FireFox is turning belly up

[GreyGeek]

Just saw this article about FireFox failing in its second attempt so far this year to raise money to keep afloat. Mozilla has already laid off 1/3rd of its work force. Chromium isn't on my radar as a usable browser, so what to replace FF with when it assumes room temperature?

https://medium.com/young-coder/mozil...d-9e912098a0e1

[GreyGeek]

The best comment in the Slashdot article about FireFox:
https://news.slashdot.org/comments.p...5&cid=60406253

by markdavis ( 642305 ) on Sunday August 16, 2020 @08:40AM (#60406253)
>"If you have the skills and time, the best possible support is to join the Mozilla community and contribute to their code base."


The best possible thing, is to just download, install, and use Firefox. It costs nothing and requires no "skills" or hardly any time. That is what keeps it relevant. Web developers and sites then see it being used and can't pull crap like the "IE Only days", only this time with Chom* [Google].


Make no mistake- there is only one non-Chom* alternative in the multiplatform browser space, and it is Firefox. If that is lost, not only have we lost browser choice, there is then nothing left to prevent Google from pushing any "standard" it wants (unless you count Safari, which only runs on Apple gear, and most Apple users probably are using Chom* now, too). Google is already flexing its muscles, the writing is on the wall. The only reason Google donates anything to Mozilla/Firefox is to keep Firefox around as a token of competition.


If you value privacy, standards, choice, configurability, and security- then you should not only be using Firefox now, but encouraging family and friends to do the same. Users switched away from Firefox because of Google's constant harassment banners on their near-monopoly search engine and other products. And for the performance BEFORE Firefox Quantum. Once Firefox converted to Quantum, almost 3 YEARS ago now, Firefox has been on-par with Chom*'s speed and features, and better in many other ways. And now the threat of the other Chom* from Microsoft, who is pushing it HARD. If you have not used Firefox in the last 3 years (especially the 2), then any per-conceived negative notions you have about it are almost certainly wrong.


This doesn't mean I want a world with ONLY Firefox- but there is no fear of that. If it had even, say, 20% of the users, that would be enough to prevent it from being ignored and keep the pressure of real competition present. The web is supposed to be about standards, not a single browser (full or engine), controlled by a single company, whose motivations are absolutely not aligned with actual privacy, choice, or open/community-based-standards.

[oldgeek]

Google is doing to Firefox what Microsoft did to Netscape. These big guys just don't want any competition at all. And Falkon is no replacement for Firefox--it doesn't even seem to be maintained any more.

[jglen490]

I have Firefox and Chrome (not Chromium) on my desktop PC. I would say that Firefox is in use 95% of the time. I'll use FF for as long as it shows up.

[verndog]

I only use FF. Its good that Ubuntu has FF by default on all its distros.

[Beerislife]

Since I recently bought a Chromebook I switched to Chrome as my main browser. It kind of made sense to have my devices synced. I use FF only to login to my other Google account to update opening times and beer lists.

[claydoh]

Since I recently bought a Chromebook I switched to Chrome as my main browser. It kind of made sense to have my devices synced. I use FF only to login to my other Google account to update opening times and beer lists.

I use a Chromebook but I still use Firefox [emoji12]

Sent from my LM-V600 using Tapatalk

[dequire]

I use a Chromebook but I still use Firefox [emoji12]

Sent from my LM-V600 using Tapatalk

Much respect

[claydoh]

Much respect

Lol, it is not hard to do on Chrome OS , especially for anyone with any Linux/Debian/Ubuntu experience and and a minimal level of command line knowledge.

[TWPonKubuntu]

Just my two cents. I have FF installed, but never use it because of what Mozilla is doing to itself and to their users.

Chrome/Chromium are Google products and I've tossed Google under the bus for everything. YMMV, but beware of Google...

My browser of choice is Pale Moon, a FF fork that is actively maintained. They do have a user forum, but I'll warn you ahead of time that the mods on the that forum can be "less than personable"... I lurk there but seldom post because it is too easy to step on the toes of the mods.

I do have the Falkon browser installed, as a backup in case the 'net gets crazy and other browsers are unable to connect. It has happened in the past.
FYI

[dequire]

Lol, it is not hard to do on Chrome OS , especially for anyone with any Linux/Debian/Ubuntu experience and and a minimal level of command line knowledge.

Oh no - Not for that reason, but because I think FF is too important in the Linux Ecosystem (and the internet in general) to get rid of, all of their glaring faults and un-attainable crusades aside.

[Goeroeboeroe]

I think the importance of Firefox cannot be overestimated.
If Firefox disappears, all forks will also disappear sooner or later. So then there's really only left Chrome (and Safari, but that's only on OS X and iOS). Chromium is not a real alternative, because there's a lot of Google stuff in it. A company like Microsoft may be able to delete all Google stuff, but that's quite a big job.
Apart from that chromium is (almost) completely hosted, financed, etc by Google.

I could make a (very) long list of everything Mozilla did wrong in my opinion. But a lot of people already did that on a lot of places. Just one example of the danger that's coming. And in this case: is already happening.

Mozilla had three very strong points: an unbelievable good extension ecosystem, good privacy and it was open source. (Most people don't care about open source. Only the last two year or so Firefox is using their privacy in pr again. For some reason they kept silent about that for years.) Okay, the extensions.
For developers Firefox used to be the best browser to build sites etc in (I still do, but it's getting harder and harder not to switch to Chrome because of the growing amount of bugs). Firefox had a whole ecosystem of unbelievable handy extensions for developers. And developers were often also 'propagandists' of Firefox.
A few years ago without any consultation of their userbase Firefox decided to change their extension system. They gave two main reasons:

* Safety. Because extensions could change the inner workings of the browser, that was a security concern. But I've never ever seen that this has been misused by an extension. (Extensions can be a real danger. But that's still possible. They can inject malicious code in a site. That can happen in every browser. That kind of misuse is happening all the time. Almost every time you read something about a malicious extension being removed somewhere, this is the reason.)

* They wanted to be compatible with Chrome. Hoping that people who made extensions for Chrome would make their extensions for Firefox too, because only small changes were necessary.
Because of this change a lot (a LOT) of very good extensions weren't possible any more, because you couldn't change the browser itself any more. That made a lot of people very angry. And that were exactly the die hard users of Firefox. Very clever move to change such an important part of the browser without any consultation.
But much worse: the API's Chrome uses for it's extension system are no open standard. Hmtl, css, JavaScript, ... are open standards, maintained by some kind of body, like w3c. A few years ago there was an attempt to make a standard for extensions and let w3c rule that. But that didn't succeed.

So every decision about extensions can be made by Google alone, without consulting anybody else.
About a year ago Google announced some change that would make the use of extensions like AdBlock virtually impossible. I don't follow it exactly, but I think it didn't happen yet, I think it are still plans, because there was a lot of resistance.
But sooner or later this is going to happen.
What can Mozilla do? Nothing. They can choose between becoming incompatible again, or also making AdBlock etc. useless. How the hell can an open standard and privacy propagandist like Mozilla make itself dependant of a proprietary system owned by one of the biggest violators of privacy

With Firefox gone - and I'm afraid that's more a time of months then years - Google is completely free to do whatever they want. Even more then at the moment.

I don't make sites anymore for a living (retired). Only have my own small site with tutorials. But if Firefox's gone, I'll stop with that site. Because if there's left an internet with only Google (and three or four other monopolists) I think to prefer to read more books, watch more moovies in the cinema, make long walks, etc.

[whatthefunk]

I would hate to see Firefox go. They've done some great things lately. The browser containers are really nice if you use multiple accounts or use you home PC for work. Their privacy management is far better than Chrome and the dev tools are great. I use Chrome as well, but Firefox is my main browser and will continue to be for as long as it is alive.

[TWPonKubuntu]

The above two posts give some valid reasons to keep using FF. That being said, I'm not doing it. The FF Fork: Pale Moon, has chosen to base on an earlier ESR version of FF and to NOT use Web Extensions (webextensions). They only allow XUL compatible add ons. Of course that will push some people away if they absolutely (why?) must have a particular Web Extension script... Mozilla and Google thank you for your patronage and welcome you to their product stable. Have another carrot.

I hope everyone can see the direction of money flow and the politics behind all of this. Even my preferences are being driven by money and politics... Such is life.

[kc1di]

I too hate to think of FF going away but according to a few articles I've read recently it seems Google has been keeping Mozilla alive for awhile now.
take a look at this one https://www.zdnet.com/article/an-end...ecies-firefox/