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Mozilla wants you to love Firefox again (www.fastcompany.com)
submitted 1 month ago by gytrash@feddit.uk to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
39 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

"Last month, Mozilla made a quiet change in Firefox that caused some diehard users to revolt..."

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[–] ExtremeDullard@lemmy.sdf.org 76 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I am doubly pissed off:

  • Mozilla opts me into an analytics scheme without requiring my permission. That's bad.
  • Mozilla partners with fucking FACEBOOK to spring this shit on me? Now THAT takes the cake!

But... I would be pissed off if I used straight Firefox, and I don't: I use LibreWolf, and I have no doubt they'll strip this latest round of Mozilla nonsense from the LibreWolf browser.

I don't know... I have a love/hate relationship with Mozilla: on the one hand, they're pretty much the only thing that stands between the final overrun of the web by the Google monoculture and still having some kind of a choice what you use to hit the internet, and they make one of the only email clients worth its salt in Linux. On the other hand, every time they decide to do something, it's always a screw-up, and it's been like that for decades. Surely in their position, they should know what not to do to piss off everybody all the time, and yet... What a weird bunch.

[–] myliltoehurts@lemm.ee 3 points 1 month ago

I like to think the behind the scenes is just a decades long game of dare in Mozilla's leadership that slowly got out of control but they've all gotten too deep in it now to give up and just call it a tie.

[–] Mikina@programming.dev 2 points 1 month ago

I've been mostly using Mullvad, and so far it worked pretty well out of the box. Few sites break, and for that I have LibreWolf, but other than that, I'm enjoying Mullvad more.

[–] 01189998819991197253@infosec.pub 47 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Mozilla wants us to love Firefox again? Ok, well, it's actually pretty simple: treat us like ~~customers~~ users, instead of products again. Make the product for us, not for the corpos. Strange how betrayal turns a friend into a foe, isn't it...

E: changed customers to users, as another user here suggested the difference between them. (thanks, fellow lemming!)

[–] jherazob 19 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Not customers, users, otherwise they'll start paywalling features

[–] 01189998819991197253@infosec.pub 5 points 1 month ago

Good point. Edited.

[–] flatlined@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 month ago

Which (pr nightmare aside) I wouldn't be against. It's not gonna fly, people are accustomed to 'free' browsers to the point they'd balk at the idea. Even if they weren't most would take a free chromium based browser or Firefox fork over a paid alternative that doesn't give them anything extra. But browsers are massive pieces of tech, they need a lot of dev time, and the money needs to come from somewhere, just relying on volunteers won't cut it.

Mozilla has been looking for sources of funding for years, sometimes in ways that are their own type of pr nightmare and sometimes in ways I'm not thrilled by, but I get their predicament. I wish there would be (more) state funding. EU, US. Whatever. Much like governments should invest in public transit we should invest in critical software infra.

I also wish Google's other branches were divorced from their browser dev branch. The stranglehold on the web given to Google by chrome is a huge part of the problem.

[–] Dirk@lemmy.ml 38 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The first part actually reads slightly optimistic.

Modern tabs management, web apps making a comeback, more money for the Browser instead of useless side projects, etc.

We still need to turn of tons of telemetry and user tracking, but its nice to see some movement.

Let's hope that this isn't just new CEO bla bla.

[–] jherazob 5 points 1 month ago

They bought an ads company AFTER this person took the reins

[–] sushibowl@feddit.nl 27 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Laura Chambers, who stepped into an interim CEO role at Mozilla in February, says the company is reinvesting in Firefox after letting it languish in recent years,

It's sort of amusing to me that Mozilla would let the Firefox browser languish. Is that not the raison d'etre of your entire organization? What are you doing with your time and effort if you are allowing your core product to languish? What would people say if Microsoft said "yeah, we've allowed windows to languish in recent years." What an insane notion.

[–] ReversalHatchery 11 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

What would people say if Microsoft said "yeah, we've allowed windows to languish in recent years."

Well, I think they did let it languish, if looking at it being enshittified in ~~recent~~ last ~10 years. Also, it's not their core product anymore. Almost nobody buys a windows license anymore, because piracy was already high, and they let you keep your license from the previous version so whether you had one or not, most probably now you have.
I think Microsoft's core product has not been windows for a long time, but their cloud services, and maybe office and the other common business tools.

[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 month ago

There was a graphic here a while ago. What was it, about 4/5 are Azure and Office 365, Windows less than 1/5.

[–] BearOfaTime@lemm.ee 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Let me tell my management they no longer have to pay windows license for the ~10,000 user machines, and then the servers.

While a single consumer can get away with it (and MS doesn't care because it means they're using Windows and likely using MS services, all while getting telemetry from the desktops), it's far from "nobody buys a windows license any more".

Even SMB's will pay, because if they don't MS will hammer them financially. No SMB could stand up to what MS can do to them - $200 windows license is cheap insurance.

[–] ReversalHatchery 2 points 1 month ago

Let me tell my management they no longer have to pay windows license for the ~10,000 user machines, and then the servers.

Current sales are nothing compared to earlier windows versions.

[–] Akisamb@programming.dev 9 points 1 month ago (2 children)

They've got thunderbird which is as far as I know the only serious alternative to outlook.

[–] sushibowl@feddit.nl 5 points 1 month ago

Kinda but Thunderbird is community driven, and spun out into an independent subsidiary.

[–] BearOfaTime@lemm.ee 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And I wouldn't call it serious, the performance is atrocious.

It's so bad I went and installed outlook from 2016

[–] Empricorn@feddit.nl 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You're not arguing from a position of strength if your personal anecdote is performance issues, 8 years ago.

[–] Roopappy@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think you misread that. This poster's experience isn't from 2016. They installed a program called "Outlook 2016" recently.

[–] Empricorn@feddit.nl 1 points 1 month ago

You may be right, but they literally wrote "from 2016". So yeah, I read that as "Since 2016 onwards..."

[–] jherazob 4 points 1 month ago

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 19 points 1 month ago

The could learn from Librewolf

[–] sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 12 points 1 month ago (1 children)

“They made this technology for advertisers, specifically,” says Jonah Aragon, founder of the Privacy Guides website. “There’s no direct benefit to the user in creating this. It’s software that only serves a party other than the user.”

Ah, the Dunning-Kruger effect.

[–] ganymede@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Dunning-Kruger effect

could you please explain further what you mean and what you're referring to?

[–] sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It refers to people that no a little about something and so assume they know a lot. To suggest that Mozilla PPA has no benefit to the average user is disingenuous at best or outright malicious malpractice with the intent of defamation.

[–] ganymede@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

To suggest that Mozilla PPA has no benefit to the average user is disingenuous at best or outright malicious malpractice with the intent of defamation

Thanks. Could you give some examples how the average user benefits from this collaboration between mozilla and meta, as implemented or due for implementation in firefox?

[–] sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

The counter argument is that all ads are bad and that we should create an Internet whereby ads don't exist. Reality says that ads aren't going anywhere. So rather than let them do what they want with invasive privacy tracking, it's best to ring fence advertisers and give them enough actionable data to appease. Now you may be thinking, we don't negotiate with terrorists! But you do, it happens all the time. In this case, it's giving advertisers enough to leave innocent people alone. As for the not so innocent (people like me and you that run adblockers), this never affected us. People that run adblockers and are upset about this were just trying to manufacture outrage because for whatever reason, they feel that unless Mozilla does that they want exactly, they're unhappy.

Just to be clear, and I'm probably oversimplifying, this is essentially a bunch of counters, user batch pressed ads on pages about _______ that was above the fold. So advertisers see ads on _____ site got __ impressions and was about _____ placement was above the fold and generated __ hits.

Smarter people that me have explained it in more and exact detail where as I'm just painting a vague picture of a concept to try and convey things.

[–] ganymede@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

imo we're all lacking innocence, regardless of using adblockers or not. we all, myself included, haven't funded mozilla fairly for FF.

even if viewing ads for a website was an ethically sound exchange (in principle? probably achievable; in modern implementations? highly debatable),

regardless, that revenue is naturally for the sites not for the browser. maintaining a modern browser requires non-trivial resources, alot of us get hours/day from our browsers, advertisers are getting paid, and meanwhile ff has been missing out.

i could be wrong, but my gut feeling is mozilla is (mostly) a legit organisation with genuine good interests at heart. and if we'd all donated even a fraction of what its genuinely worth, they probably wouldn't have to make these kinds of faustian deals.

giving advertisers enough to leave innocent people alone

I think this is very optimistic, the ad industry has virtually zero incentive to play fairly here. afaict they've currently got it far too good to have any genuine motivation to make concessions?

if i had to guess, one of the biggest actual threats on their horizon is somehow maintaining s̶u̶f̶f̶i̶c̶i̶e̶n̶t̶ infinite growth, which is further reason for them to NOT be satisfied with an equivalent or lesser scope than they already have right now.

imo its not a matter if but when it will be discovered meta's behaved in bad faith here. i could be wrong, and hopefully i am because it would ofc philosophically be a step in the right direction.

[–] sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

if we'd all donated even a fraction of what its genuinely worth, they probably wouldn't have to make these kinds of faustian deals

That's wrong. The creation of PPA isn't about getting paid, it's about trying to safeguard the privacy of the average (non tech savvy) user. I don't understand where this suggestion that this is a means for Mozilla to syphon money, comes from.

[–] ganymede@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

That’s wrong. The creation of PPA isn’t about getting paid

ok that's fair, thanks for the useful info i didn't know that. until money or other resources change hands i'm happy to withdraw the view that while firefox is underfunded by the community, it may not have resulted in these kinds of collaborations.

what i'm not understanding is how average non-adblock running users will be better off?

i appreciate you've stated how the sole purpose of this collaboration is intended by mozilla.

yet unlike the current implementation which appears to be opt-out, afaict meta's particpation here is entirely opt-in, isn't it? if meta etc decide on a whim they want to have their cake and eat it too, what is stopping them?

[–] sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You live in a town and to get from say the supermarket to the school, everyone cuts across a field. The problem is the field is quite overgrown and while it's okay in groups, it's considered dangerous with more than one incident taking place and people still insist on taking the path. The town mayor decided to put lights along the makeshift route that people use and also cut the grass. The residents of the town are mad because they never asked for the field to have its grass cut or for the lights to be put up. The major hopes that their actions will reduce the danger, but only time will tell.

[–] ganymede@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

seems roughly accurate.

but probably would add

the mayor is a good person, and genuinely appears to want to see the best in people. but most of the reported incidents involve thugs with overt connections to an organised crime syndicate which is currently so powerful they mostly don't have to answer to anyone.

the same crime syndicate has been granted the contract to light the field, cut the grass and keep everyone safe.

the mayor has a fairly good record of delivering on good community projects. so on the one hand mayor has a good rep, on the other...it's an organised crime syndicate who is literally one of the worst offenders when it comes to making the field unsafe in the first place.

[–] JustMarkov@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm gonna move to LadyBird as soon as it gets released.

[–] gwen@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

you can build it from source and use it rn

[–] JustMarkov@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

That's true, but currently it isn't ready for daily use. I want it to enter at least an alpha phase to give it a shot.

[–] linuxfiend@fedia.io 3 points 1 month ago

I never stopped.

[–] No1@aussie.zone 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

All I need is mozilla on android to be able to load local html files.

It's the only reason I left.

It's the only reason I will return.

[–] maniacalmanicmania@aussie.zone 3 points 1 month ago

It doesn't? I need to see this (not) in action. Will be back.

[–] geoma@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 month ago

Is it possible to turn off PPA on firefox/fennec mobile? (android)