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TechRepublic: Mozilla 'Is Desperately Needed to Save the Web' (techrepublic.com)
"I can't remember the last time I cared about Mozilla," writes Matt Asay at TechRepublic. "I also can't remember a time when we needed it more."
An anonymous reader quotes TechRepublic:
Mozilla's Firefox is almost a rounding error in desktop market share, and nonexistent in mobile browser market share. It offers a few other services, like Pocket, but largely gets ignored... This is a mistake. Our world is increasingly mediated by the internet, and that internet has just a few gatekeepers, collecting tolls as we browse. As Python guru Matt Harrison put it, "Vendors control the default browser which 99.9% of people use." Those vendors are happy to sell us access to information. Nothing about it is free. You are most definitely the product.
On mobile, where the majority of the world's content is now consumed, Google and Facebook own eight of the top 10 apps, with apps devouring 87% of our time spent on smartphones and tablets, according to new comScore data. For that remaining 13% of time spent on the mobile web, Google and Apple offer the two dominant browsers... the majority of our time online is now mediated by just a few megacorporations, and for the most part their top incentive is to borrow our privacy just long enough to target an ad at us. Then there's Mozilla, an organization whose mantra is "Internet for people, not profit." That feels like a necessary voice to add to today's internet oligopoly, but it's not one we're hearing... We clearly need an organization standing up for web freedom, as expecting Google to do that is like asking the fox to guard the henhouse. Google does many great things, but its clear incentive is to sell ads. We are Google's product, as the saying goes.
The article applauds the Mozilla-sponsored Rust programming language as promising, "but not to save the web from the all-consuming embrace of Facebook and Google, especially as they wall off the experience in apps... "If I sound like I don't know what to propose Mozilla should do, it's because I don't. I simply feel strongly that the role Mozilla played in the early browser wars needs to be resurrected to save the web today."
On mobile, where the majority of the world's content is now consumed, Google and Facebook own eight of the top 10 apps, with apps devouring 87% of our time spent on smartphones and tablets, according to new comScore data. For that remaining 13% of time spent on the mobile web, Google and Apple offer the two dominant browsers... the majority of our time online is now mediated by just a few megacorporations, and for the most part their top incentive is to borrow our privacy just long enough to target an ad at us. Then there's Mozilla, an organization whose mantra is "Internet for people, not profit." That feels like a necessary voice to add to today's internet oligopoly, but it's not one we're hearing... We clearly need an organization standing up for web freedom, as expecting Google to do that is like asking the fox to guard the henhouse. Google does many great things, but its clear incentive is to sell ads. We are Google's product, as the saying goes.
The article applauds the Mozilla-sponsored Rust programming language as promising, "but not to save the web from the all-consuming embrace of Facebook and Google, especially as they wall off the experience in apps... "If I sound like I don't know what to propose Mozilla should do, it's because I don't. I simply feel strongly that the role Mozilla played in the early browser wars needs to be resurrected to save the web today."
they will jettison what made their browser great: the extensions.
And that is why I am having to use the browser 'Pale Moon' in order to use the extensions I love such as Pentadactyl.
Since firefox have disregarded what was great about their browser, i.e. the extensions, they are effectively killing it.
they are effectively killing it.
How? Extensions still exist and Firefox 57 really is a whole lot faster. You should try out the nightly version now, or wait for 57 to move to beta.
scrapped an extensions architecture that worked fine
It didn't work fine. Firefox 57 is faster without it. Have you tried Firefox nightly? Alternatively, wait for 57 to move to the beta channel and try it then.
Instead when you use a word like "guys", you get blocked. I'm just stupified by the bullying behavior of Mozilla's employees: https://mzl.la/2gu5521
Lol, that thread is freaking great. A contributor asked about the status on a two year old feature request and makes the mistake of using "guys" when referring to a collective group and get three responses about his use of "gendered language" and his responses marked as abusive and off-topic. And the icing on the cake is that guys is considered non-gendered by both Mirriam-Webster and Oxforddictionaries. As for the feature request itself, still in an unknown status. Honestly if that is how they react to every perceived slight, I can see why Firefox is struggling.
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the (supposed) good of its victims may be the most oppressive