I am tired of Firefox shitty takes.
Does anybody expect them to say anything else? Web engine development is more costly than even OS development, we’re talking costs that often run into the hundreds of millions per year – it’s virtually impossible to fund unless you’re a giant like Google or being funded by someone with very deep pockets, like… er… Google.
Even MS bailed and ceded power to Google, because it simply didn’t make financial sense. Apple does it but they’re pretty meh in terms of implementing standards and such… there’s a reason 3rd party WebKit browsers are rare. They comparatively run it on a shoestring budget, and they’re Apple FFS - their wealth is practically limitless!
People aren’t going to start paying to use Firefox, and that money needs to come from somewhere. The community rejects giants paying Mozilla (understable sentiment), rejects paying for Firefox (also understandable), and rejects Mozilla selling data (definitely understandable). Some say donations, but be real, that won’t make hundreds of millions per year.
What is the solution here? I’m not trying to be contrarian I just don’t know what they can actually do. You’d hope that the Linux Foundation or something would chip in, but nope, they help Chromium instead. I worry for the future of web browsers.
That said, I’m also deeply uncomfortable with Google being able to pay to be default search on so many products. It gives them a huge advantage. I don’t want them to have that advantage. It’s anticompetitive and scummy as fuck.
Mozilla are definitely between a rock and a hard place here. I don’t like some of the decisions they make, but damn, I’m not sure I have the smarts to come up with better ones, given the position and market they’re in.
Web engine development is more costly than even OS development
Unfortunately, many applications that used to be desktop applications in the past are now programs that run in the web browser. It doesn’t matter anymore if they are a lot less effective than being native.
we’re talking costs that often run into the hundreds of millions per year – it’s virtually impossible to fund unless you’re a giant
That is the problem - the web needs to be a lot simpler, browser development should cost fractions of that. It got unnecessarily, absurdly complex.
I know I’m in the minority but I would pay yearly to use Firefox. Not sure how much I’d pay, but I am getting into the habit of purchasing software instead of allowing it to purchase me
You can donate to software development freely right now. This and many others developers
Mozilla is such a disorganized company. Why wouldn’t they find another search engine deal besides Google? It’s possible that they could find another deal somewhere, but it seems to me that they don’t care — more like they’re a controlled competitor. I’m not surprised considering they scrapped their wording regarding privacy, which leads to a lot of ambiguities.
It would hurt badly at the beginning, but it would be better in the long run if Mozilla were to lose that Google search payment. Take some of the financial hit out of the c-suite comp package. Let those more interested in tech industry CEO money go work for the likes of Google, etc. Mozilla should be looking to attract someone whose singular motivation is not money.
You think the heads salaries/bonus/lobbying budget will be the first to get axed if google money goes away?
No, I don’t think that is where the cuts will be. But it should be.
It really is a shitty take. Mozilla are essentially saying they depend on Google remaining a monopoly; and that we shouldn’t fight the bad guys because the bad guys might hurt us if we try.
The Mozilla blog post was all about the DOJ asking to end search-bar payments, and how this might hurt independent browser. But I saw no mention of the DOJ saying that Google must sell Chrome; which I think is very relevant to the discussion about browser dominance.
More and more I believe that Mozilla’s current leadership are acting in their own self interest, not for the public good.
More and more I believe that Mozilla’s current leadership are acting in their own self interest, not for the public good.
I think the salary alone is enough evidence of that. There’s a point, specifics of which will depend on your living situation, at which wanting a higher salary requires the same infinite greed that becoming a billionaire requires. And I’m very sure that this point is far below 1 million dollars a year. Mozilla’s CEO makes over 6 million.
If you feel like you deserve that, you are not fit to lead a nonprofit. You have already proven that you care more about giving yourself obscene wealth than about the benefit of others.
And I’m very sure that this point is far below 1 million dollars a year.
Personally I place the amount around 600,000. Rich enough for anything reasonable.
setting one number is a little silly tho. somebody with 4 kids has totally different needs than a single person. especially if someone has a kid with special needs the costs can be huge. obviously that doesn’t apply to these CEOs but I would say one person doesn’t need more than 100k
I mean if you’re talking about “need” as in absolute need the number goes down a lot more. But 100k doesn’t go too far anymore.
