Mozilla CEO Objects To Safari Auto Install

hairyfeet writes "Do you use iTunes on Windows? If so you may be getting the gift of Safari from Apple whether you want it or not, and Mozilla CEO John Lilly is not happy about it. After his daughter was offered Safari as a 'bonus update' with a recent update to her iTunes software, Mr. Lilly says on his blog, 'What Apple is doing now with their Apple Software Update on Windows is wrong. It undermines the trust relationship great companies have with their customers, and that's bad — not just for Apple, but for the security of the whole Web.' He also pointed out the check box is already clicked when you go to update meaning you have to opt out, not in and that it lists Safari as getting an update even if you don't have it installed." Update: 03/21 21:44 GMT by KD : Corrected the name of the Mozilla CEO; also linked directly to his blog.

Comments

Off the Record...

[RobBebop]

While speaking off the record, Mozilla CEO Joe Wilcox was heard to say, "I don't give a shit whether they are taking market share away from Internet Explorer with this move, but Safari will take Firefox's place on some computers."

He went on, "Personally, I think Apple should be ashamed of themselves for exploiting their successful music business to empower their web browsing software."

On the other hand... default installations of Internet Explorer was one of the major reasons that Netscape lost its market share lead in the 90's. The only problem that I have with this is that the "Update" claims to leave the Checkbox for installing Safari clicked by default.

Been there and done that.

[Mactrope]

IE8 and the 1999 anti-trust trials ring a bell? This is a made up and distorted issue.

Re:Obligatory

[opieum]

I personally find that update "feature" annoying. I am no OS fanboi. This is something I hate about both companies. They force their software on you. That said, it is hard to really take it seriously when the CEO of a competitor is saying it. But I do agree with him.

No, I'm not going for this BS.

[Mactrope]

Apple is not as evil as Microsoft. Their common interest with Mozilla is open standards. Apple has used a lot of free software such as KHTML on which Safari is built. A common burden for Apple and Mozilla is dealing with companies like Microsoft, the AAs and others who hate your freedom.

Mozilla statements have been blown out of proportion and this is not a big deal. It would be nice to see people from Mozilla weigh up the two companies or compare the IE8 force to this.

If you think about it, Apple has done what it did because Microsoft does not have it's act together. Why shouldn't Apple leverage iTunes like this? No force was involved other than Microsoft and iTunes being non free in the first place. This one time advertisement is a big fat zero next to the constant stream of intrusive Windows update popups that few dare turn off.

Re:Obligatory

[pohl]

Yeah, you know, that's the way law works with respect to monopolies. They're held to a different standard. While Microsoft has been legally declared a monopoly, and it held up on appeal. So far, the only people who call Apple a 'monopoly' are trolls on various internet forums -- a far cry from a federal court ruling. Like it or not, Microsoft has different rules to abide by. Get over it. You sound like someone who's whining about their pedophile uncle not being allowed to live near a public school system.

Re:Fake fight, Slashdot has been trolled hard.

[SEAL]

If people are really against Apple that much, there's a simple recourse: uninstall iTunes. Problem solved.

that's quite a presumption

[Mactrope]

that and ad hominem attacks go hand in hand with Microsoft defense, don't they? The point of my comments here was to point out how this issue has been spun and to speculate on the spinners. You have not added much to that and I wish you would shut up.

What and how I named this account is none of your business. Just imagine that I like the way it sounds.

Look again. Microsoft is really to blame.

[Mactrope]

I can see how it might be confusing to have an "updater" give you new software but the text of the message is clear. In bold letters it says, New software is Available from Apple. Between that and the fact that you know you don't have Safari installed, anyone who's had their morning coffee would have done OK.

I also expect Apple will continue to make this available in their updater because the updater is really a package manager. If the package manager can get Safari, why should the package manager hide it?

Finally, this would not be a problem if Microsoft had it's act together. Why is it that every company has to make it's own custom package manager for Windows? Apple, Mozilla, Adobe, AV companies, freaking everyone has to include their own custom package manager on Windows. You would think that all of these companies could get together and agree on a standard repository system that gives users control. There are two big reasons that won't happen. No one trusts Microsoft and Microsoft would rather die than give users real choices. More on topic, if it were not for the games Microsoft plays, people would not be afraid to install another browser. I've got three or four on my GNU/Linux computers and all of them work well. Through Wine, or virtual machines, I could have IE if I wanted it but I have not needed that in more than five years.

Re:"Quicktime" is a million billion, trillion...

[Jeremy_Bee]

You're obviously just trolling (and using a great deal of inexact, exaggerated language), but it has to be pointed out that almost none of the points you mention are actually true.

Only if you are the kind of fool that just clicks on every dialogue box that comes up, doesn't read anything, and goes with the default suggestion on every install would you even get close to the kind of behavior you describe.

Monopolies and anti-competitive behavior.

[Mactrope]

If Safari was forced, you might be able to compare Apple and Microsoft. It's not, unless you fail to read the dialog, so charges of leveraging a monopoly position are bullshit. I'm also not aware of any kind of music player contract that forbids makers from supporting other file formats, except from Microsoft.

The law does not forbid monopolies for monopolies sake, it forbids harmful anti-competitive behavior. There's nothing wrong with designing a good OS or even dominating a particular market, so long as you don't get up to dirty tricks. Microsoft got busted when they punished vendors for including the then superior Netscape browser with new computers. By doing this, Microsoft reduced Netscape from 90% market share and prosperity to broke dick in a very short time. Apple including Safari as an option the user can decline is no more a monopolistic practice than Red Hat's including Firefox in it's distribution.

The only thing that raised any eyebrows was that the dialog was a little confusing. Anyone with an IQ better than that of a sponge would understand they were gettin a new browser when they click "OK". As CNet noticed the problem is that,

at some point people became conditioned to downloading anything that shows up from an official source, like Microsoft, Apple, AOL, Yahoo, or whoever.

It's my opinion that people are reduced to this stage by Window's poor package management. There is no central repository in the non free software world, so every vendor is forced to roll their own package manager if they want to keep their customers up to date. So really, this is all about how Microsoft sucks.