Firefox, please ask on first launch — as you do for telemetry — if the user is ok with ads. The default being opt-out and later on a “sorry, we hear you, this was a mistake” doesn’t sound good.
Mozilla Corporation, please figure out a way for users to directly donate to support Firefox. Not everybody realizes or knows that the donations on mozilla.org go to Mozilla Foundation and not to Mozilla Corporation. Not everybody knows that Firefox is primarily funded by a search partnership agreement with Google. The direct donations to Firefox may not be a lot, but I’m sure it could pay for at least one programmer a month, if not more.
Mozilla Corporation, expand the availability of Mozilla VPN to all the countries that Mullvad offers its services in. Keeping it restricted isn’t helping anyone much.
Mozilla's "default search provider agreements" are worth upwards of $400 million a year. Mozilla Corporation doesn't need any more money, but they're a corporation...
Mozilla is sitting on around a billion dollars in assets and continues to have revenue around $400 million a year.
Mozilla has had weasely language regarding their advertising agreements since at least 2014 when they announced their "ongoing search strategy," saying that Yahoo was going to be their "long term strategic partner." They then breached their contract with Yahoo in 2017, presumably because Google offered them a deal they couldn't refuse to be reinstated as the default to coincide with the Firefox Quantum release.
... it would seem that 14 more years of eating out of Google's hands(with ever growing sums) has softened their resolve.
"The things that make Mozilla and Firefox a success [are] the product, and the community that cares about it."
First and foremost, we would protect those things," Baker said. "If the protection of those things would come into conflict with Google, or any of our search partners, we would opt for the community who built Firefox and love Firefox."
Doesn't mean it's maintained with reasonable assurance.
Who is even asking for these features? The majority of firefox users I know are very privacy conscious. Is a little address bar feature really going to attract more people to use firefox?
Of course they go can together. Ads can be coupled with the content rather than the user, as they are in print, on the radio and on TV. What is incompatible with privacy is user stalking -- i.e. surveillance in the name of monitoring/improving ad effectiveness.
I'd argue that this works only because there is a hard stop. A newspaper can not track you even if it wanted to.
On the web, contextual ads is where everyone begins as they "don't want to be evil". But ad monetized business models can make more money only in two ways - more users or more ads per user.
Once you exhaust the first option for growth, the businesses inevitably pursue the second option because the web as a platform allows them to do that easily with additional tracking and data monetization, unlike with newspapers or radio.
That makes this a 'soft' stop and the temptation has been proven too hard to resist for many, analogue to putting a jar of cookies in front of a child and asking them not to touch it.
It would be much 'healthier' if a business model itself was not designed in a way that puts it potentially onto a trajectory to collide with user's privacy at some point in time.
Exactly this. Public ad companies with shareholders cannot keep growing if their userbase stays as constant value and no other methods are used. And grow they must.
Running both uMatrix, uBlock and quite a few other addons isolating things further, I have enabled ads on DuckDuckGo and have allowed plausible analytics explicitly for all sites. For a browser, the right thing is still very clear: not this.
They will end up trying to have their cake and eat it, taking money from both places. And after news like this one, many users would not want to support them, understandably.
They lost a big chunk of valuable (but not financially) user trust. It's really tricky to regain it, they would have to take a leap of faith, do "the right thing", and hope users will believe.
Or maybe we need to fork it and crowdfund (crowdhire?) firefox developers. And hope they will accept the risk of financial difficulties down the line. And there will be a long term trust/authority problem to solve - who makes decisions? But I would trust their devs personally, I think
I personally think that Firefox Pro could offer a shiny icon that says "Pro" in it, and the satisfaction of knowing that I supported a project I care about.
For an annual license, perhaps a sheet of stickers?
Cloud sync of plugins/tabs. Pocket, filesharing between devices, their VPN nobody uses, Firefox monitor integration, earlier updates (i.e. you can still get the latest build by building from source, but prebuilt libraries first get supplied to Firefox pro),...
Basically all the stuff they have acquired over the years, with few users but large support requirements.
These are just the ideas I came up with in the spot
Let's take YouTube Premium as an example to set a baseline. About 3% of users convert (50M vs 1.5B), for basically the same benefit.
Firefox starts with 200M users now and if 3% get Pro that is 6M users paying $5/month (?) for $30M/month and $360M/year in revenue. That is almost exactly that same as what Firefox makes from Google. The added benefit is that this change could transition it into a user-centric mindset.
> Mozilla is a global non-profit dedicated to putting you in control of your online experience
Well, I think this is a huge misstep if that’s really your mission statement, Mozilla. Selling “my” eyeballs to ad vendors is not giving me control of my online experience.
It’s, frankly, behavior we expect from Google. From Apple. Facebook. Is this the company you wish to keep?
The fact that it's opt-out is pretty hostile, and it's not like they didn't know how it was going to be received; Brave browser made a [supposed 0] blunder when they appended affiliate tags to popular sites[1] - pretty close to doing ads in autocomplete results, and it was received just as badly.
Safari is nowadays getting ~$15,000,000,000 per year with a Google search deal. Meanwhile Mozilla has been ignoring their core user base going as far as laying off development teams working on Firefox components in the name of cost saving while they try to diversify income to support the rest of Mozilla (which makes basically nothing) yet they've retain their own Google search deal with lower user share for <$500,000,000 per year anyways.
At this point a better risk avoidance strategy would have been focus on Firefox development and retaining user share (particularly on Mobile where they basically faded to nothing while holding onto the old browser engine on Android for far too long) to have decades worth of current income on hand from the same deal they've kept anyways.
I was amazed/saddened that they laid off the Servo team. That seemed like the one really worthwhile improvement Mozilla had bet on in a decade. I use and appreciate Firefox, maybe it's partly nostalgia for when FF pushed the web experience forward.
Maintaining even one browser engine is an ungodly amount of work (see how even microsoft dropped the ball on that), let alone 2. Discontinuing Servo was the correct decision however sad it is.
On the other hand, Firefox does incorporate more and more Rust into the browser, but reimplementing such a core part is simply infeasible.
Servo was a research project to write those various Rust components that did made it into Firefox not an alternative reimplementation to one day replace it wholesale.
I hear what you're saying, but at the same time what's the way forward for Mozilla and Firefox? Firefox either needs to be way more performant than other browsers, or needs to have some significant UI benefits over other major browsers (like it used to have with tabs and extensions). With great respect to Mozilla, I don't see either happening or even a path to either anymore.
I still find Firefox plenty extensible, as well as it is the most privacy oriented browser, hands down.
With containers, and tree style tabs/sideberry it gives a unique user experience. To me it is performant enough and has great adblocking through ublock origin (that is not in danger of removal by API changes, looking at you every single chromium fork).
A phoenix is born from the ashes of its past. Mozilla the browser was considered bloated by some and that led to a cleaner browser, a firebird if you will. This is just another indicator we're past due for another cycle of fire.
Late replying, but who exactly do you think is going to lead this? Firefox is so bloated at this point precisely because there's a mandate to make it fast and support new web features. There are so many Rust dependencies that I can't even build Firefox on a computer with "only" 16 GB of RAM because it runs out of memory while compiling gkrust and freezes the computer or hangs the build.
Starting from scratch doesn't have a chance at this point. The web is too complex for a volunteer team to build a brand new browser. So the only option is a fork of Firefox, but most of the people who have the time, energy, and ability to work on fully understanding the Firefox code base probably work for Mozilla.
For revenue they should sell naming rights to their release versions like stadium naming rights. The name will also be in the executable "Firefox: vX.X TikTok"
There will always be something wrong with every version which is why there's always updates. You'd think that on HN people would realize that software is never finished.
Also you'd name minor and major versions, not patch versions.
No thanks. I’ve used Firefox since the beginning and never took to Chrome etc. Use Brave on iOS so guess I’ll be seeing how that and other alternatives are on Mac. I’d be willing to pay some bucks a month. I’m not willing to have the area of the browser that should be signal littered with noise.
Genuinely curious if this could possibly work when there are so many free option pre-installed on devices (Edge and Safari) or only a click away (Chrome). What would you have to charge willing users a year to break even on this?
Firefox gets $500M/yr for making Google it’s default browser. If each user pays $50/yr that’s 10M users just to match what FF considers inadequate revenue.
Old people will show up and say: "Paid Firefox, I remember that when it failed as Netscape." Although technically that was Netscape Communicator? Maybe times have changed though.
Donations to (non-profit) Mozilla Foundation are not (afaik can not be) used to support development work done by (for-profit) Mozilla Cooperation, which is where Mozilla's Firefox development happens.
That’s by definition very different than what I’m looking for. I want to pay someone to sell me a browser that puts users (and specifically, paying customers’) needs first. Like essentially any other paid software or service.
If Mozilla wants to offer a “We won’t screw with you, like by creating new places for ads and burying the settings (like we have and will with free users)” premium plan, I’d consider it. I’d prefer to pay a company that doesn’t do that at all, though (that is, it’s built around innovating for paying customers), even if they aren’t able to offer a free browser.
Obviously being a paying customer doesn’t guarantee customer-first decisions or transparency, but as we saw this week, not being one makes it almost impossible.
After 19 years on Firefox I moved to Edge in August. While I always kicked the tires on Chrome and other browsers over the years, I never felt compelled to switch until now. I'm still on Edge and while it's a work in progress, I'm pretty happy with it. It just took a while to get everything setup how I like it. While ads definitely help keep me away, I left because the keyword shortcuts for search engines claim to work in settings, but don't actually work. Moving from DDG with it's !bang support to another search engine and replacing bangs with browser shortcuts meant moving to an omnibar. If I'm doing that, I may as well get the advantages of Blink/V8.
And it's my longheld belief that most people should use native browsers, as they have natural technical advantages on a platform. Now I'm in alignment on my own hardware. I use Safari on iOS and Edge on Windows. I do keep Edge installed on iOS for the send to device functionality, which doesn't work too well right now. More evidence that Edge seems to be a WIP but it's definitely got a bright future.
I don't think Edge is advisable. It doesn't offer end to end encryption for all categories of synced data, its session ID persists across reboots and is hardware-based and their start page connects to approx. two million things.
Including of course the standard of having search suggestions on and sent to a privacy unfriendly vendor.
It's an amazing browser, probably just the best one atm if you don't care about privacy, but for privacy it's far from ideal.
You're correct. First, I find your analysis very well balanced. While I'm going to continue using Edge, you're "not wrong". I for one love my choices being criticized because that's how I've improved myself and my decision making through my life. I love informed people with a rational stance. Allow me to respond though with my reasons why I use it anyway.
My main reason for using it anyway is that I'm neck deep in Google's world, who I'm most worried about, and view perfect privacy as unattainable so I try to view most things as a larger effect overtaking a smaller effect. I need to get off my Google Account first, which applies to Maps, Youtube, Gmail and search. I use all of those. I view Google as having the most intimate view of who I am given they know where I go, watch, type, and look for. I'm making efforts. I'm moving to another email provider once I sort out how to transfer all my emails over. That'll go a long ways. That doesn't excuse privacy intrusions anywhere else, but Google is definitely my biggest issue. And the least trustworthy of all actors that I do business with.
For the browser itself, I balance privacy with other factors. I want a browser from a large vendor, capable of proper support over the longterm. Microsoft fits the bill there. Being my native browser doesn't hurt at all, it was Mozilla's development articles that opened my eyes to all the advantage that native browsers have over 3rd party. I also want performance if Firefox doesn't suit my uses any longer, the move to Chromium solved that. I agree with your assessment, I think it may be the best browser out now, discounting privacy.
I do keep Tor installed for any sensitive searches, which I do none of, but I keep it on my machine and phone (Onion Browser on iOS) just to remind me of how insecure most browsing is. Tor would be a good idea even for Firefox users. I do agree with the idea that the best privacy by default is a good idea, it's just not enough of a concern to overrule where Firefox and Edge are respectively today.
And lastly, I think there's room for improvement for everyone. I hope Edge continues to get better on the privacy front. I don't think any of them are cemented in their position, especially Edge as it feels unfinished in many ways on basic levels still.
I am fine with this, but maybe Firefox should try something better, like at startup offer checkmarks for ways to help fund Firefox sorta like how NPR does, but way less annoying. Allow a user to select ways ads are offered to help Firefox, but have them all unchecked by default.
Anyone have stats on how much it costs to run Wikipedia's collection of websites? Do they release itemized expenses (servers, programmers, lawyers, management, etc)?
I have considered the owners and maintainers of Firefox to be malicious to the project for quite some time now. This finally cements that theory beyond any reasonable doubt.
But I'm not sure I agree this is malicious. Perhaps annoying and even poorly thought out, but malicious implies they are actively trying to undermine the project, rather than trying to find ways to break the project's dependence on Google but missing the mark.
Well they're fucking it up, royally, and it seems hard to do worse.
I wish they'd stop wasting money on dumb projects like a VPN and instead just focus on making a fast, modern browser that respects my privacy and doesn't fucking show me ads.
I think VPN would be/hopefully will be a great escape rope for Firefox, as it fits well with their privacy orientedness, and does pay somewhat for the development costs.
If you have ideas for alternative sources of funding for Mozilla to pay its programmers and other staff without relying so heavily on Google money for their organization's existence, I'm sure they'd like to hear about it.
They're trying to tackle the revenue issue on multiple fronts, including Mozilla VPN, a subscription "privacy pack" (that includes Mozilla VPN and upgraded versions of Firefox Relay and Firefox Monitor) and this.
I don’t mind them receiving funding from Google. It just seems like a poorly thought out way to raise funds. They receive 400-450 million /year from Google. Is this not enough to fund Firefox development adequately?
They're worried about what would happen if that funding were to disappear at some point (Google could choose not to renew the contract at any time and then Mozilla would have a huge problem). Part of leadership in a big organization is looking ahead and trying to mitigate potentially-catastrophic risks before they become actual problems.
Mozilla doesn't want the future of their entire organization to rest in the hands of Google, whose decisions they don't have control over (and who is also their main competitor).
But Google is funding them with... advertising money. Collected from your searches and search suggestions. I'm really unsure why reliance on Google is better than other options?
No it's not. Advertising is natural, from pretty flowers, to peacock and spider dances, to animals marking territory and making whatever mating noises they care to.
The advertising industry, which generally means the corporate owned, mass surveillance apparatus that is every authoritarians wet dream is malicious.
I shouldn't have to disable a single damn thing. The entire browser should operate without any telemetry whatsoever. There should not be a single HTTP request sent outside of the ones I explicitly authorize by either explicitly clicking a link in a webpage or entering a URL into the URL bar. Anything else is harmful and a slippery slope.
Maybe not inherently, but in practice, it is. Pretty much all ads are forms of emotional manipulation (FOMO, artificial status boosters, nurturing insecurities about life, body image, or career) or self-serving statistics and figures. The only ads that aren't malicious are independent consumer test reports, and they're only independent if the original manufacturer didn't pay for them. And if we accept that advertising is malicious by default, all attempts to improve the reach or effectiveness of ads can only be a net negative to society.
And that's not even touching on the entire surveillance infrastructure that has been constructed in the name of advertising, which we can similarly classify as malicious.
It is not Mozilla's job to profit off its users. Its job is to provide a browser. They have utterly failed at this job.
I have a fundamental right to see not see the content I do not want to see. I have a fundamental right to not be advertised to. Firefox has violated this right.
> It is not Mozilla's job to profit off its users. Its job is to provide a browser.
Firefox is a non-profit, but it needs revenue to provide that browser to users. Right now most of that revenue comes from Google (and its search suggestions, also enabled by default, I think). I'm not sure how you expect it to do its job for free, and it seems to get nothing but pushback whenever it tries to become more independent. I do not agree with all of Firefox's decisions, but to say they have "utterly failed" feels overstated.
There is not a single UI change that they have made in the last five years that I have liked. The new look for tabs that they pushed a few months ago is an utter disaster.
Every decision they have made in recent memory has been in the pursuit of getting rid of user customization. Something which Firefox was originally built on. This is the reason they are hemorrhaging users.
Nothing we can do but fork or switch. I'll stay on Firefox, bearing it, until they do something like this that I can't turn off. As soon as it ceases to be an option, I'm gone. It shouldn't be opt out but it's still the best browser for privacy, for now.
Fast, small footprint, highly battery life friendly. Bunch of extensions. Extensions support on desktop and mobile. Trustworthy repository of extensions. Special ad-blocking extensions API that delivers high performance and does not require extensions access to content of the page. Tab-groups out-of-the-box. Read later feature that is synchronised across devices out of the box, no third party service required. Bunch of privacy protecting features. Apple's hide-my-email thingy built-in.
When you need to register on a website, you can opt-in into a random email that is generated by Apple. Something like cooker-huskies0u@icloud.com. They then setup a relay that sends everything it receives to your email that is registered with your Apple Id. You can cancel any of those emails whenever and never hear from that website again. There's a similar offering from joint venture of Fastmail and 1Pawword if you're not into Apple.
Nothing is faster or leaner. I have always been a fan of Firefox the underdog but it gets worse with every release in so many different facets. Performance has been terrible for a while now.
Personally, I love ads. I barely notice them. I'll notice that guitars are popping up all over the place if I was just browsing Guitar Center or Sweetwater, but other than that most ads are irrelevant to me anyway. That said, they pay for a lot of things I enjoy. My email account is free. My web browser and search engine are free. To me, anyway. Thanks to all those people who look at and click on ads. Who are those folks, anyway? What are they looking for?
Now, I don't particularly enjoy the idea of being tracked, but I don't really have activity that I wouldn't want a stranger (or a close friend, for that matter) to know about, anyway, and that's intentional.
Yah ads aren't inherently bad, but the business models that developed around ads and tracking is what most oppose, and has turned ads into evil, unfortunately.
Mozilla Corporation, please figure out a way for users to directly donate to support Firefox. Not everybody realizes or knows that the donations on mozilla.org go to Mozilla Foundation and not to Mozilla Corporation. Not everybody knows that Firefox is primarily funded by a search partnership agreement with Google. The direct donations to Firefox may not be a lot, but I’m sure it could pay for at least one programmer a month, if not more.
Mozilla Corporation, expand the availability of Mozilla VPN to all the countries that Mullvad offers its services in. Keeping it restricted isn’t helping anyone much.