

A dangerous conflict of interest between Firefox and Google - urlwolf
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13739_3-9776759-46.html

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pmorici
What a poorly written article. The main gist of the guys argument is that
since Mozilla doesn't include some Firefox ad block extensions (which he
likes, and perceives to be popular), as default feature's in Firefox and those
extensions might be frowned upon by Google, Mozilla must be in Google's back
pocket.

His gauge of the ad blocker extension's popularity is that these extensions
are "getting to be extremely popular. It has been featured in The New York
Times,"

This article reads like a 9/11 conspiracy theory. Esp. when he goes on to
contradict himself by pointing out that this add blocking software that he
loves does a good job on banner ads but misses many of Google's text ads. If
this really is the evil scheme he is hatching it out to be wouldn't Google
want an extension included that easily blocked it competitors banner adds
whilst letting it's text adverts sneak through?

Maybe next week he can write a follow up about how Firefox3 doesn't include
the DOM Inspector by default and hypothesize that Google strong armed Mozilla
into removing it so folk wouldn't be able to get at all those juicy Google
HTML secrets.

~~~
cstejerean
actually i would like an extension that only blocked large, obnoxious ads
while leaving alone google-like ads.

~~~
axod
I agree. Small text ads, or even some banner ads (non animated please) all
fine. Big popup flash animated adverts with sound, not ok.

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SingAlong
The post's author seems to be having a bad blogging ettique. He seemed to have
edited his posts after receiving comments/feeback. And he has included the
'update' section in his post only after a reader noticed the editing and told
him to do so.

@pmorici: agree with you

If G and Mozillia really wanted to get rid of the ad blocking software, they
would have released a patch to somehow make the extentension unworkable.

Now for the question as to why Mozilla Firefox doesn't come with ad blocking
extensions pre-installed, the answer is easy and straight. It is because
Firefox base system has always been kept to the bare minimals else they could
have included all the usually used plugins & extensions like Flash player,
Real Player, Java Runtime Environment, etc

As for shipping with Google Toolbar, the author shouldn't be bothered about
this fact since the are two versions: with google toolbar pre-installed and
without google toolbar. And you can choose what you want.

Yahoo! too shipped IE7 with Yahoo Toolbar. IE as fas as I know uses MSN's
"page not found" (I have IE6 on XP and haven't bothered to update it since I
use Firefox)

And for using Google as the default search engine, all my non-tech friends
know is "internet is google". The moment they need something... Go to firefox
address bar and type google.com

Even though other search engines are beginning to have clutter free pages
homepages like Google. Its Google that made its mark first with the both -
good results and clutter free pages - and quickly won users(most of them now
being loyal followers of any 'good' and necessary G product).

~~~
pchristensen
"Go to firefox address bar and type google.com"

That cracks me up, because I have told my wife about 1024 times that the
little box to the right of the address bar will Google things for her!

~~~
SingAlong
Yeah! I recently found out a trick too.

Instead of using the small google search box, you can directly use the search
phrase into the firefox address bar.

But I have noticed something: I typed "Hacker" in the address bar and I got a
google search page. But when I typed "distrowatch", it took me to
distrowatch.com I think the behavior of this feature is like... it takes you
to a website if the term entered is not a dictionary term. If the term entered
is a dictonary term is takes you to a google search results page.

I have started using this frequently since I access the address bar with F6. I
just enter my search terms. I am comfortable with this since most of my
searches are with non-dictionary terms like "term vector tutorials" or "how to
make pizza"

:)

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anewaccountname
>Fact: Users who enter keywords or misspelled URLs into the Firefox 2.0
location bar will essentially be running a Google "I'm Feeling Lucky" search.
That is, they will be taken to the first result for a Google search query for
those terms.

From which Google makes exactly $0.

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thorax
I can't say I'm omfortable with the conflict of interest gray area for the two
organizations. That being said, this article:

* Was written in November of last year, before FF3 release and some of Mozilla's latest initiatives.

* Is really stretching things a bit in terms of good reasoning.

* Has an "axe-to-grind" tone which I don't exactly understand.

I think there's some good points to be made about this relationship, but it
doesn't feel like this author really has anything to show about where that
Google influence is causing much in the way of problems.

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josefresco
Being a web designer/developer I need to see the web as my customers do, with
means handy plugins like AdBlock are useless to me.

The idea that any company would include ad blocking tech in their web browser
is insane. The web is built on advertising... talk about biting the hand that
feeds you.

