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Mozilla CEO: Windows 10 Strips User Choice For Browsers and Other Software

Posted by Soulskill on from the if-it's-not-one-thing dept.

puddingebola writes: Mozilla CEO Chris Beard has sent an open letter to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella complaining about the default settings in Windows 10. Users who upgrade to 10 will have their default browser automatically changed to the new Edge browser. Beard said, "We appreciate that it’s still technically possible to preserve people’s previous settings and defaults, but the design of the whole upgrade experience and the default settings APIs have been changed to make this less obvious and more difficult. It now takes more than twice the number of mouse clicks, scrolling through content and some technical sophistication for people to reassert the choices they had previously made in earlier versions of Windows. It’s confusing, hard to navigate and easy to get lost. ... We strongly urge you to reconsider your business tactic here and again respect people’s right to choice and control of their online experience by making it easier, more obvious and intuitive for people to maintain the choices they have already made through the upgrade experience.

12 of 371 comments (clear)

  1. If you think Windows is bad by NotDrWho · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Try using a non-Safari-based browser in iOS

    --
    SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
    1. Re:If you think Windows is bad by ADRA · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Its almost like... in those cases the OS is a specially crafted web browsing tool instead of a GENERAL PURPOSE operating system.

      Nobody's assuming that a phone / tablet / netbook have unlimited control (though it is nice when given), but for a general purpose OS, you expect fluidity. I guess some of the big shifts in Windows since 8 (maybe earlier, but in much smaller doses) has been their ham-strung proprietary and irreplacible components that lock down more and more of the OS. This may well be my last Windows if Linux Gaming becomes more of a thing. If the last couple years' growth has been any indication, it looks like a real possibility now.

      --
      Bye!
    2. Re:If you think Windows is bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Or try using a non-Firefox browser with the Firefox OS.
      Or try using a non-Chrome browser with the Chrome OS.

      Point of clarification. 99.999% of Chrome/Firefox OS users voluntarily chose that OS to get the fuck away from IE/Microsoft and prefer the browser that comes with it.

      I thought that was rather obvious to most.

    3. Re:If you think Windows is bad by KGIII · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Nobody's assuming that a phone / tablet / netbook have unlimited control (though it is nice when given) ...

      Like hell I am not. I expect full control of a tablet and a netbook. What is up with you people relinquishing control???

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  2. Oh the irony! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Lemme repost directly from HN for convenience:

    Animats 16 hours ago

    I am writing to you about a very disturbing aspect of Firefox 38.0.5. Specifically, that the update experience appears to have been designed to throw away the choice your customers have made about the Internet experience they want, and replace it with the Internet experience Mozilla wants them to have.

    When we first saw the Firefox upgrade experience that strips users of their choice by effectively overriding existing user preferences for the search engine and other apps, and forces the integration of Pocket and Sync, we reached out to your team to discuss this issue. Unfortunately, it didn’t result in any meaningful progress, hence this letter.

    We appreciate that it’s still technically possible to preserve people’s previous settings and defaults, but the design of the whole upgrade experience and the default settings APIs have been changed to make this less obvious and more difficult. It now takes more than twice the number of mouse clicks, scrolling through content and some technical sophistication for people to reassert the choices they had previously made in earlier versions of Firefox. It’s confusing, hard to navigate and easy to get lost.

    Sometimes we see great progress, where consumer products respect individuals and their choices. However, with the launch of Firefox 38.0.5 we are deeply disappointed to see Mozilla take such a dramatic step backwards.

    These changes are unsettling because there are millions of users who love Firefox and who are having their choices ignored, and because of the increased complexity put into everyone’s way if and when they choose to make a choice different than what Mozilla prefers.

    We strongly urge you to reconsider your business tactic here and again respect people’s right to choice and control of their online experience by making it easier, more obvious and intuitive for people to maintain the choices they have already made through the upgrade experience. It should be easier for people to assert new choices and preferences, not just for other Mozilla products, through the default settings APIs and user interfaces.

    Please give your users the choice and control they deserve in Firefox.

  3. Mozilla had better gear up... by QuietLagoon · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Mozilla will be facing the Take Back The Web battle with Microsoft once again, though this time it will be a bloated Firefox vs. a newly aggressive Microsoft.

    .
    Microsoft has caught the smell of Firefox's current weakness and is exploiting it.

    What to watch: will Firefox's marketshare drop to the point where Firefox no longer has any impetus in pushing for, or moving towards, new web standards? A browser's marketshare needs to be over 20% (some say, well over 20%) for the browser to have that amount of gravitas.

    Perhaps this default settings quarrel is Microsoft trying to grab a lump of marketshare for Edge, giving Edge a big boost towards that 25% mark and cementing Edge as a replacement for Firefox in setting web standards.

  4. Please by thewebsiteisdown · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Its like saying "Hey, Chevrolet, you know your customers like the radio station set to 101.9, why cant you engineer your cars to respect their choice instead of forcing your nefarious 101.5 agenda." You're installing a new operating system. If you think there is going to be zero configuration, you have no business installing an operating system. Setting the default applications is in the same place it always was. With all of Mozilla's other problems solved, its good to see Beard focus on what matters /s.

  5. Re:IE all over again by squiggleslash · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I don't think anything's changed about the degree to which IE or NewIE is part of the OS since Windows 7. What's changed is that browsers can't set themselves to be the default any more - the user has to do it explicitly in the system settings.

    Personally, I thought the Windows 8.1 way of doing it was better. But I don't think this is as terrible a change as being suggested.

    --
    You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  6. EU Antitrust by TerryC101 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Anybody else see a big fine for Microsoft on the horizon. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

  7. Re:IE all over again by Shakrai · · Score: 3, Interesting

    When I upgraded to Windows 10 yesterday, there was a screen that came up that asked me if I wanted to reset the default apps. I said no for my browser and media player, and when it completed, Chrome and VLC were still the default applications. I think it's a little underhanded, but not as underhanded as the article suggests.

    Mozilla is whining anyway; when they switched search providers from Google to Yahoo I had to go through and specify it on EVERY INSTANCE of Firefox I have. Since I use --no-remote and segment my web browsing this was actually a royal pain in the ass. Granted, Google was the old "default," so I had never changed it, but it was still an undesired change in behavior. If they're going to whine about Microsoft doing the same thing then they ought to look at their own behavior.

    Firefox is still my browser of choice for personal use but for others I've started to recommend Chrome. It's just less hassle to support it for your luser friends. The future of Firefox and Mozilla is not an encouraging one, which is a pity.

    --
    I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
    We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  8. Re:IE all over again by lgw · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm pretty sure this was arrogance, but not malice, on MS's part: they really want to shift the IE userbase to Edge and drop IE support in some future release. Can you blame them? But in their arrogance they didn't remember (or didn't care) that quite a large portion of Windows users don't run IE in the first place.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  9. Bad summary and/or FUD by Vyse+of+Arcadia · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Users who upgrade to 10 will have their default browser automatically changed to the new Edge browser

    No they won't. It popped up a screen that asked me if I wanted to change my defaults for four common tasks to the new Win10 apps for those tasks. Photos, videos, music, and browser. I clicked no on each, and my old defaults carried over.