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Mozilla Contemplates a Future Without Google
An anonymous reader points out a story at Business Week which begins:
"Mozilla Chair Mitchell Baker says the Chrome browser is making the foundation behind Firefox rethink its reliance on revenues from Google. Since Google introduced its own Web browser, Chrome, the prospect that Google may not re-up the three-year contract set to expire in 2011 has Mozilla considering other search partnerships and ways to generate revenue, Baker said. 'There are probably other search engines that would pay us more money,' Baker says. Yahoo! and Microsoft's MSN, Google's two main search rivals, come to mind, but Baker says smaller search engines wouldn't be discounted should such a situation arise. One player Baker won't identify 'offered a blank check to replace Google,' she says. Set to launch on certain Nokia phones in late spring, Fennec is the first Mozilla browser optimized for mobile platforms. If it gains traction with enough handset makers and mobile users, Fennec could represent another way to draw revenue from a partnering search engine."
Could this be a good way for Yahoo to gain some ground in the search engine market again? Or is it more likely that Mozilla will find a smaller party to latch on to?
Either way, I think Google was a significant player in making Mozilla much more successful, especially with Firefox. They did promote it initially after all.
MS Firefox is more likely.
MS has no inherent interest in propping up IE, which is a widely disliked, cruft-heavy bit of software that provides no revenue for them but batters their public image.
I think it quite likely that the big check that was offered to Mozilla came from Microsoft - and that they're thinking of taking it. In some ways, Firefox is a better fit for Microsoft than for Google: Microsoft doesn't rely on ad revenues, so the fact that it is much easier to block ads on Firefox than on Chrome isn't an issue for them.
If and when that happens, I look forward to watching a million heads explode.
The major Linux distributions, like Red Hat, would probably chip in. Part of the reason that Linux has any desktop market share at all is because Firefox runs on it, and many major sites support it. If people couldn't access their banking sites, YouTube, etc. with their Linux browser, they would replace their Linux desktop with Windows. Or, in the case of netbooks, buy the Windows version instead of the Linux one.
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In X-Windows the client serves YOU!
I can't believe Google will let the contract expire.
They won't. This is how CEOs of companies communicate with each other: through the media. These statements are for Google's benefit only. She is telling them: don't think about trying to use Chrome as leverage in our search agreements, because we have plenty of other options. Why the hell else would she make that "blank check" comment? It serves absolutely no other purpose than sending a message to Google.
Another example of this was Steve Jobs' "offhanded" remark that iPhones would never run Flash. He was sending Adobe a message: we don't need you, so don't even think of trying to charge us to put your "ubiquitous" runtime on our phones. We'll take it for free though, thank you very much.