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Mozilla Rolls Out Sponsored Tiles To Firefox Nightly's New Tab Page

Posted by timothy on from the now-how-much-would-you-pay? dept.

An anonymous reader writes Mozilla has rolled out directory tiles, the company's advertising experiment for its browser's new tab page, to the Firefox Nightly channel. We installed the latest browser build to give the sponsored ads a test drive. When you first launch Firefox, a message on the new tab page informs you of the following: what tiles are (with a link to a support page about how sponsored tiles work), a promise that the feature abides by the Mozilla Privacy Policy, and a reminder that you can turn tiles off completely and choose to have a blank new tab page. It's quite a lot to take in all at once.

5 of 171 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Work for the man, not for mankind by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 3, Informative

    That's how I feel too: they've turned Firefox into a cheap whore - albeit with an opt-out option.

    Yet I realize they have to make money to keep bringing out new Firefox releases.

    Yet... it sucks. Ads sucks. Ad-funded internet sucks.

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  2. Re:Turn tiles off... but for how long? by narcc · · Score: 3, Informative

    1) about:config
    2) search for newtab
    3) double-click browser.newtab.url
    4) Modify to your heart's desire.

    If that doesn't satisfy you:

    Open userContent.css, add the following:
    @-moz-document url("about:newtab") { #newtab-search-container { display: none !important; } }

    You're welcome.

    --
    Required reading for internet skeptics
  3. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Opera has been reduced to a reskinned Chrome.

    Posting this on an Opera 12 holdout machine.

  4. Pale Moon by BenFenner · · Score: 3, Informative

    I am so thankful for Pale Moon. I don't have to read Firefox news with dread anymore. Even at work here using Linux I can enjoy it.

    http://www.palemoon.org/

  5. Mozilla tiles too complicated? by lippydude · · Score: 5, Informative

    "When you first launch Firefox, a message on the new tab page informs you of the following .. It's quite a lot to take in all at once"

    It seems fairly straight forward to me: a) a promise that the feature abides by the Mozilla Privacy Policy, b) a reminder that you can turn tiles off completely ..