PII (IP address at the very least). There is plenty of opportunity for your data to be stored and used (not saying that it is). If and how is that data actually used, we do…

I was going to download your browser (from https://browser.kagi.com/ ), but I realized 1) There is no Windows option, and 2) It requires me to submit a great deal of information via a Google Form before I can download. Honestly, this is not what I expected from the "privacy respecting, zero-telemetry, browser" that you've been heralding here. The Google Form alone is far more alarming than Brave's P3A (which is not c…

1) We are not developing for Windows yet, just Mac. Small startup, we have to focus our strengths. And we are slightly more bullish on macOS than Windows.

2) Perhaps you missed that we are in beta. You are opting-in your email in exchange for being invited to become a beta tester. You do not need to do that. And if you do, we are going to use your email only to send you the invite.

And the reason why there are so many questions in the form is that we want to deter as many people as we can, and get only the most determined beta testers. If somebody finds a 10 question form intimidating, their value to us as an active, contributing beta tester is likely to be small.

When we are out of beta you will be able to download the browser without submitting anything, and enjoy a zero-telemetry browser out of the box. Makes sense?

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#609

Post by freediver »

jonathansampson wrote: post #597
freediver wrote: post #592

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It looks like we are coming from two different sides of the table. So let's try to agree with this statement: "A privacy respecting browser has no business sending data on its own anywhere without the user being OK with it first." This is true by the very definition of what privacy is. If you want to check for updates - let the user initiate/opt-into automatic updates. If you want to update your malicious domain list…

We are indeed seeing these topics from two very different perspectives. I applaud your efforts; it sounds like you're building a nice project for [power users]. Brave is built for all users, however. As such, asking users to opt-in to security is, IMHO, a bad idea. > "…you lose the right to call yourself a privacy-respecting product…" I obviously disagree here. The problem is not _requests_, but rather the nature of…

> I applaud your efforts; it sounds like you're building a nice project for [power users].

Thank you! If by power users you mean users who want to have their privacy on the web respected, then yes, we are building Orion for them.

> I obviously disagree here. The problem is not _requests_, but rather the nature of the requests.

But the problem _is_ requests, because each request at the very least carries IP, and IP is PII as ruled in multiple court rulings. I respect your decision to disagree with that, but that is the state of things.

> I don't think this is a legal question, but rather an engineering one.

There is no debate with court rulings.

It is also reasonable to assume that each court ruling involving this question involved dozens of engineers on both sides, probably more knowleadagable than you or me in this matter. And each ruling was made after careful consideration of evidence and with a lot at stake.

> It sounds like you're targeting power users who are okay with elevated risk.

I do not think you made a case that there is an elevated risk assigned with choosing to respect user's privacy in a browser. And if there is, and Brave has chosen not to respect user's privacy to include what it perceives as security features, I think you owe your users at least an explanation on your home page about that choice that you made for them.

Brave is a formidable competitor with devoted following and relevant and increasing market share. I enjoy the opportunity to discuss these important issues with you in a public forum.

Re: Firefox lost 50M users since 2019

#610

Post by jonathansampson »

freediver wrote: post #608
jonathansampson wrote: post #598

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to download your browser (from https://browser.kagi.com/ ), but I realized 1) There is no Windows option, and 2) It requires me to submit a great deal of information via a Google Form before I can download. Honestly, this is not what I expected from the "privacy respecting, zero-telemetry, browser" that you've been heralding here. The Google Form alone is far more alarming than Brave's P3A (which is not c…

1) We are not developing for Windows yet, just Mac. Small startup, we have to focus our strengths. And we are slightly more bullish on macOS than Windows. 2) Perhaps you missed that we are in beta. You are opting-in your email in exchange for being invited to become a beta tester. You do not need to do that. And if you do, we are going to use your email only to send you the invite. And the reason why there are so man…

Bullish on macOS? Windows isn't going away anytime soon. My apologies if I am misunderstanding what was meant by "bullish" in this context. It does strike me as odd (given your tone here) that you would be requiring users to submit their email address, and answer [a Google-hosted] questionnaire, in order to use your application. "…we want to deter as many people as we can [from using the browser at this time]" (brackets contain my own words) doesn't seem like a great pitch; why not let everybody test the software, and invite (from within the app) users to share their feedback after a day/week of use?
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