Slashdot Mirror
Google's Shadow Over Firefox
eldavojohn writes "The Mozilla Foundation's chief executive now earns roughly half a million in pay and benefits. With $70 million in assets, the Foundation gave out less than $300,000 in grants to open source projects in 2006. And in 2006 85% of their $66 million in revenue came from Google. When these figures first came to light, people worried whether Firefox was becoming a pawn in Google's cold war with Microsoft. The Foundation addressed these fears and largely laid them to rest; but now the worry is that, even though it's clear that the community's code is what makes Firefox successful, Mozilla may be becoming dangerously reliant on Google's cash."
That's because adblocking is built into Opera, doofus.
Opera doesn't need add-ons to do everything useful. For some reason they figured they might as well integrate them.
Although if the Firefox code base remains open, and as long as extensions can be written, there is nothing to stop anyone from creating ad-blocking extensions, after all it is something that many people seem to like, moreover if there is (however unlikely it may be) a concerted effort to prevent ad-blocking technology within Firefox there is always the option of creating a fork with those countermeasures removed.
Don't get me wrong, I don't like the idea that the Mozilla Foundation *appears* to be dependent on Google's advertising revenue, and I can see how that *could* impact decision making, but I dont see a whole lot of alternative funding streams, nor a threat that could not be overcome, that is after all why we like open standards and open code, no one person or group truly has 100% control and it is nearly impossible to take something that is free and open and turn it into something proprietary and closed..
Mitchell (Mozilla's "chief lizard wrangler") wrote a fairly large blog post, not only about the numbers as published, but also saying some things on the directions Mozilla is moving.
Far more interesting reading than the fluff news.com article, let alone the random FUD spouting by the submitter.
First, the Firefox CPU bug you've been complaining about (Firefox consumers lots of CPU after the computer wakes up from standby or hibernate) was fixed in Firefox 2.0.0.8. If you're still having any problems with the latest release of Firefox, let developers know by filing a proper bug report, including steps to reproduce the problem.
Second, there is no sign of any "memory gobbling bug" that I can see, just a few little leaks here and there and some memory fragmentation. If you're still having any problems with the latest release of Firefox, let developers know by filing a proper bug report, including steps to reproduce the problem.
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
I've stopped using extensions a while ago and just use Privoxy.
You are modded flamebait, but I'm not sure I disagree. The GP says that nothing in Opera blocks Google ads, but all you need to do is add *.googlesyndication.com/* to the blocker and they're gone for good. If anything, it's the GP who's wrong..
Send email from the afterlife! Write your e-will at Dead Man's Switch.
Uh, wrong.
Rightclick on page with annoying flash ad -> Block Content..
Click the offending ad -> it disappears with "Content Blocked" across it
(Opera 9+)
According to the financial statement, Mozilla spent $11,775,516 on "software development" in 2006. I'm guessing that mostly means salaries and benefits for employees who work on Gecko and Firefox. So the bulk of Mozilla's spending is on developing (specific) open-source software.
I don't know what the "less than $300,000" thing refers to. Maybe it refers to monetary grants to other open-source projects, or maybe it refers to things like buying laptops for volunteers so they can contribute more effectively.
The shareholder is always right.
They spent around $19 million in 2006. Some big chunk of that was paying people to work on Firefox. The $300,000 was money given to *outside* projects.
It's really hard to say if the CEOs pay was worth it. Really, really hard. If the foundation knew it wasn't, I bet they would find a different CEO. Apparently, they have less than perfect information yet still find the arrangement acceptable.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Or configure Preferences -> Advanced -> Content -> JavaScript Options -> User JavaScript files (or the appropriate opera:config page I hopefully just linked to; opera:config#UserPrefs|UserJavaScriptFile), and drop hide-objects.js in the folder you configured; flash will then be blocked until you double-click to load them.
If you use IMap with gmail, you're still handing your data over to google.
Or use firefox and get the filterset-g extension, and it takes care of everything for you, including automatic updates to the ad server list. Blocks ads, flash or not. And doesn't block the flash that you want.
Check out their financial FAQ as well. They specifically talk about how they'll be increasing money spent on grants in the next year.
So by "killing Thunderbird" you mean "set up a new subsidiary corporation to develop Thunderbird with $3M to get started"?
Does anybody actualy read the faqs for software they use? It explicitly says NOT to use filterset-g with ABP RIGHT IN THEIR OWN DOCUMENTATION - FILTERSET-G IS NOT OPTIMIZED FOR ABP! Just use Easylist+EasyElement and if your paranoid the ABP Tracking Filter and you have the best ad-blocking system on the planet.
From Adblock Plus FAQs:
In short, the Filterset.G extension duplicates functionality already in the Adblock Plus extension, it's slow, and it's harder to use. The filter subscriptions supplied by Adblock Plus are the recommended alternative.
Why does the CEO make half a million a year?
This is incorrect. Mitchell received $300K/year salary, not half a million. If you doubt it, read the actual financial statement rather than second (or third) hand commentary.
As for the question you raise, this amount is well below the average and even slightly below the median salary for CEOs of other non-profits I've looked at, though I haven't found a breakdown between private foundations and public-benefit foundations so there could be some disparity there. Also, CEO pay in the non-profit sector is about 1/10 of what they could be making in traditional for-profit businesses so it's a safe bet that non-profit CEOs aren't in it for the compensation alone.
Add into that the costs of living in the Bay Area, where Mozilla is headquartered, and the ridiculously competitive employment landscape there, and reasonable people will surely mostly agree that this is reasonable compensation.
- A
I don't know how it would make you feel better. Getting both companies won't make Mozilla more secure. The reason Google is forking that money over is to ensure Mozilla keeps Google as the default search engine and other Google friendly policies. The only way Mozilla can take Microsoft's money is to throw away Google's money, and thus those policies in favor of Microsoft friendly policies.
Of course, this wouldn't happen as Mozilla would likely look to Yahoo before it looked for Microsoft, and even then Microsoft would have to actually look back, which it probably wouldn't, but the idea remains the same. It is the key reason Google gives the money. In turn, it allows Google to stand off against Microsoft.
That said, Mozilla doesn't have much to worry about as far as becoming over-dependent on Google. Mozilla is actually the one holding the leash and could easily tell Microsoft/Yahoo that they will make Microsoft/Yahoo's search the default for the right price if Google decided to stop paying/has financial trouble.
Given Firefox's growth, Yahoo would not say no, so at least Mozilla has one fall back.
I'm probably naively misjudging, but I'm going to assume you're not trolling and reply.
Actually, that would be "along with about 130 to 140 million others".
If you define need as very short term, then you could possibly have a point. I don't, and the rest of the people making Mozilla and Firefox don't think about things only in the short term. Mozilla's mission to promote choice and innovation on the Internet and to advocate for people using the web, is a long-term mission that still has not demonstrated sustainability beyond a few short years.
I'd wager that the percentage of Firefox's 130+ million users who even know what open source is falls somewhere south of 10%. Those who "believe in the open source community" are far from making up double digit percentages, much less a majority. That doesn't change the fact that our mission is dependent on the support and participation of a large community of contributors, but our mission is much larger than open source and cannot be considered anything of a success if it's limited to those "who believe in the open source community."
From the way you phrase this, it sounds like you're suggesting that the Mozilla project is not "open source community". I take issue with this. Mozilla is one of the most important communities in the entire open source ecosystem and I think it's completely reasonable that the money that Mozilla generates go first and foremost into forwarding Mozilla's mission. Beyond that, we're building a grants program for other projects with strong alignment that's already giving out hundreds of thousands of dollars. But a grants program requires a lot of work, work that we think is important to do but that we don't have all of the right people for today. We're working on it. You can throw stones at slashdot or you can help us make things better.You could do better than that. You could work with your favorite OSS programs developing and writing grant proposals. You could work with OSS projects to help them develop revenue streams. You could contribute in so many positive ways that going out of your way to remove resources from an open source project seems misguided. That is, unless I was being far too generous in assuming you weren't just a troll.
Actually, we're not 90 people. We're thousands of people working to further the Mozilla Mission. The overwhelming majority of Mozilla's full-time staff are organizing and managing a much larger area than simply their direct reports or their code modules. If you want to make comparisons with more traditional organizations, I'd wager that Mozilla is operating much more like a company of about 1000 employees than a company of 100.
If you think there exists a competent CEO who could lead Mozilla effectively for less than a six figure salary, you're living on a different planet. If you think there's a CEO that would lead any non-profit company with 10s of millions in annual revenue, for less than six figures, you're living in a fantasy land.
If you really care about open source software, you'll seek out positive ways to contribute and bashing a project that's delivered open source software to the desktops of more people than any other project in the history of OSS will fall way down on your list of priorities.
-A
We built the search feature into Mozilla in 1999. Google has been an option in that feature since its inception. That was 5 years before there was any revenue associated with it. We made Google the default in 2002 or 2003 to replace the silly "Netscape" default which was simply a Netscape branded Google. This was years before there was any revenue associated with it.
We made these decisions because it was the right thing for users, not because it was a revenue opportunity. If we ever have to decide between doing what's right for users and a revenue opportunity, we'll put the users first every time. The nice thing about the current situation is that it's both the right thing for users and a revenue opportunity.
And this is just about the "defaults" in Firefox. If you don't like Google, switch it to Yahoo. If you don't like Yahoo, you can add any one of more than 13,000 additional search services to the Firefox search toolbar with just a click or two at http://mycroft.mozdev.org/
- A
Dude, lay off the caffeine or pop a Xanax or two.
He was talking about Adblock and not Adblock plus. They are two seperate applications.
Filterset G works just fine with Adblock.
Scott
©20014 angrykeyboarder & Elmer Fudd. All Wights Wesewved