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Google Earth Gets a New Home On the Web (arstechnica.com)
To celebrate the Earth Day, Google says it is rolling out what was a two-year in the making major update to Google Earth. From a report: V9 is designed to run in a Web browser (just Chrome for now), but there's now a standalone home for Google Earth. The Android app has been updated, too (iOS is coming soon). Version 9 puts a big focus on guided tours via the "Voyager" section, which serves as a jumping off point for YouTube videos, 360-degree content, Street View, and Google Earth landmarks. The tours are led by scientists and documentarians, with some content produced by well-known groups like the BBC's Planet Earth team. For kids, there's a Sesame Street muppet section.
Targeting Chrome as the only supported browser has become possible thanks to Firefox's decreasing market share. It's now down to about 5% or 6%, across all versions and all platforms. It has no mobile presence of any substance (0.03%).
Targeting only Chrome really wasn't feasible back when Firefox had 30% or more of the browser market. But thanks to one unwanted chaneg after another, users have fled Firefox and moved to Chrome instead. Now Chrome has 50% or more of the browser market, including a significant share of the mobile market.
I think we're just going to see more of this happening. It'll be like the "Best Viewed With Netscape Navigator" and "Best Viewed With Internet Explorer" days of the 1990s, except there won't be an alternative. There will only be, "Viewed Only With Chrome". As more and more sites require Chrome, even fewer people will have a reason to use Firefox. Firefox's already small usage share will continue to drop, perhaps even until it effectively reaches 0% of the market.
The saddest part is that it really didn't need to be like this. Firefox was a major player at one time. People liked using it, more than they liked using Chrome. But then the Firefox devs had to throw it all away! It hasn't just hurt their product; it has hurt the web as a whole.
Please don't delude yourself into thinking that Firefox is any better when it comes to privacy and not tracking its users.
Just look at how much user info Firefox can collect and send to Mozilla and others.
Their page clearly lists various types of identifiers and browsing history that might be sent, including such things as: "IP address", "location", "phone number", "email address", "URLs", "information about visited sites", "terms you type in the Awesome Bar or Search Bar", "website domain", "Google advertising ID", "active URL at time of crash" and "personal information".
In case you don't believe me, let's look at some examples from their page:
"Once per day, Firefox sends the following info to Mozilla when it checks for browser updates: your Firefox version information, language preference, operating system, and version."
"Firefox contacts Mozilla once per day to check for add-on information to check for malicious add-ons. This includes, for example: browser version, OS and version, locale, total number of requests, time of last request, time of day, IP address, and the list of add-ons you have installed."
"Firefox sends Mozilla a monthly request to look up your location at a country level using your IP address."
"Some Mozilla sponsored snippets are interactive and allow you to optionally share your phone number or email address. For example, you can enter your phone number to receive an SMS to install Firefox on Android. Your information is received and handled by our email and mobile marketing vendor."
"This data includes, for example: device hardware, operating system, Firefox version, add-ons (count and type), timing of browser events, rendering, session restores, length of session, how old a profile is, count of crashes, and count of pages."
"Firefox may send metadata, including URLs associated with the downloaded file, to the SafeBrowsing service. "
"Firefox that sends Mozilla usage, performance, and responsiveness statistics about user interface features, memory, and hardware configuration. Your IP address is also collected as a part of a standard web log."
"When Telemetry is enabled, certain short-term experiments may collect information about visited sites."
"Firefox sends to Mozilla data relating to the tiles such as number of clicks, impressions, your IP address, locale information, and tile specific data (e.g., position and size of grid)."
"Firefox sends Mozilla a request once to look up your location at a country level using your IP address."
"Firefox may send the terms you type in the Awesome Bar or Search Bar to your Default Search Engine to retrieve suggestions"
"Firefox may send “Referral Data” such as the website domain"
"Firefox sends Referral Data to our mobile analytics vendor, and also includes a Google advertising ID, IP address, timestamp, country, locale, operating system, and app version."
"Firefox records and sends Referral Data to Mozilla as part of Firefox Health Report. "
"Firefox may use several pieces of data to determine your location, including your operating systems geolocation features, Wi-Fi networks, cell phone towers, or IP address."
"This report contains technical information for us to improve Firefox including why Firefox crashed, the active URL at time of crash, and the state of computer memory during the crash. The crash report we receive may include personal information."
"Firefox sends information to Mozilla, including the list of add-ons you have installed, Firefox version information, and your IP address."
Some people will try to justify this by saying nonsense like "At least they disclose it!" or "At least some of it can be disabled!", but none of that really matters. What does matter is that this information is being collected and sent to Mozilla in the