Why Google Needs Firefox

Mozilla may not want Google by BitZtream · 2011-08-12 00:54 · Score: 1, Troll

But if the exec want to keep drawing ridiculous salaries while they run Netscape errr Mozilla into the ground again, than they'll keep on talking Googles money just like Netscape did before them with their other partners.

Who else is going to give them money? Won't be Microsoft ... and by extension that means it won't be Yahoo.

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by mcvos · 2011-08-12 01:04 · Score: 1

Why wouldn't it be MS? Have you read the article? It makes a pretty good case for why it would be Microsoft.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:09 · Score: 5, Informative

I agree with the basic premise in the article about the advantage of using MS, but only for a short term gain. the folks in Redmond would make a good short term partner but lack the basic scruples to avoid turning around and biting Firefox hard once it is to their advantage. The folks at Firefox will go down that road at their own peril. Too many people have cut deals with MS only to eventually regret it. History matters.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:31 · Score: 2, Insightful

Why wouldn't it be MS? Have you read the article? It makes a pretty good case for why it would be Microsoft.
I read the article but I didn't see it make any case at all. There seemed to be a vague implication that Microsoft might think that even though users of Internet Explorer (still the browser with the largest market share) overwhelmingly use Google rather than its default of Bing, that users of Firefox would blindly use whatever the default is and that therefore Microsoft would shovel money at Firefox to get that default status. But there was no explanation at all of why Firefox users wouldn't just keep using Google, just as internet Explorer users do.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by zget · 2011-08-12 01:39 · Score: 1

What short term gain? Microsoft is interested to gain more visitor (and hence user data that they can use to improve Bing's search algorithms) and Firefox is interested to get revenue from its users. The deal doesn't need to be anything else than Microsoft paying certain percent (lets say 70%) from the ad clicks that Firefox users generate. In fact, there's already similar programs for the Bing toolbar (and Google toolbar too), but they usually pay $1 one time payment per user. With the traffic Firefox can send them, I'm sure they can also negotiate revenue share too. They don't need to do anything else. Besides, Microsoft has changed a lot recently, and to the good direction. Google on the other hand is going the opposite way.

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by BitZtream · 2011-08-12 01:46 · Score: 0

...
Do you know who Microsoft is and what Firefox is?
MS is not going to become bedfellows with the browser organization they spent a fuckton of effort (in development and legal battles) destroying them and Navigator the first time around. They aren't going to do anything at all to keep them around this time.
This one is personal for Ballmer, don't be so naive.

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Vintermann · 2011-08-12 02:02 · Score: 2

The reason they undermined Netscape was that they wanted to control web standards. They won the battle, but lost the war - they are no longer in a position to dictate proprietary extensions to the web through control of the browser. A page that only works in IE is no longer an option for developers.
(A page that only works on Windows, however, is still an option in a few contexts, and MS struggle to keep it that way).
I wouldn't bet on Ballmer's stupidity overriding his business sense.

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by mcvos · 2011-08-12 02:02 · Score: 1

Balmer hates Google a lot more than he hates Mozilla. $85 million to hurt Google? I think he'd go for it.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:19 · Score: 1

the folks in Redmond would make a good short term partner but lack the basic scruples to avoid turning around and biting Firefox hard once it is to their advantage. The folks at Firefox will go down that road at their own peril. Too many people have cut deals with MS only to eventually regret it.
The sad thing is that everything you've said applies equally to Google. Wittiest comment I've seen on the subject.

Google has released its own Web browser, Chrome, with Linux version Chromium [today.com]. "We absolutely promise that we only want to completely screw over Microsoft with this, and certainly not Mozilla Firefox," said Google's Sundar Pichai. "That we put a pile of our sponsored Mozilla developers on the project is completely irrelevant. We're not evil, remember."
"We are so, so happy with Google Chrome," mumbled Mozilla CEO John Lilly through gritted teeth. "That most of our income is from Google has no bearing on me making this statement."
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:43 · Score: 0

Sure, a partnership with Google is MUCH safer...
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by squiggleslash · 2011-08-12 02:44 · Score: 1

From what I'm seeing, the relationship with Microsoft right now is one of friendly rivalry. Mozilla and Microsoft generally work together on the W3C, and Microsoft themselves are making a concerted effort to ensure their stuff works well in Firefox - something they're emphatically not doing with Chrome (for example, Outlook Web Access works just like the desktop app in Firefox and IE, but has to be run in a stripped down mode looking more like standard web mail in any other browsers.)
I think it's extremely important to notice the changes going on at Microsoft at the moment. They're accepting, finally, that the threat to Windows has little to do with whether people use IE or not, and repositioning themselves to enter the markets that most likely will replace it. Hence Office on the web. Hence a complete review - a virtual rewrite - of their mobile platform. They're not even pushing .NET over emerging web standards in the same way as they had been.
In that context, fighting Mozilla, rather than partnering with them, over something as minor as "writing an alternative to something we bundle for free with our OS", when Mozilla could be providing opportunities (like directing serious amounts of traffic to Bing) is utterly absurd. There's no cause to do it.
It's a positive development. Personally, I'd be more than happy to see Microsoft sponsor Mozilla. And while I'm sure it'd be a shock to many on Slashdot, I suspect the only thing blocking it is Google's wallet.

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Certhas · 2011-08-12 02:49 · Score: 1

Is your argument really: "Don't be naive, even if it would make huge business sense this is a personal decision by the CEO who would act out of petty feelings rather than rationally to earn the company more bucks."??? That's just inane.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by artor3 · 2011-08-12 02:58 · Score: 2

Given that this whole discussion is predicated on the assumption that Google is about to turn on Mozilla, MS can't be any worse.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Svartalf · 2011-08-12 04:43 · Score: 1

Actually, Google is about to turn on Mozilla. Microsoft WILL turn on them...it's not an "if" like it currently still is with Google..it's a solid "when".

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Runaway1956 · 2011-08-12 04:54 · Score: 1

Microsoft has changed? Maybe I'm just going blind, but I don't see it. Had you claimed that they had toned things down, and acted less like a blood crazed shark in chum waters than they used to, I might agree. But real change? No - they are still predators. Get into their sights, and they're still coming after you, albeit, without the berserk feeding frenzy.

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Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Runaway1956 · 2011-08-12 05:05 · Score: 1

I dunno. I think that I'd use Mozilla a lot less if Mozilla and Microsoft were having conjugal relations. Just how much market share MIGHT Mozilla lose in the deal?

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"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by thetoadwarrior · 2011-08-12 06:27 · Score: 1

Then there would be a good case for me never touching Firefox again.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by dadioflex · 2011-08-12 07:15 · Score: 1

What exactly do Mozilla do with 100 million dollars of tax-free revenue? I'm not trying to be a dick, I'm just curious about the numbers How many people do they employ? Are they building a war chest? That'd be 500 full time employees at 100k per year with 50 million left over in case of emergencies. Again, I'm not knocking them - I'm a very happy Firefox/Thunderbird/Lightning user.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by asa · 2011-08-12 08:00 · Score: 4, Informative

It's a positive development. Personally, I'd be more than happy to see Microsoft sponsor Mozilla. And while I'm sure it'd be a shock to many on Slashdot, I suspect the only thing blocking it is Google's wallet.
That's a mis-understanding of how Mozilla works. We don't sell our search to the highest bidder. We want to provide the best possible experience for our users while making the Web a safer, more competitive, and healthier place to live and do work.
In Russia, for example, Google is an also-ran and so Firefox ships Yandex as the default search service. This is not because Yandex outbid Google -- there was never a bidding opportunity, but because Mozilla believes that Yandex is the best choice today for Firefox users in Russia.
Bing is an increasingly good search service in the US and as a result of their improvements, we added Bing to Firefox 4's built-in list of search services. We didn't do that because Microsoft outbid other people on that list. We did it because Bing is a useful search service for many US users. It turns out that Bing is not doing as well in the rest of the world, so where it's not useful to our users, we don't included Bing.
- A
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Ironhandx · 2011-08-12 08:35 · Score: 1

Hello there.
My sensors have indicated that you are new to reality.
Allow me to assist you in getting up to speed.
People are people. People do stupid things for stupid reasons.
Some of the largest companies in history have been bankrupted due to corrupt and/or self-centered and/or moronic CEO's/Managers/Boards.
In any other industry or with any other company Ballmer would have bankrupted it a long, long time ago. Microsoft simply have too much inertia and market share behind them. Which is entirely a function of people not wanting to learn new things if they can avoid it.
See: Windows XP continued market dominance, even while declining.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by Your.Master · 2011-08-12 09:05 · Score: 1

"is about to" is not an "if" word, it's a "when" word, with "when" = "very soon".
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by jesser · 2011-08-12 09:17 · Score: 1

What exactly do Mozilla do with 100 million dollars of tax-free revenue?
The first thing we do with it is to pay taxes. It was not trivial for us to figure out how to do that.

Are they building a war chest?
You can get a sense of how much we're saving by reading financial reports from previous years. To some extent, we're saving not because we want to save, but because we can only hire people so fast while maintaining quality and culture.

That'd be 500 full time employees at 100k per year with 50 million left over in case of emergencies.
500 full time Mozilla employees and contractors isn't far off.
I've heard a rule of thumb that once you throw in benefits, offices, and travel, the cost of employing someone is about twice their salary. I don't know whether that holds for Mozilla, which has generous employee benefits but many remote employees.

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The shareholder is always right.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by jonadab · 2011-08-12 12:07 · Score: 1

Microsoft? Are you out of your everliving mind? We *just* got the web (mostly) wrested free from their proprietary grip. It was a rather near thing.

I admit, having almost every browser *except* IE default to the same search engine does seem less than ideal, and a couple more major players in the search space would be good for competition.

But I'd rather dump the default search traffic straight to the name resolver (and overburden the whole world's DNS infrastructure, not to mention giving the user rather inferior results) than send it to Microsoft.

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Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by jonadab · 2011-08-12 14:02 · Score: 1

On the contrary, Google only controls a few web services, none of which have more than about 60% market share worldwide (though the search engine has a higher market share than that in the English-speaking world, which is a very important market). Microsoft, on the other hand, controls the operating systems on more than 85% of the world's computers.

A browser can visit another site if one site stops working with it. Even if Firefox stops working on Google, users could still use Firefox on their computers, for browsing other sites, and just break out Chrome for using Google services. Let the same company control the search engine that controls the operating system, though, and the browser would be caught in the middle, unable to do Jack Diddley Squat without Microsoft's permission.

Also, Microsoft has consistently shown itself to be willing (indeed, eager) to promote exactly the sort of proprietary black-box file formats and protocols that are fundamentally incompatible not just with open-source software but with *alternative* software in general -- incompatible with competition of any kind. Google, whatever their sins against privacy, have never been so much as *accused* of that kind of lock-in scheme. Microsoft has been convicted of it in court and is widely believed to be guilty of MUCH more than was proven.

Google is powerful and perhaps not entirely trustworthy, but Microsoft is more powerful and WAY more unscrupulous and hostile.

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Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Re:Mozilla may not want Google by charlievarrick · 2011-08-12 17:46 · Score: 1

Ummm... maybe someone could mod parent up?

Hey why NOT kill that goose? by gatkinso · 2011-08-12 00:54 · Score: 0

After all I want sauce, and those golden eggs are a pain in the ass.

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$85 million in royalties by snl2587 · 2011-08-12 00:58 · Score: 1

...is a whole lot of hits. Even if Google wanted Chrome to dominate, I still don't think they'd want to let all of Firefox users who use whatever's in the search bar out of convenience leave for another engine.

Of course, the article makes this pretty clear, but why ruin the Slashdot tradition and publish a descriptive, non-flamebait summary?

Re:$85 million in royalties by Idbar · 2011-08-12 01:17 · Score: 3, Insightful

Hey, if by this time you haven't realized that articles starring with the word "why" on the title are very poor and read them with care or just ignore them, you need to keep "learning slashdot".
Re:$85 million in royalties by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:22 · Score: 0

AdSense brings in a gross total of about $10 billion a year. $85 million is a drop in the bucket in comparison.
Re:$85 million in royalties by LordLimecat · 2011-08-12 01:43 · Score: 1

$85 million is what they pay Mozilla, not what Google makes off of those hits. Obviously in order for them to ink the deal, the revenue would have to be >$85mil.
Re:$85 million in royalties by flanders123 · 2011-08-12 03:26 · Score: 1

Add to that list "Articles posted by the author of said article"....This one qualifies.
Re:$85 million in royalties by flimflammer · 2011-08-12 03:37 · Score: 1

I doubt Google makes more than $250-$300 million on the traffic they generate from AdSense through Firefox. That's about 3% of the total generated revenue from AdSense.
I'm not saying it's something Google would want to throw away, however that's still not to say that Google needs Firefox. I think Google could easily make do with 3% less.
Re:$85 million in royalties by ZombieBraintrust · 2011-08-12 05:42 · Score: 1

Yeah but your comparing the wrong things. You don't compare the money generated from AdSense through Firefox to all of AdSense. You compare it to the money generated through AdSense on Chrome. How much is Chrome worth to Google? Chrome traffic is higher margin. So Google's best move is too negociate a better deal from Mozilla. Chrome is good leverage for that.
Re:$85 million in royalties by flimflammer · 2011-08-12 05:47 · Score: 1

Well that's perfectly fine but in the end Chrome isn't meant to displace Firefox or anything of the sort. Chrome was meant to spur innovation where Google felt innovation was lacking. I don't think Google wants to gouge Mozilla or anything silly like that.
Re:$85 million in royalties by dirtyhippie · 2011-08-12 11:26 · Score: 1

+1. To say Google "needs" Firefox is just ludicrous.
Google benefits from Firefox. Google wants Firefox traffic. But since Firefox has always AFAIK set the default engine to google, google has no need to pay any effort wooing the firefox devs/users.

No money no development by whiteboy86 · 2011-08-12 01:03 · Score: 1

I wonder whether there will be any vigorous progress without those cash infusions from uncle Google. Also taking the Chrome push into account I would not be surprised that the search box contract is not renewed, lets face it, why would Google want to pay and support a direct competitor?

Re:No money no development by Skuto · 2011-08-12 01:11 · Score: 1

The article explains why.
Re:No money no development by BBird · 2011-08-12 01:21 · Score: 4, Insightful

Mozilla is not a competitor. Google does not sell browsers, it sells ads, and mozilla is one more channel.
Re:No money no development by nickysn · 2011-08-12 01:26 · Score: 1

I wonder whether there will be any vigorous progress without those cash infusions from uncle Google. Also taking the Chrome push into account I would not be surprised that the search box contract is not renewed, lets face it, why would Google want to pay and support a direct competitor?
Basically, because Firefox hurts IE's market share and promotes Google search, instead of Bing. Also, Firefox has much better support for web standards. Microsoft is a much worse competitor to Google than Mozilla. Therefore everything that hurts Microsoft's IE and Bing is good for Google. That's also why Google supports Opera.
Re:No money no development by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:29 · Score: 0

Because it is not a competitor, RTFA! Google is in the advertising business, Mozilla is not. Mozilla is simply selling their default search engine for best bid.
Re:No money no development by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 04:15 · Score: 0

Google undoubtedly gathers information from Chrome that it can use to improve its ads and search. Does it get that with Mozilla?
Re:No money no development by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 04:51 · Score: 0

I don't think you understand the point. The intent of the article was not to say Mozilla was a competitor, but to state Google has more to lose by losing Firefox than Mozilla has to lose by switching from Google as its default search engine.
Re:No money no development by Svartalf · 2011-08-12 04:51 · Score: 1

Mozilla is a competitor. Google does effectively sell browsers, it sells ads, but Mozilla is merely a channel.
FTFY. Chrome nukes that supposition that you just made. Combine that with Chromebook and there's nothing at all accurate in your claims.

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I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Re:No money no development by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 06:18 · Score: 0

Chrome? Its a browser. Its Google. Yes they sell browsers
Re:No money no development by Your.Master · 2011-08-12 09:15 · Score: 1

How does that nuke his supposition? Google doesn't sell Chrome, it distributes Chrome without charge -- sometimes it even pays organisations to distribute Chrome. I don't know whether it profits from Chromebook sales, so I'll let that point slide for now.
But Google isn't obviously getting anything out of a person using Chrome rather than Firefox. Dig a bit deeper and maybe they can pick up user habits and data for advertising from Chrome, but that's exactly an argument to do what they can to remain Firefox's default search engine.
Google sells ads. As in, they get their money from advertisements, and therefore they care about competition for advertisements. The vast majority of their other activities are in service to their advertising empire. So if it's between their piece of the ad market and their piece of the browser market, their ad marketshare will win, unless there's something else I'm missing or some other card they have yet to play.
Re:No money no development by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-13 06:07 · Score: 0

It does. You can buy one here. Of course you don't pay in cash.
http://www.google.com/chrome

It's symbiotic by Lieutenant_Dan · 2011-08-12 01:05 · Score: 1

Of course Google wants Chrome to gain more market share. There is also an argument to have Google fund Mozilla to continue their work. Not to have a combined force to erode IE (or Safari), but to simply have an independent entity that develops standards and pushes the envelope. Having their financial tie will probably increase collaboration which a) helps Google in improving Chrome, b) gets good PR, c) as the article mentions brings in millions of users straight to their search engine and d) Google has not yet been invested by MBAs, so they may follow "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" approach rather than their formal "don't be evil".

Doesn't MS own a chunk of Apple?

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Wearing pants should always be optional.

Re:It's symbiotic by amnesia_tc · 2011-08-12 01:41 · Score: 5, Insightful

but to simply have an independent entity that develops standards and pushes the envelope.
You mean Opera?
Re:It's symbiotic by gumbi+west · 2011-08-12 03:06 · Score: 1

Eroding Safari is like eroding a grain of sand.
And MS bought a big chunk of Apple back in the day as a method of cash infusion to keep them from going under and MS from getting chased for being a monopoly. Since then Apple has done... uh ... a little better, and MS has divested.
Re:It's symbiotic by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 03:59 · Score: 0

Opera not only pushes the envelope of innovation with their rich and creative features, but they also push the envelope of crippled CSS rendering :(
Re:It's symbiotic by fatrat · 2011-08-12 08:18 · Score: 1

It's not enough to exist - Opera doesn't have enough market share to really force change in the way FF does.

Correct subject: Why Firefox Needs Google by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:05 · Score: 0

... or am I missing something?

Switching from Google by deckitbruiseit · 2011-08-12 01:06 · Score: 1

If Mozilla moves away from using Google as its primary search engine, I see a lot of pissed off users who don't want to deal with another search engine switching to a different browser.

Re:Switching from Google by Lifyre · 2011-08-12 01:13 · Score: 1

Some would but I think a larger number wouldn't notice or care. The only reason Google gets most of my search traffic is inertia and I'm so deeply integrated into the whole "Google Experience" at this point that it's just more convenient. I haven't used Bing but I would be willing to at least give it a shot.

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I'll meet you at the intersection of "Should be" and "Reality"
Re:Switching from Google by maxwell+demon · 2011-08-12 01:18 · Score: 1

Switching the default search engine is much easier than switching the browser.

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The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Re:Switching from Google by Lieutenant_Dan · 2011-08-12 01:19 · Score: 2

Seriously? I doubt that somehow many would feel that strongly to switch browsers rather than to change a setting. I know I wouldn't. I like Firefox as my browser, I like Google as my search engine, heck I like Windows Vista 64-bit (ewww) as my OS.
Your average, no-knowledge-of-IT user is on IE or Safari. Those are the ones that will let their computer dictate the way they use it. BTW, not saying that savyy users aren't using IE/Safari by choice.
If most Firefox users saw "bing" as the default search; there would be a ton bing searches "Change Firefox default search" and the vast majority would be back on Google within a short little while. People are creatures of habit; a search engine may be enough of game changer that people may not just follow blindly like sheep/lemmings.

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Wearing pants should always be optional.
Re:Switching from Google by Wattos · 2011-08-12 01:21 · Score: 3, Interesting

Cant speak for other users, but I get immensely annoyed when I see search results from other engines (e.g. at work). I immediately ignore the results and type in google.com into the browser.

It just doesn't feel right anymore.
Re:Switching from Google by deckitbruiseit · 2011-08-12 01:24 · Score: 1

True. I guess if we were talking about IE users they might not know how to change those settings, but that type probably wouldn't care anyway.
Re:Switching from Google by Lifyre · 2011-08-12 01:25 · Score: 1

I have in the past as well but it has only been due to the fact that the results displayed were useless and that to find results that mattered I had to go three or four pages in. With Google it would be front page and usually top 5. If Bing has it's results similarly well arranged then I would be willing to try it.

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I'll meet you at the intersection of "Should be" and "Reality"
Re:Switching from Google by Dog-Cow · 2011-08-12 01:37 · Score: 1

In IE 8, changing the search provider is exactly as easy as it is under FF. Click the dropdown and choose a different provider. IE has fewer defaults installed, but one of the options is to "Find More Providers..." which takes you to a list that contains all the popular search engines and then some.
Re:Switching from Google by rafe.kettler · 2011-08-12 02:10 · Score: 0

All you have to do is change the Bing, or Yahoo, or whatever logo on the search bar to Google. If you'd rather switch browsers than do that, then you're an idiot.
Re:Switching from Google by Dhalka226 · 2011-08-12 02:10 · Score: 1

Then why don't you go try it?
I'm sorry, but the idea that a Slashdotter is willing to try a new search engine but can't be bothered to make the two total clicks it takes to change it in Firefox doesn't compute -- nor does the fact that that same user would use it if only Mozilla would change it for them. Maybe I'm giving people more credit than they deserve.
The majority of users--and the vast majority of Firefox users--are going to use the search engine they prefer. You'll catch a few stragglers who literally have no preference yet or who don't notice the change, but that's about it. People with a preference will use their preference. Change-adverse people will use the one they're familiar with. It's not a big deal for Google who, by the way, are still likely to give Mozilla some money and render this entire conversation moot.
Re:Switching from Google by digitalchinky · 2011-08-12 02:26 · Score: 1

I'm not so sure that any search engine provides quite what you actually want these days - it used to be that you could +/-"quote your search" and only get pages that had (or didn't have) that specific quote in the body. Google and Bing seem to ignore this on a random basis and give you only what is popular rather than what you actually searched for. I guess the advanced search overcomes these issues a little bit, though you still have issues like "convert x to y" and all you get are pages on how to convert y to x.
For the most part search engines are infinitely better than they were 10 years ago though :-)
I suspect my point is that I'm probably just a sheepish user now, searching can be quite troublesome so I don't really care what logo sits in the banner.
Re:Switching from Google by Denogh · 2011-08-12 02:26 · Score: 1

Mozilla offers the option to set your own default search provider anyway. They're not getting paid by Yahoo!, Amazon, Wikipedia, Answers, Creative Commons or eBay, yet they are offered as options in my (default) install of Firefox. I can't see them removing the option, and even if they did I'm sure one could add it back fairly easily though the "Get More Search Engines" option.

This won't harm the users, just Google (maybe) and the Mozilla Foundation (definitely).
Re:Switching from Google by Hatta · 2011-08-12 02:37 · Score: 1

The more likely situation is if Google stopped funding Mozilla, that Firefox would fall behind pretty drastically. Then most folks would be stuck with a choice between IE and Chrome. Some proportion of that group would choose IE, and probably stick with the default Bing search. This costs Google money.

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Re:Switching from Google by geminidomino · 2011-08-12 02:59 · Score: 1

In a surprising example of user-friendliness, IE 8 actually goes one step beyond Firefox in that regard, by helping you create a search entry for one that it doesn't have in its list.
Since I have to use IE often for testing, I was surprised to see that when I changed to qrobe for my search.
Re:Switching from Google by artor3 · 2011-08-12 03:04 · Score: 1

For those "convert X to Y"queries, use Wolfram Alpha. It's way better than Google Calculator.
Re:Switching from Google by HJED · 2011-08-12 22:30 · Score: 1

That works both ways, it is extremely annoying when I change my default search engine to Yahoo and then Firefox still sends me to google if I type keywords in the address bar.

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Nonsense by ibwolf · 2011-08-12 01:09 · Score: 2

For $85 million — or whatever Mozilla decides to charge, because it could charge almost anything — Bing could bolster its global share to 10, 15, or maybe 20%.

What absolute nonsense. Bing is already the default search engine on IE and only a fraction of IE users are using Bing. To assume that all Firefox users would meekly follow Mozilla's direction to use Bing is absurd.

Re:Nonsense by Skuto · 2011-08-12 01:13 · Score: 1

To assume that all Firefox users would meekly follow Mozilla's direction to use Bing is absurd.
Yes, it's absurd, which is exactly why the line you quote does *not* make that assumption.
Re:Nonsense by twocows · 2011-08-12 01:19 · Score: 1

Care to cite some statistics? Most of my tech illiterate co-workers using default IE end up using Bing. I think it's fair to say that, while not all of Firefox's users would switch to Bing, there would be a fair portion who would either give Bing a chance or not bother switching (especially the ones who can't tell the difference).
Re:Nonsense by jellomizer · 2011-08-12 01:27 · Score: 1

Well for most IE users they don't even use that search bar. They will click on a shortcut to google then type in the search box something like www.yahoo.com. For firefox users I think their head will explode if the search box went to Bing.
Is there really that much hatred of the both just because both have browsers. In normal business it is very common for companies to Partner with each other and Compete with each other at the same time. And their Partnership is very strong with a lot of good MBA Buzzwords like Synergy. And their competition is very aggressive against each other.
How do they do this? Simple neither side is Stupid. Mozilla need to partner with the Search Engine area of Google were the success of both is beneficial. And Mozilla is competing with Chrome the Software development unit of Google. Where one product can take market share of the other.
If Google made the Search Engine Google only work for chrome they will hurt both sides as a lot of people will not switch their browsers to use the search engine and without the search engine money they cannot put more development effort into chrome.
Life isn't black and white... It is a very complex thing.

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If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Re:Nonsense by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:30 · Score: 0

How can over 50% of people use IE, and Google still be the number one search engine by a wide margin? The only way that's possible is if a fair number of IE users specifically choose Google.
Re:Nonsense by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:45 · Score: 0

search for google in either the address or bing bar, search on google
Re:Nonsense by LWATCDR · 2011-08-12 02:46 · Score: 1

Not as much nonsense as you think. Bing from what I hear doesn't suck it is also pretty. If you are really into the Google ecosystem then you might not care. If you type a search and you get what you are looking for and it is pretty then a lot of people might not change back. If nothing else it will get people to try Bing.
I know that people on Slashdot really don't like Microsoft and that includes me. From what I see Bing is actually a pretty good search engine. Since I use everything Google including my phone odds are that I wouldn't switch but it isn't bad.

--
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Re:Nonsense by artor3 · 2011-08-12 03:06 · Score: 1

How many IE users have bothered updating to a version recent enough to have a search bar?

Re:Who cares, honestly by S.O.B. · 2011-08-12 01:12 · Score: 1

Firefox is a browser, Webkit is a layout engine.

What's your point?

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Some of what I say is fact, some is conjecture, the rest I'm just blowing out my ass...you guess.

THIS is the reason for the version acceleration! by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:14 · Score: 1

Now we know they'll run out of money at the end of 2011, it's obvious they're trying to get as many versions as possible out before dying.

Google search worthless now by ArchieBunker · 2011-08-12 01:15 · Score: 0

Good luck trying to find anything on google these days. Try searching for a USB driver for a Pantech Breeze cell phone. Find me one link that ISN'T part of a link farm or SPAM, Hell I don't even remember finding Pantech's or ATT's site.

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Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard

Re:Google search worthless now by Eponymous+Coward · 2011-08-12 01:27 · Score: 1

Are you serious? I typed "Pantech Breeze" into Google and got http://www.pantechusa.com/phones/breeze_ii as the second search result, behind AT&T's page for the phone.
Googling for "Pantech Breeze USB" returned this page which has a bunch of information about USB and the phone. Apparently you need to use Microsoft's ActiveSync package to connect the phone, or bluetooth.
You might want to check your computer for viruses and trojans. It sounds like something is intercepting your search results.
Re:Google search worthless now by characterZer0 · 2011-08-12 01:28 · Score: 1

Second hit for "pantech breeze": http://www.pantechusa.com/phones/breeze_ii
Click on "PC Suite".

--
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
Re:Google search worthless now by Tr3vin · 2011-08-12 01:29 · Score: 1

Isn't that more a problem with ATT and Pantech's websites? I couldn't find anything on their pages, so how would Google? Google just indexes the internet. When I search for usb drivers for the HTC Incredible, the first site is HTC's own, with a nice page to download drivers. To me, it sounds like it is more of an issue with the carrier and device manufacturer than with Google.
Re:Google search worthless now by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:11 · Score: 0

Mozilla should invent their own search engine.
With SEO and link farms it is destroying the value of Google's search capabilities. Try searching for anti virus software or articles on it. Almost all are links to malware and link farms.
I think there would be quite an attraction of exGoogle users too if a newer engine that did not have SEO optimized for Google came out and it would give Google quite a black eye.
Re:Google search worthless now by fatrat · 2011-08-12 08:21 · Score: 1

Google gives different results for different users, so if the OP is logged in they might well get a different set of results to you. Getting to a state where all the results are link spam is impressive though :)

Re:Who cares, honestly by maxwell+demon · 2011-08-12 01:16 · Score: 1

Maybe he thinks Mozilla should rewrite Firefox to use Webkit.

--
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.

Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by circletimessquare · 2011-08-12 01:17 · Score: 0

Google abandoned Firefox.

So strategically, businesswise, I would abandon Google and go with Bing.

Yes, I know this goes against traditional Slashdot prejudices about Microsoft and Google: Google is darling upstart, Microsoft is evil Borg.

As if the world we live in is 2001?

Folks: Google is the new evil empire. Microsoft is a weak old underdog.

Please adjust your silly outdated prejudices accordingly.

--
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it

Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by maxume · 2011-08-12 01:23 · Score: 1

Mozilla should choose the default based on the projected revenues for the various search companies, not based on Google's 'abandoning' Firefox.
Especially if you want to describe it as a strategic business decision.

--
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:25 · Score: 0

Brought to you by Paid Microsoft Plant #44452.
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by ilguido · 2011-08-12 01:34 · Score: 1, Insightful

Folks: Google is the new evil empire. Microsoft is a weak old underdog with rabies.
Fixed.
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by geekmux · 2011-08-12 01:50 · Score: 1

...As if the world we live in is 2001?
Folks: Google is the new evil empire. Microsoft is a weak old underdog...
Weak?
That "weak old underdog" is still the same company that runs corporate America(quite literally), so call it weak and old all you want, but much like members of Congress, they're still around, and still in power. And that "underdog" is still the #1 choice of botnets everywhere.
Who is worse is all dependent on your definition of "evil".
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:10 · Score: 0

Also, I'm not aware of Google trying to derail standards like Microsoft tried with OOXML. I also can't recall any instance of Google being found guilty of abusing a monopoly. What exactly makes Google evil and what has Microsoft done to be less evil?
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by Skuto · 2011-08-12 02:23 · Score: 1

I also can't recall any instance of Google being found guilty of abusing a monopoly.
Google has a bunch of lawsuits running against them for antitrust violations in the EU. I think it's silly to think that Google doesn't have a monopoly on search. Whether they're abusing that is another matter. If you surf with IE on Google, I think it continuously slams Chrome ads down your throat. Too much of that behavior can get them in trouble.
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by NickFortune · 2011-08-12 02:48 · Score: 1

Google abandoned Firefox.

If by "abandoned" you mean "continued to fund", then yes, I suppose they did.

So strategically, businesswise, I would abandon Google and go with Bing.

Yep, because Microsoft has no history at all of shafting its business partners and has no vested interest whatsover in seeing firefox fall by the wayside. And to think I was worried for a second there...

Folks: Google is the new evil empire. Microsoft is a weak old underdog.

After all, saying it is enough to make it true. Which is probably just as well, since it takes more than "makes a lot of money" to qualify as an "evil empire". Similarly, just because MS have been unable to dent Google's dominance in online search, that's not enough to make them the underdog in the wider scheme of things.

Please adjust your silly outdated prejudices accordingly.

First of all you'll have to supply me with something less silly to take their place. You are so going in the wrong direction at the moment.

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Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by geekmux · 2011-08-12 02:49 · Score: 1

Google has a bunch of lawsuits running against them for antitrust violations in the EU. I think it's silly to think that Google doesn't have a monopoly on search. Whether they're abusing that is another matter.
Using and abusing sit on opposite sides of a rather large chasm of legality. Google can't help it if people prefer to use Google, so that certainly doesn't make them a monopoly by any means. Abusing/Manipulating search results could be construed differently, but if the abuse were really that bad, usage would have likely declined significantly. It really hasn't.

If you surf with IE on Google, I think it continuously slams Chrome ads down your throat. Too much of that behavior can get them in trouble.
I'd sure as hell prefer to deal with simple ads then "bundled" installs, such as what has managed to junk up the average users computer when trying to keep their Java client up to date. I hate that crap, and it was one of the worst decisions ever made between Java/Sun and other vendors.
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by Skuto · 2011-08-12 03:20 · Score: 1

I'm not sure if you realize this, but if you install Adobe Flash nowadays it will also install Chrome and set it as the default.
Re:Chrome is eating Firefox's marketshare by Zontar+The+Mindless · 2011-08-12 11:19 · Score: 1

So you hacked circle's account, Florian? Naughty, naughty...

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Il n'y a pas de Planet B.

Let's be sensible by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:21 · Score: 0

Mozilla gives google lots of hits, I won't even try to say how many. But based on Firefox's current web share it's about double that of chrome. If Firefox goes tits up (which they will without that money, and Microsoft isn't going to give them a dime) Chrome doubles (at least) in market share. That has two *major* advantages for Google

1) They get to collect *way* more of your personal data when you're using their very own web browser, and don't have to pay anyone for it.

2) They immediately become the major driving force in web standards, so they can start playing all kinds of nasty games.

Is there absolutely any reason for Google to want to keep firefox around?

Re:Let's be sensible by Skuto · 2011-08-12 01:29 · Score: 1

Microsoft isn't going to give them a dime
Bing is in the list of default search engines in Firefox, and somehow, I don't think Mozilla puts them there for free.
Re:Let's be sensible by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:44 · Score: 0

My mistake; I'm inclined to agree. I haven't used Firefox since it became a steaming pile of crap a few years ago so I was unaware of that. I was going based on the sustainability documents that they post (they mention Google, eBay, Amazon, but no Bing).
Re:Let's be sensible by BitZtream · 2011-08-12 02:09 · Score: 1

2) They immediately become the major driving force in web standards, so they can start playing all kinds of nasty games.
I guess you haven't noticed ... they already ARE a major driving force in web standards.

--
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IE v. Biollante by wrencherd · 2011-08-12 01:24 · Score: 1

From TFA:

Back in 2003 when Mozilla and Firefox first emerged, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer owned 95% of the browser market. Mozilla single-handedly destroyed IE over the next five years

That's a bit of an overstatement I think. Keeping in mind the "guesstimate" nature of browser market share, the usage trends for both IE and FF (mutant Mozilla) are probably not so much the results of direct competition as they are simply the predictable result of the market "maturing" as the executive types say.

IE probably went downwards b/c there is actually a lot more competition now in terms of OS and platform; it's not all desktops on desks running XP.

82%, not 86% by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 01:25 · Score: 0

85 million of 104 million is 82%, not 86%.

Re:82%, not 86% by DaScribbler · 2011-08-12 02:44 · Score: 1

The 86% is in reference to the portion of the royalties from the search box, not the whole $104M. Crunch the numbers and 86% is still off by 1%, but that's easily attributed to rounding off the actual numbers. ie... 103.5 x .965 x .855

Re:Why wouldn't it be MS? by TaoPhoenix · 2011-08-12 01:30 · Score: 1

There's something very slippery about the article, almost like it's AstroTurf 2.0. Stay with me mods, it's at least an intelligent article.

Mozilla is at least a decent entrant into the OSS world. There's always nitpicks, but they're pretty solid. Mozilla makes a browser first.

Google is doing Search first and only lately is doing a browser. Does Google want Chrome to be the dominant browser, the same trick MS pulled last time? Maybe. I've seen my share of "FF is old and tired, go Chrome". Hard to tell if any Astroturfers are mixed in with the users there.

MS makes IE first and Bing second. If Firefox were to make themselves reliant on MS for money, MS would pull some stunt like Nokia and squash it.

So are there really no other networks other than Google and Bing? For $85 million to remake the web?

There's pages of details going on here, but my sum point is something is seriously silent here.

--
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine

Chrome isn't about winning by doconnor · 2011-08-12 01:33 · Score: 1

The purpose of Chrome isn't to make money or even to be the most popular browser. The purpose of Chrome is to advance technologies to promote standards to encourage the creation and usage of web applications as part of Google's war against Windows applications and now iOS applications.

Mozilla is also a big promoter of web standards and is a big part of Google's war.

While Microsoft could use Firefox to help Bing, Google needs Firefox even more to help the entire company.

Re:Chrome isn't about winning by jopsen · 2011-08-12 01:59 · Score: 1

I think you're right... Without Chrome javascript would still be slow and browsers wouldn't be so clean as they are today... Chrome paved the way for better web applications, and without it the web application platform wouldn't be as attractive.
Re:Chrome isn't about winning by FreakyGreenLeaky · 2011-08-12 02:37 · Score: 2

The purpose of Chrome isn't to make money or even to be the most popular browser
The purpose of a business is to turn a profit. Without profit, a business starts dying. Everything, including odd-ball projects and products, is geared towards supporting the business model of turning a profit.
To think otherwise is embarrassingly naive.
Re:Chrome isn't about winning by doconnor · 2011-08-12 02:44 · Score: 1

The purpose of Chrome is to help other parts of Google's business turn a profit.
Re:Chrome isn't about winning by Skuto · 2011-08-12 02:48 · Score: 2

Without Chrome javascript would still be slow
Jeez, Google's advertising campaigns sure do work. JavaScript performance wars were pretty hot years before Chrome appeared.
Re:Chrome isn't about winning by foniksonik · 2011-08-12 11:06 · Score: 1

Yes and web apps serve ads and keep people on the web where they see ads. That is how Chrome eg the promotion of web standards, etc makes Google money.

--
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.

Google does NOT need Firefox by cjjjer · 2011-08-12 01:33 · Score: 1

Without Firefox think of all extra advertising dollars they would make without NoScript/Adblock or other ad blocking plugins that Firefox offers. The bottom line is that Google is using Firefox as a way to keep the "do no evil" drones in line.

Mod me down but it's the exact thing Microsoft and Apple do only to a different target audience.

Re:Google does NOT need Firefox by RebelWebmaster · 2011-08-12 03:06 · Score: 1

Except that there's an Adblock Plus extension for Chrome too...
Re:Google does NOT need Firefox by cornface · 2011-08-12 03:50 · Score: 2

But no decent equivalent to NoScript, which is arguably more important for privacy concerns. It is mind-boggling the number of useless third party javascript that exists on most pages.
Even if you just take Google into account, they have their finger in a huge percentage of sites either through hosted javascript libraries (jquery especially), ads, analytics, maps, etc.
It is sort of ridiculous.
Re:Google does NOT need Firefox by rbayer · 2011-08-12 04:29 · Score: 3, Interesting

But it's nowhere near as effective as the Firefox version. Last I checked, the Chrome version couldn't block those annoying ads that play at the start of some video clips, whereas with Firefox I didn't even know such things existed.

Firefox/Mozilla needs the money by rossdee · 2011-08-12 01:37 · Score: 1

So it can pursue its 'new version every month' policy
and break all the add-ons

Re:Firefox/Mozilla needs the money by Lifyre · 2011-08-12 02:15 · Score: 1

Is it every month? Seems like they try to update me every other week or so... I'm slowly migrating over to Chrome because of the hassles it causes.

--
I'll meet you at the intersection of "Should be" and "Reality"

Invent Mozilla Search by Billly+Gates · 2011-08-12 01:40 · Score: 2

I saw a link, but can't find it where a user recommended a search engine similiar to Google's but is not prone to SEO, fake reviews, and other sleezy techniques that make Google less efficient than 10 years ago. Anyone know the name of it?

10 years ago you could find anything with Google without people trying to sell you crap and it was always accurate. Remember those days?

Anyway, a browser is free but advertisement is where it can make some money and I think Mozilla should hook up with that search engine or another small one that uses advanced analysis rather than keywords to find results, but is not prone to the man things that ruin Google. It would give them a black eye for sure and could generate serious revenue.

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http://saveie6.com/

Re:Invent Mozilla Search by Rizimar · 2011-08-12 04:05 · Score: 1

I saw a link, but can't find it where a user recommended a search engine similiar to Google's but is not prone to SEO, fake reviews, and other sleezy techniques that make Google less efficient than 10 years ago
Every search engine is prone to sleazy techniques. Search engines all have ranking factors to determine the value of a page and its relevance to the user's input query. There will always be people who will do what they can to identify those ranking factors and exploit them.
That said, I wouldn't say that SEO is a bad practice. Using SEO techniques appropriately will help people find legitimately useful content among pages of text with similar words, less developed information, irrelevant data, or whatever else.
Re:Invent Mozilla Search by BenoitRen · 2011-08-12 07:05 · Score: 1

I have a hard time these days finding things with Google, not because of sites trying to game Google, but because Google changes my search terms as they see fit. I can type in one term and it will change it with a term that looks similar and include it in the search results. There's no way to have it search what you told it to search any more.
Re:Invent Mozilla Search by SnowZero · 2011-08-12 17:15 · Score: 1

There's no way to have it search what you told it to search any more.
http://www.google.com/#q=%2B%22yes+there+is%22
Normal users often search for vague terms, and don't understand things like operators, so the default has to be to support that majority of users. Power users can learn to use quoting, plus, and other operators, so it is up to you to learn those features and employ them.
Re:Invent Mozilla Search by BenoitRen · 2011-08-14 07:38 · Score: 0

I know about quoting and using operators like +. They don't help. For example, try searching for +"ps cave". You still get results with pscave in them.

I really hope not by AmiMoJo · 2011-08-12 01:41 · Score: 3, Insightful

Cutting off funding could be the best thing for Firefox. They would have to get rid of all the UI designers and tech evangelists who are slowly destroying Firefox. It would go back to being community driven with a focus on producing a really good app instead of playing buzzword bingo and copying Chrome.

Fingers crossed.

--
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC

Re:I really hope not by Tridus · 2011-08-12 02:25 · Score: 1

Oh but then we couldn't have Asa telling us why enterprise users are bad and we really want a new version every 6 weeks even if all we get out of it is a shittastic looking UI in Windows 7. (And that's generous compared to the disaster that is the new Thunderbird UI.)
I'm with you. Mozilla needs to clean house and get back to what they were doing when Firefox was growing: making a better browser for users.

--
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
Re:I really hope not by Skuto · 2011-08-12 02:40 · Score: 1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers
Community driven browsers (without corporate backing) seem to be doing great, eh? The internet is big cutthroat business, these aren't the Phoenix days any more.
Re:I really hope not by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 05:08 · Score: 0

Hate to disillusion you, but Firefox was never "community" based. Right from the beginning the people doing most of the work were on the Netscape payroll, then the AOL payroll, then living on the money AOL gave them after spinning them off. Now they're running on Google ad money.

bing by Lehk228 · 2011-08-12 01:46 · Score: 1

Article implies bing does not suck

article is wrong

--
Snowden and Manning are heroes.

Re:bing by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:35 · Score: 0

Quite. The only Micro$oft product that wouldn't suck is a vacuum cleaner.
Re:bing by flimflammer · 2011-08-12 04:03 · Score: 1

There is a number of Microsoft products that don't suck. Sorry you're too blinded by hate to see it.
Re:bing by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 04:29 · Score: 0

Article implies bing does not suck article is wrong
Many reviews and attempts at testing relevance now rank Bing US results as very competitive with Google (fx this one). But it seems that it is only US Bing that doesn't suck.

No, that is not the question.. by i_want_you_to_throw_ · 2011-08-12 01:47 · Score: 1

A better question to ask, though, is whether Mozilla wants Google as its primary search engine..
Well the math seems obvious to me, they receive $100.8 million from Google (97%) and there's no other entity that is going to step up and pay them so what do you think?

It's in Google's best interest to kill off the relationship because of gaining higher Chrome market share. Is that "evil"? No, it's business.

Re:No, that is not the question.. by artor3 · 2011-08-12 03:10 · Score: 1

Unless it was Microsoft doing it. Then it'd be called evil.
Re:No, that is not the question.. by flimflammer · 2011-08-12 04:06 · Score: 1

I liked when the author stipulated that Mozilla could charge whatever it wanted, instead of just $85 million.

google has been great in the past by FudRucker · 2011-08-12 01:51 · Score: 2

the last couple of years the search engine department has been getting sloppy, allowing content farms looking for click through revenue spamming the hell out of the search hierarchy. it is high time google update and refine their search engine filters because lately the crap i have to wade through to find what i am looking for is getting deep...

oh, and i like both firefox and seamonkey so i will be willing to abandon google before i abandon mozilla's firefox and the open source community developed seamonkey

--
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing

Re:google has been great in the past by Errol+backfiring · 2011-08-12 02:05 · Score: 1

Just install another search engine as the default, like ixquick.

--
Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
Re:google has been great in the past by AlXtreme · 2011-08-12 02:28 · Score: 2

Doing so hurts mozilla. userdefined search engines dont pay the bills.
I think mozilla could have used those $85m to fund a search engine of their own, that would avoid their reliance on google and make a much better investment than all those UI designers who keep breaking firefox.

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This sig is intentionally left blank

Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by GrumpySteen · 2011-08-12 01:53 · Score: 4, Insightful

"It is speculated, mostly by tech pundits, that considering the sheer amount of effort that itâ(TM)s putting into shoving Chrome down our throats, it would not be in Googleâ(TM)s best interests to re-sign with Mozilla."

Most of Google's revenue comes from advertising, not Chrome. To ensure that revenue, they need to remain the number one search engine. To that end, it is in Google's best interest to remain the default search engine on Firefox as long as Firefox has any significant market share, regardless of Chrome's market share.

Re:Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by Raenex · 2011-08-12 03:39 · Score: 1, Flamebait

Article overlooks the stupidly obvious
No, the article didn't overlook the stupidly obvious, you did, because you failed to read the next paragraph:
"While it's true that Mozilla strongly relies on Google's royalties, don't forget that Google is completely reliant on search traffic"
and later:
"In all likelihood, Firefox is probably the cheapest source of traffic that Google has."
and:
"If Google fails to renew its contract with Mozilla, do you think that Microsoft would blink an eye at spending $85 million for the majority share of Firefox's 450 million surfers?"
Of course, if you had a clue, you could have just read the title to get the gist of the article: "Why Google Needs Firefox"
Re:Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by swillden · 2011-08-12 03:40 · Score: 2, Informative

"It is speculated, mostly by tech pundits, that considering the sheer amount of effort that itâ(TM)s putting into shoving Chrome down our throats, it would not be in Googleâ(TM)s best interests to re-sign with Mozilla."
Most of Google's revenue comes from advertising, not Chrome. To ensure that revenue, they need to remain the number one search engine. To that end, it is in Google's best interest to remain the default search engine on Firefox as long as Firefox has any significant market share, regardless of Chrome's market share.

"It is speculated, mostly by tech pundits, that considering the sheer amount of effort that itâ(TM)s putting into shoving Chrome down our throats, it would not be in Googleâ(TM)s best interests to re-sign with Mozilla."
Most of Google's revenue comes from advertising, not Chrome. To ensure that revenue, they need to remain the number one search engine. To that end, it is in Google's best interest to remain the default search engine on Firefox as long as Firefox has any significant market share, regardless of Chrome's market share.
Another, slightly less obvious but equally important oversight/misunderstanding is Google's goals for Chrome. The article assumes that Google wants Chrome to displace Firefox and believes that not paying Mozilla would further that goal. But that's not what Chrome is for. Google has publicly stated on many occasions that their intent with Chrome is not to make it the universal browser, but to create competition. Not because the browser market lacked competition, but because the browser makers were not competing in the areas that Google wanted browsers to improve.
Specifically, when Chrome was first introduced, Google really wanted it to do one thing: Motivate browser makers to speed up Javascript engines. V8 was the reason for Chrome. See, Google wants the web to become the computing platform making the underlying OS irrelevant (with some success), but to do that the web has to be an adequate platform for doing all of the stuff that desktop apps do. And that requires fast Javascript execution, HTML5, etc. Had Chrome never broken the 1% marketshare mark but succeeded in convincing Mozilla, Microsoft, Apple, Opera, etc. to speed up their Javascript engines, Google would have considered Chrome a resounding success, even though pundits would have called it yet another Google failure.
Bottom line: Google likes Mozilla and Firefox, and not just for the search traffic sent to google.com -- though the revenue from that search traffic undoubtedly more than justifies the money Google spends. Google wants the web to become the platform, and truly cross-platform browsers like Firefox are important to that goal. In fact, to realize that goal, it's also important that Chrome not be the only browser. Google doesn't want the web to be "the Google platform", it wants the web to be "the platform". Because Google is convinced that it can outcompete anyone, given a standardized platform on which to compete. And, honestly, though many people will probably call me naive, or a shill, because Google thinks that making the underlying OS irrelevant is what's best for the world. Yes, that sort of idealism really is not only common, but the norm at Google.
(Disclaimer: I'm a software engineer at Google, but I don't work on Chrome, and with the exception of my comments on the ideology of people at Google, none of the above is any sort of inside information. It's all stuff I knew before joining the company.)

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Re:Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by Sirusjr · 2011-08-12 05:21 · Score: 1

But by now most users are used to google and would simply change the default if it was something else. By now Bing is unfamiliar to the majority of the population and Google is considered the best search engine by most. It is going to take quite a lot more than setting Bing as the default to change that in people's minds.
Re:Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by Zenin · 2011-08-12 06:01 · Score: 0

Agreed. Heck, at my current company we ended up getting a bunch of our top executives to install Chrome because neither FF or IE were fast enough to run the internal metrics app that we built for them.
Which...oddly...is all Flash based and doesn't even care about Javascript speed. Yet still, running in Chrome is the difference between working well and barely functioning at all... Go figure. :-/
That said, I still run Firefox myself. I hate beyond hate the Chrome UI and can't stand not having my Firefox addons (especially developer addons).

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My /. uid is better then your /. uid
Re:Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by TemporalBeing · 2011-08-12 06:13 · Score: 1

But by now most users are used to google and would simply change the default if it was something else. By now Bing is unfamiliar to the majority of the population and Google is considered the best search engine by most. It is going to take quite a lot more than setting Bing as the default to change that in people's minds.
True. If Mozilla tried to change the default to Bing or anything else, I'd simply change it back to Google; just like I do with all IE installs I come across - switch them over to using Google for their search provider (mostly b/c those people don't realize they do have a choice, they just use the search bar or [more likely] just load google's website directly).

--
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
Re:Article overlooks the stupidly obvious by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 06:41 · Score: 0

And, Google doesn't want the web to be "the Google platform", it wants the web to be "the platform". Because Google is convinced that it can outcompete anyone, given a standardized platform on which to compete. And, honestly, though many people will probably call me naive, or a shill, because Google thinks that making the underlying OS irrelevant is what's best for the world. Yes, that sort of idealism really is not only common, but the norm at Google.

The problem is that trying to be evil and controlling rarely works for business. It might work in the short or medium term, but in the long-term it doesn't. Imagine if Google put their own sites up over others on search. It might help those other sites, but it would also mean that the search engine wouldn't be giving the best results and would damage the reputation of it.
But there's another thing (and this is going to sound hippyish) which is about "negative energy" in businesses. If your business is trying to basically screw customers then you're channeling energy into that rather than giving the customer more for their money. You might be able to say, force upgrades on a customer at a rip-off price, but eventually when that customer has to upgrade their system, they'll go elsewhere.

Two views by boyfaceddog · 2011-08-12 01:55 · Score: 2

Normal, rational view: "Sign them up NOW. This product is a gold mine and it doesn't cost us anything. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to go swim in all of our money." Corporate Board-Room view: "Mozilla accounts for most of our profits. That means they are taking internet share away from OUR browser. Cut these guys off at the knees!" Gosh, I'm vexed as to which way Google will go. Yep, that's a puzzler. /sarcasm

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Here will be an old abusing of God's patience and the king's English.

Re:Two views by Endimiao · 2011-08-12 05:10 · Score: 1

The second option is the same rationale Elop is using in regards to the Nokia's N9. It's a gold mine but a threat to its so-far-non-existant WP7 market.
Smart eh?
Let's see if Google is able to emulate that. I'm starting to believe all those solar storms are frying up some brains..
Re:Two views by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-13 07:33 · Score: 0

Your sarcasm is noted, but I'm honestly not sure. Google's been making some baffling moves lately.

Re:Why wouldn't it be MS? by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:01 · Score: 0

Is it just me, or does that comment make no sense?

Firefox needs Chrome by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:01 · Score: 0

Among browsers I've tried, Chrome seems to be more reliable than FireFox, less prone to crashing. It's not quite as user-friendly, but efficient.

Re:Firefox needs Chrome by cornface · 2011-08-12 02:08 · Score: 1

I've been using SRWare Iron a lot which is basically chrome with all the Google tentacles removed.
It (and Chrome) are noticeably faster than Firefox and IE, but I still feel weird using it for general purpose browsing because of the lack of NoScript. Until equivalent functionality exists in Chrome I'll probably never switch entirely.

'default' being the operative word by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:06 · Score: 0

Just coz a browser makes a search option a default doesn't mean that they'll use it. I, for one, would change the default from either Bing or Yahoo straight back to Google, i don't give two fucks who gets what royalty, i like the results from google, for now, the engines just plain suck.

Re:'default' being the operative word by Dr.+Spork · 2011-08-12 04:25 · Score: 1

Yeah, that's the first thing I thought. The article seems to assume that every Firefox user is some kind of grandparent that's won't change any defaults without the supervision of their grandchildren. I would assume the opposite - that if the default search box engine changed, 70% of Firefox users would devote their first two clicks to changing it back. Many of the rest would change it after realizing "hey, this isn't Google!" Although I noticed that Bing is working pretty hard to deliver search results without doing much to alert the user that they're not on Google.

DuckDuckGo by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:07 · Score: 0

Considering its target audience, Mozilla would be more likely to go with DuckDuckGo to replace Google, not Bing. That's a big deal for Google, because Bing doesn't really threaten Google's credibility with the hipster-nerd FOSS-lover crowd, but DDG with its "take privacy serious" policy does -- and even 3-5% marketshare for DDG would be a massive increase and more than a blip on Google's radar.

Re:DuckDuckGo by neminem · 2011-08-15 09:20 · Score: 1

Only problem: I found duckduckgo a while ago, I thought they sounded really cool, so I set it as my home page instead of google. I like the look way better, I think it has some neat features, and I can count on them not adding annoying "features" without some way of turning them off, but... about half the searches I did, I ended up being annoyed with the crap results, and queried them again with !google at the front. After a couple weeks of doing that, I gave up and set it back to google. Google may be increasingly annoying and arguably eviler, but they won the search engine game for one major, obvious reason: their search results are rather higher quality than any other search engine I've ever tried, and always have been.

Re:Who cares, honestly by Skuto · 2011-08-12 02:18 · Score: 4, Insightful

If we're at the point where the internet is "whatever Webkit renders", we've done something wrong.

Re:THIS is the reason for the version acceleration by Tridus · 2011-08-12 02:19 · Score: 1

Has Netcraft confirmed it yet?

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-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates

Tired... by synapse7 · 2011-08-12 02:32 · Score: 0

I'm tired of reading articles on search engines and advertising, which are an even greater letdown on Friday.

Re:Why wouldn't it be MS? by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 02:34 · Score: 0

No, it's not just you. I honestly wondered if I had suffered a stroke prior to reading it.

No offense to GP.

Title should read... by Kamiza+Ikioi · 2011-08-12 02:36 · Score: 1

"Why Firefox Needs Bing"

I'll be honest, Google is in the dominant position, and I'll never use Bing. But, Microsoft is throwing money at search like there is no tomorrow (because for them, there may not be if they have no virtual real estate). Microsoft would probably be willing to up the offer of money. Even with their rivalry, they know good and well Chrome is a bigger rival to IE. If nothing else, Firefox could force a much better contract with Google with a high Bing offer.

That's just smart business.

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I8-D

How would a change work? by SydShamino · 2011-08-12 02:47 · Score: 0

I have to wonder if the new contract would be even half as valuable as the old one. This depends very heavily on how the change over to a new default search provider would work.

A) If Firefox does the "right thing" and honors existing users' choice of provider during an upgrade, then none of the existing install base would switch over. With Firefox's market share not growing all that much, adoption of the new default would be limited to the relatively small amount of churn.

B) If Firefox tries to switch provider during an upgrade (for everyone, or at least everyone who uses Google), I'd suspect there would be outrage. How dare they try to force (and/or trick, depending on if it's automatic or a "confusing" pop up) a change on unsuspecting users!?! That doesn't sound so different that Microsoft's attempts to switch default browsers back in the Great War. Firefox would lose a good part of the tech crowd support they have left.

So either way, I just don't see the value of their search box as being that high any longer. So I think whether they go with Google or not they're screwed.

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It doesn't hurt to be nice.

hand in hand by hesaigo999ca · 2011-08-12 02:54 · Score: 1

They both do good on the web, they both try to offer better solutions then MS could ever bring, they bring competitive edge, they are both companies that started off by providing free services, and now built a cult following, becoming a brand house hold name. They would be crazy no to stay together...sort of like ross and rachel!...just wondering who is the guy and who is the girl...maybe the fox is the gurl?

Re:Why wouldn't it be MS? by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 03:57 · Score: 0

There's pages of details going on here, but my sum point is something is seriously silent here.

Every attempt at getting meaning from that sentence feels like my brain is being sandpapered.

If they do, i will keep mozilla up with donations. by unity100 · 2011-08-12 04:34 · Score: 1

$5 at a time, $15 at a time.

at this age, i am not at all able to take shit from any i.t. corporation. google is no exception.

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Read radical news here

Interesting strategic thinking by Dr.+Spork · 2011-08-12 04:39 · Score: 1

So follow me here: Assume (fairly, I think) that MS would pay a lot more than Google is paying now for Mozilla search results. They might make an offer to Firefox to make Bing their default search, offering them substantial money for this. But now it gets interesting: If Firefox takes that big pile of money, they will use it to improve Firefox, which will make IE's work harder. But: MS also knows that if it made any offer to the Mozilla foundation to change the defaults, Google would match that in an effort to keep from Bing gaining a foothold. In fact, Google can pay more for this than MS could. The result of this bidding war would be that Google stays the default and adds a lot of extra resources to keep Firefox going strong. That is more harmful to MS than the way things are now. So somehow how I expect that this renewal will happen without any noticeable fanfare.

Big Whoop by TangoMargarine · 2011-08-12 04:47 · Score: 1

It's just two clicks to change the selected search engine (one, if you hold and drag). On principle, yes, it's bad, but unless they set it to reselect Bing every time I start the browser (which is only once a day anyway), I wouldn't really care that much.

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Ha! Haven't used Bing!, have you... by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 04:48 · Score: 0

I no longer enchanted with Google, that way I used to be. Their efforts to provide me with localized, customized, personalized search results while directing me to do business with people that pay for keywords and preferential placement in the stream of so-called 'results,' leaves me feeling like I'm completely manipulated.

That having been said, Bing! still sucks...

Re:Ha! Haven't used Bing!, have you... by mcvos · 2011-08-12 05:04 · Score: 1

I just switched to DuckDuckGo for me search needs. For everything else, I'll happily continue using Google, though.
Re:Ha! Haven't used Bing!, have you... by bluegreen997 · 2011-08-12 11:00 · Score: 1

I've yet to see any real personal drop off in the quality of Google's searches. I have to say that with some effort, tweaking my search terms and the search tools, most of the time I am able to find what I'm looking for for even relativly obscure things.
That being said I honestly don't shop around like I did in the 90's when if one search engine did not find something for me I'd move to the next.

Anti-Trust by Swanktastic · 2011-08-12 04:52 · Score: 1

Whether or not it would result in an Anti-trust judgement down the road, I don't think Google is in a position to deny Firefox as a customer.

The DOJ has Google under the gun right now, and they would be wise not to do anything stupid. Using their monopoly in search to hurt a broswer competitor would be considered anti-competitive by quite a few experts.

Make default random by cfoushee · 2011-08-12 05:03 · Score: 1

Wouldn't it make sense for Firefox to be search engine agnostic and implement a random choice for the default. They would still collect their royalties, but they would prevent putting all their eggs into one basket and building up either Bing or Google too much. It benefits them to ensure that both Bing and Google and any other decent search engine does well so that there is competition, because once there is not competition they can more easily target by either Google or Microsoft and lose market share.

$86M? by Johnny+Mnemonic · 2011-08-12 05:21 · Score: 1

$86M seems like chump change. I'm surprised that MS hasn't bid up the value of that real estate, except that they would have to eat crow to support an OSS browser. But I'd think that they'd make that $86M pretty fast back if they could redirect firefox to bing. Or at least make Google pay more for the privilege ;)

Maybe MS doesn't want Mozilla to have more financial resources, even if it would mean costing Google more money?

And btw, who accounts for the other $19M of royalty for that real estate?

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i'll use googleù by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 05:31 · Score: 0

really i don't care if firefox has default bing search, i will still use google

What else would they use? by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 06:00 · Score: 0

Bing and Yahoo! couldn't find a skyscraper in front of their faces. Useless.

Re:Who cares, honestly by Jesus_666 · 2011-08-12 06:41 · Score: 1

Perhaps the GP is thinking about Trident. That's entirely plausible if they have been in a coma for the last decade, for instance.

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Mozilla gets funding from memory manufacturers by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 06:51 · Score: 0

They have back room deals woth multiple memory manufactuerers to deliberatley include memory leaks, so they can sell more ram. Back in 2004 a Gig of memory was high end, now it is too little for even netbooks thanks to payola from memory companies.

No no no by Anonymous Coward · 2011-08-12 07:41 · Score: 0

Perhaps I'm too much of an idealist, but Firefox is very much a part of the open source world. Microsoft has a history of trying to crush the free and open source world. Therefore, why would Firefox want to welcome Microsoft's search engine Bing? If for some reason things went sour with Google, Bing should not even be considered as a replacement. Even if Bing is second place in superior search results (I have no clue if it is) giving Microsoft more power by having it be the default search engine should never happen in the name of all of us that fight for free and open source products.

Relevant fact: I’m appalled that right now Bing is even an option to choose from in the search engine list.

Percent of Revenue? by V-similitude · 2011-08-12 08:12 · Score: 1

It seems like everyone's just taking for granted that Firefox does indeed constitute a large percentage of Google's search traffic. Is there any evidence for this? It seems to me, if Google is paying Firefox $100M then the traffic they constitute is probably on the same order of magnitude (eg 100M/6B =~ 2%). (Or to be more exact, calculate what Google paid in the first year of the contract vs their revenue at the time.) . . . So to think that Bing could somehow gain 10% market share from some portion of this seems pretty off.

Firefox struggling to stay relevant by loufoque · 2011-08-12 08:24 · Score: 1

Discarding Google will make them disappear.

Problem is, there still isn't any good web browser.

Surprised more distros don't override this. by Rich0 · 2011-08-12 08:26 · Score: 1

That is a LOT of cash. I'm surprised most linux distros don't negotiate their own deals with Google. They could charge Google to keep their default browser setting in Firefox (or for that matter Chrome), for example, or charge Bing to switch it. Granted, the volume for linux will be lower than for windows, but I imagine that quite a few people still install firefox/chrome/etc.

Now, the trademarks could become an issue. A way around that is to patch in the change post-install so that the distro doesn't actually distribute a modified version of the browser. Or, they could just iceweasel it. :)

Ah, now maybe I understand... by Paul+Fernhout · 2011-08-12 10:49 · Score: 1

... why Mozilla has not made a social semantic desktop with all that vast amount of money. No search engine advertising revenues?
http://semanticweb.org/wiki/Semantic_Desktop
"The Internet, electronic mail, and the Web have revolutionized the way we communicate and collaborate - their mass adoption is one of the major technological success stories of the 20th century. We all are now much more connected, and in turn face new resulting problems: information overload caused by insufficient support for information organization and collaboration. For example, sending a single file to a mailing list multiplies the cognitive processing effort of filtering and organizing this file times the number of recipients ? leading to more and more of peoples' time going into information filtering and information management activities. There is a need for smarter and more fine-grained computer support for personal and networked information that has to blend the boundaries between personal and group data, while simultaneously safeguarding privacy and establishing and deploying trust among collaborators.
The Semantic Web holds promises for information organization and selective access, providing standards means for formulating and distributing metadata and Ontologies.
Still, we miss a wide use of Semantic Web technologies on personal computers. ..."

But maybe sour grapes on my part as I applied for a job at Mozilla a couple months ago, suggesting upgrading Thunderbird into such a thing, and never heard back. I've been trying on-and-off on my own for years towards that SSD end, but some finanical support (and teamwork) would help me have time to focus on it more and help make it happen:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/pointrel/

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A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.

Re:Who cares, honestly by S.O.B. · 2011-08-12 10:54 · Score: 1

Then what you should have said was "Gecko is old news. Webkit is where the future is."

Then you would be comparing apples to apples instead of apples to apple trees.

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Some of what I say is fact, some is conjecture, the rest I'm just blowing out my ass...you guess.

Webkit-based, too (and mod parent up) by robla · 2011-08-13 04:48 · Score: 1

Agreed, though I wouldn't go so far as to say that Google would be upset if Chrome marginalized Firefox through merit-based competition.

The main thing I would add is that it was only a matter of time before someone created a competitive Webkit-based browser for Windows, and there's no guarantee that whoever that was was going to be friendly to Google.

182 comments