Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

manualdousuario.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

641–650 of 782 posts

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#641

Post by kulahan »

everdrive wrote: post #4

Does anyone want AI in anything? I can see the value of navigating to an LLM and asking specific questions, but generally speaking I don't want that just running / waiting on my machine as I open a variety of applications. It's a huge waste of resources and for most normal people is an edge case.

Yep. I use it a lot. It's nice when you're getting started on some new topic, and as someone whose attention bounces and then sticks hard for a while, it has made getting started on topics much faster for me. I personally do want it in a browser, because that's... pretty much the only way I use LLMs.

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#642

Post by taeric »

dpark wrote: post #467
taeric wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The debacle that was Google Wave into Google Plus is... really hard to really come to terms with. I don't even know that Hubris is enough to explain how badly managed that time period was by them. Just so bad.

Wave was an interesting jumble of ideas that just didn’t bring a coherent answer for why anyone should use it. Google Plus was 100% hubris. “If we build our version of Facebook, it course everyone will flock to it.”

It was more than just "if we build our version of Facebook." It was, "if we kill off every other social like thing we have and force people into circles, we can build our own Facebook." Google Buzz, in particular, was a fairly well done integration with Google Reader and Google Mail. I legit had discussions about articles with close friends because of it. But, alas, no. Had to die because their social was supposed to be Plus.

I'm trying to remember all of the crap integrations with the likes of Youtube that were pushed. Just, screw that stuff. And quit trying to make yet another new messenger app!

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#643

Post by Razengan »

andy99 wrote: post #70
everdrive wrote: post #4

Does anyone want AI in anything? I can see the value of navigating to an LLM and asking specific questions, but generally speaking I don't want that just running / waiting on my machine as I open a variety of applications. It's a huge waste of resources and for most normal people is an edge case.

The existence of the features doesn’t bother me. It’s the constant nagging about them. I can’t use a google product without being harassed to the point of not being able to work by offers to “help me write” or whatever. Having the feature on a menu somewhere would be fine. The problem is the confluence of new features now becoming possible, and companies no longer building software for their users but as vehicles to…

> by offers to “help me write” or whatever.

It's fucking Clippy all over again

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#644

Post by mghackerlady »

netsharc wrote: post #173
cwillu wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And will that work permanently, or will I have to hunt down another setting in another month when they stuff it into another workflow I don't want it in?

Every time I update Google Photos on Android, it asks me "Photos backup is turned off! Turn it on? [so you use up your 15 GB included storage and buy more for a subscription fee?]".

What's even worse is that every time you sign into a google account without a phone number or home address associated with it, it screams at you to add them for sECurItY

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#645

Post by 52-6F-62 »

coldpie wrote: post #235
52-6F-62 wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Way off. I've polled about this (informally) as well. Non-technical people think it's another thing they have to learn and do not want to (except for those who have been conditioned into constant pursuit of novelty, but that is not a picture of mental health or stability for anyone). They want technology to work for them, not to constantly be urged into full-time engagement with their [de]vices. They are already prea…

> I've polled about this (informally) as well. This is kinda like how if you ask everyone how often they eat McDonald's, everyone will say never or rarely. But they still sell a billion burgers each year :) Assuming you're not polling your Bsky buddies, I suspect these people are using AI tools a lot more than they admit or possibly even know. Auto-generated summaries, text generation, image editing, and conversation…

Only if you are assuming I am asking so directly...

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#647

Post by debugnik »

paradox460 wrote: post #510
debugnik wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> kids playing in a sandbox with non-profit money Nitpick: Firefox is developed by Mozilla Corp., not the non-profit.

A distinction without substance

And yours redundant, I made that clear already.

> nitpick

> to find faults in details that are not important

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#648

Post by sejje »

burnte wrote: post #527
creatonez wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Problem is, a chatbot sidebar isn't something new to try, it's a tired dead-end idea that never delivered any value to the multiple competitors that tried the exact same thing. Firefox's implementation of a chatbot sidebar is especially cookie-cutter because it just plugs into existing LLM APIs, it doesn't make use of local AI the way the alt text generator and local machine translation features do. What were they th…

The absolute last thing I need in my browser is AI. What's it going to do, read the page then rewrite it for me to read? Why would I not just read the page? Is it going to generate images of the webpage for me? AI is a great tool, but it's not useful in every circumstance. Right now product managers are trying to think of any place to shoehorn AI into regardless of it being a good idea or useful just to be able to pu…

> 25 years ago I made a sidebar extension that let you add webcam feeds to a sidebar so you could keep an eye on multiple internet cams easily. It was literally a webpage in a sidebar that you just added the cam URLs to. This is the exact same thing, except an LLM.

Yeah, and billions of people on the planet can't build your little webcam feed website to solve their problem, so they're more likely to need it than you.

It's like you think we should limit AI use-cases to what you can personally imagine. As if someone could have predicted your webcam use-case.

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#649

Post by wannabag »

Another Mozilla-made-a-decision thread, another list of complaints.

I'm a happy Firefox user since it showed up as an alternative to internet explorer. I tried Chrome once or twice but always came back and stuck with Firefox. I don't trust Google for anything and don't want them to rule over the web. Firefox works, it has worked for me all these years and continues to do so. I still believe in them and their mission even if they have to take Google money to exist.

I think that complaints here are just making things worse for Mozilla, how about helping out instead of whining about every little thing. They're trying, that's a lot more than can be said about a whole lot of other actors out there.

Firefox team, if you read this, you rock! Thank you for giving me a great browser.

Re: I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

#650

Post by mghackerlady »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #532
mythrwy wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Communicating in pictographs

Gotta love them emojis

If someone wanted to do this for whatever reason, there's actually a language that can be written exclusively in emojis. It's called toki pona, and while emojis aren't the standard writing system, there have been several proposals. It works well since toki pona has a very small syntax (only around ~150 words iirc)
Post reply on HN