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Google, Mozilla, and Opera React To Microsoft's Embrace of Chromium (venturebeat.com)
With the news earlier today that Microsoft is embracing Chromium for Edge browser development on the desktop, VentureBeat decided to see what the other browser companies had to say about the decision. From the report: Google largely sees Microsoft's decision as a good thing, which is not exactly a surprise given that the company created the Chromium open source project. "Chrome has been a champion of the open web since inception and we welcome Microsoft to the community of Chromium contributors. We look forward to working with Microsoft and the web standards community to advance the open web, support user choice, and deliver great browsing experiences."
Mozilla meanwhile sees Microsoft's move as further validation that users should switch to Firefox. "This just increases the importance of Mozilla's role as the only independent choice. We are not going to concede that Google's implementation of the web is the only option consumers should have. That's why we built Firefox in the first place and why we will always fight for a truly open web." Mozilla regularly points out it develops the only independent browser -- meaning it's not tied to a tech company that has priorities which often don't align with the web. Apple (Safari), Google (Chrome), and Microsoft (Edge) all have their own corporate interests.
Opera thinks Microsoft is making a smart move, because it did the same thing six years ago. "We noticed that Microsoft seems very much to be following in Opera's footsteps. Switching to Chromium is part of a strategy Opera successfully adopted in 2012. This strategy has proved fruitful for Opera, allowing us to focus on bringing unique features to our products. As for the impact on the Chromium ecosystem, we are yet to see how it will turn out, but we hope this will be a positive move for the future of the web."
Mozilla meanwhile sees Microsoft's move as further validation that users should switch to Firefox. "This just increases the importance of Mozilla's role as the only independent choice. We are not going to concede that Google's implementation of the web is the only option consumers should have. That's why we built Firefox in the first place and why we will always fight for a truly open web." Mozilla regularly points out it develops the only independent browser -- meaning it's not tied to a tech company that has priorities which often don't align with the web. Apple (Safari), Google (Chrome), and Microsoft (Edge) all have their own corporate interests.
Opera thinks Microsoft is making a smart move, because it did the same thing six years ago. "We noticed that Microsoft seems very much to be following in Opera's footsteps. Switching to Chromium is part of a strategy Opera successfully adopted in 2012. This strategy has proved fruitful for Opera, allowing us to focus on bringing unique features to our products. As for the impact on the Chromium ecosystem, we are yet to see how it will turn out, but we hope this will be a positive move for the future of the web."
Why is anyone giving them any more credit than due? IE6, IE7, IE8, IE9, IE10, IE11, and EDGE, all insufferable and incompatible and slow and macro-ey and COMPLETELY VULNERABLE FOR YEARS.
But now because M$ wants to try their hand at product managing someone else's dev infrastructure, we're supposed to give them some kind of benefit of a doubt? Fuck that. Fuck the advertising of this.
Get something that works and people won't need to be beat over the head with your combination of marketing and forcing it on existing customers. Fuck you Microsoft. Fuck you for advertising yourself.
Do, or do not, stfu until then.
Remember Microsoft's old informal motto: Embrace, Extend, Extinguish?
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
A non-trivial percentage of them are ex-IE devs. Assuming any teammates from 10 years ago are still there, of course.
If it were the olden days I would be more concerned about the EEE approach of old.
But these days? Microsoft really seems committed to a more standards based approach. Probably in part because they want to, but in large part because they no longer have the power to truly pull off the Extend/Extinguish part of the dance. If they go too far people will just keep using Chrome.
If anything I think having Microsoft on board will help keep Google more honest as Microsoft will have a vested interest in the Chromium engine being more reliable, and probably bring in new ideas for development of their own.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
One exploit to rule them all!
I love supporting multiple browsers said no web dev ever. Fuck I hate web dev, the early days were rough.
Security wise I find this a problem though. In the old days when one had a 0day you just ran the other for a bit.
Fix Firefox so that it does useful things again and tons of people would be glad to switch back.
"Chromium is an open-source browser project that forms the basis for the Chrome web browser. But let’s take a little deeper look at what that means.
When Google first introduced Chrome back in 2008, they also released the Chromium source code on which Chrome was based as an open-source project. That open-source code is maintained by the Chromium Project, while Chrome itself is maintained by Google.
The biggest difference between the two browsers is that, while Chrome is based on Chromium, Google also adds a number of proprietary features to Chrome like automatic updates and support for additional video formats. Google also took a similar approach with the Chromium OS, which is an open-source project that forms the basis for their own Chrome OS—the operating system that runs on Chromebooks....."
It can be dangerous...
Chromium is an open-source web browser project. Although Chromium project itself is legitimate, it is often misused as a platform for malicious web browsers categorized as adware and potentially unwanted programs (PUP). ... Clicking these ads is risky and may lead to high-risk adware or malware infections.Feb 20, 2018 How to uninstall Rogue Chromium Browsers - Virus removal instructions...
What is Chromium? Chromium is an open-source web browser project. Although Chromium project itself is legitimate, it is often misused as a platform for malicious web browsers categorized as adware and potentially unwanted programs (PUP). Most infiltrate systems without users’ permission. In addition, these apps continually track Internet browsing activity, generate intrusive advertisements, and cause unwanted browser redirects.
https://www.pcrisk.com/removal...
Not sure I'm entirely comfortable with pretty much everyone except Mozilla jumping on to the Chromium bandwagon.
Lack of choice has never been a good thing, and if everything is running with Chromium at it's heart, there's no choices anymore.
How much data is Google slurping from every Chromium based browser install is another problematic issue.
I'm not a big fan of Edge, but it was an alternative choice from Firefox, Chrome or others. I think choice and diversity in web browsers is ultimately a good thing, since it keeps everything fairly open and sane, since everyone has to cooperate on the standards. If Chromium's engine dominated the web, they can start making tweaks and changes, not telling Mozilla about it, effectively shutting out existing and future competitors. Hmmm. It's play right out of Microsoft's playbook, and you'd be a fool to think Google won't do it.
None of this can ultimately be good for users.
Not sure if that went thru or not.
It would be called? Googzilla? More cowbell? Wagner killed Natalie.
I know there's a lot of people going "Waheyyy!", because microsoft are axing Edge, but this isn't a positive thing in the grand scheme of things.
Back in the IE6 days, nearly every browser was IE6, with nearly 95% market share at it's height. Despite this incredible monopoly over browser share that microsoft had, we still had plenty of competing rendering engines. We had Firefox (Gecko), Safari (Webkit), Opera (Presto), as well as multiple smaller browsers with their own rendering engines, such as KHTML, NetPositive, etc .
Now we're in an era where there's a near monopoly on rendering engines. With Chrome being based on a fork of webkit (blink), Opera using a fork of blink, and Microsoft now also using Blink, we're in an era where there's really only 3 rendering engines now, and 2 of those (Webkit and blink) are nearly brothers. The only true non-related renderer is Firefox's Gecko.
So surely this is a good thing? If everyone uses the same renderer, the web will look much more consistent right? Yes, that's true. But consistency and standards compliance are not the same thing. In the age of IE6, the web was very consistent, as every website was written for the quirks in Trident, but now we're going to see an era where websites are designed for Chrome, because every browser uses the Blink/webkit rendering engine.
This change isn't a positive one, oh no. Quite the opposite
If you gave me a choice between a printer and a giraffe with explosive diarrhoea, i'll get my ladder and my raincoat
TIL Opera is still a thing. I wonder what are the use cases of someone to use that over just regular Chrome/ium.
This just increases the importance of Mozilla's role as the only independent choice.
Funny, all the modern anti-features of Firefox seem to be put there because they are partly owned by Google and other third parties. They are definitely not there because they listened to the actual users of Firefox, nor did they listen to their original mission to build a lean, standards compliant and extensible browser. It is quite standards compliant, but not exactly lean and "extensible" is quite an interesting word if you disable the entire extension ecosystem.
Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
There will be a transition period where Microsoft will be supporting three different browsers and Internet Explorer is to get security updates until 2029 in LTSC versions. Will the old code be thrown away or will it be preserved some how? What will happen to enterprise web apps now edge is avalible on Windows 7?
Why wouldn't Microsoft just open source the Edge HTML engine and let the community participate in its development? We need more browser engines, not less.
From now on we'll basically have Chrome (>90% of the market) and Firefox. Palemoon and others are used by a handful of geeks ...
Sadly Firefox is going it alone these days and was badly losing market share before Microsoft ever hinted at moving away from EdgeHTML engine to chromium. Most users don't care about the browser engine anyway. I doubt Edge suddenly using chromium will affect market share. After all, how many browsers use Blink, Chromium as their engine and still have no market share to speak of.
Be wary...
I fear something coming that may be even worse than having one browser: having one "base" that is been tweaked by each vendor and the results are just slightly incompatible with each other. Use Chromium and Chrome back and forth enough times and you'll see what I mean. Google has done some slight tweaking that makes it not 100% totally identical. Imagine now we have 4 "Chromium" browsers, but each one takes the Chromium code and just adds or tweaks something or adjusts compiler settings to "make it faster" or "make feature X" work. Now what you have is 4 browsers that report to be identical and are treated as identical, but are actually more like 99.98% identical, and that tiny fraction of a percent difference is enough to not prevent things from working at all but just not working right.
I'm picturing a future of Chromium in stock, Chrome, Edge, Opera, and Vivaldi "flavors" - all of which have their own little incompatibilities, something a lot harder to design for and test against than different rendering engines entirely.
This is true, but they can't, because Firefox elected instead to embrace the Chrome add-on model.
They had no choice. Go back and use a pre-change version of Firefox. The performance is terrible. It's single threaded, one thread dying takes down the whole browser, like it's the 1980s again. Can't even be properly sandboxed.
And the add-ons were a security nightmare. Bugs in the add-ons could be exploited by web sites to steal info from the browser or underlying OS.
The add-on API was holding the whole browser back. They could make necessary fixes because it would break add-ons. A clean start was the best of a bunch of bad options, and at least they selected an API that was familiar and allowed porting of many existing add-ons on day one.
Firefox is actually decent again now.
What add-ons are you missing, by the way? Maybe we can suggest some alternatives.
Firefox is making a comeback.... but it's yet to win me back. I moved to PaleMoon a couple years ago and love it. The time I use FF now is when I need to use the add-on Video Download Helper. If something ever goes horribly wrong with PaleMoon, I would likely go back to FF over Chromium. I just don't care for Chrom(e/ium). There are too many things about FF/Palemoon that I find very useful. For instance... for the MANY sites where I have accounts, I like to keep a password hint in the bookmark description. If I forget my password, just right-click on the bookmark, properties, and I see my hint. Years ago when I tried using Chromium for a while, I really missed that feature. I tried one of the encrypted password managers available, but after loading in all my passwords it barfed on something and lost them all. Simple and functional is good... FF got away from that, and Chrom(e/ium) is a bit too simple for me.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Chromiem...
Be honest, how many people are going to install another browser if Edge uses the same rendering engine as Chrome? The only differences between browsers is going to be the UI, and with skinning and add-ons, that won't be enough for many people to bother to install an additional browser. Microsoft will re-dominate the desktop browser share with this change.
Mozilla regularly points out it develops the only independent browser -- meaning it's not tied to a tech company that has priorities which often don't align with the web
From this bit of news which states that Google pays Mozilla 300m per year, no they aren't independent like they claim. But I do understand what they mean though. 2 big companies using the same engine means less "competition". THen again, Microsoft's IE was always problematic and the devs that took care of it didn't seem to know what they were doing most of the time. When you ask any webdev to work on a webpage and request them to be 100% compatible with IE, firefox and google, they started to rip their hair off because they had to get IE compatible with their webpage. So yes, IE was very problematic.
Will Outlook still use Word's rendering engine or Chromium? So sick of coding my emails for the "Outlook Factor".
I mean fuck, they're forcing us to use WebExtensions too.
Mozilla has been a shill to Google's interests since they got funding for Firefox(Or was it the shitty Interpreted XUL based original Mozilla Browser? Did you forget about that one?) which wasn't even an official Mozilla project until they convinced the guy who developed it to join them, coopted leadership of the project, ousted him, then redid it using XUL, even when everyone at the time wanted the original xul-free native widgets that made it faster than all fuck.
While the switch to xul/addons turned out to be a net benefit as the internet fell to spyware, most people forget, or never knew how much faster and leaner the original firefox browser versions were compared to the later XUL ones, because the big push for them came with google support while they were using it as a prop against microsoft while they spun up internal development on Chrome, which if you look at it from a maintainability point of view is an even bigger mess than Gecko/Quantum from a API/ABI point of view.
Regarding alternatives to WebExtensions: They could have spun up instances of XUL based addons on a per-window or per-tab basis, and offered the user the ability to compromise for efficiency or performance in their addon usage rather than losing the public a huge swath of features they feel they need for less choice and ties to a competitor's technology.
But Mozilla has always been a Trojan horse in open source being used by Google in the same way Microsoft used companies in the past to forward its own agenda. Anyone who hasn't realized that by now is truly a huge fool.
Give us speed, privacy, and security in a browser with decent features and the public will flock to you. Skimp on one and you will have users looking elsewhere. Simple as that.
Hosts are actually very limited in the security they provide. It's like using an antivirus software that only checks file names.
It's prone to false positives, such as the advice you posted about blocking Github and Gitlab. While that may block malware, it also blocks lots of useful software that poses no threat.
You've also said that most newly registered domains are used for malicious purposes. New subdomains can also be generated almost endlessly for the same malicious purpose. An approach like yours that relies on blacklisting is horribly ineffective against such threats. Your own words demonstrate why your software provides very limited security.
To me it's irrelevant that I, and most other people, (almost) never used Edge, I liked the fact that there were at least two non-Chrome browsers out there. That helps keep Google honest. A little competition is always a good thing, and now we're heading back to the days of IE6, only replace IE with Chrome and Microsoft with Google.
See subject & KODI malware from ESET listing github as the hosting threat - period/fact https://www.welivesecurity.com... - you lose.
* For such "limited scope" security? How come they were SO effective in this VERY PARTIAL LIST only vs. malware/botnets etc. https://news.slashdot.org/comm...
(Plus MANY security pros DISAGREE w/ you - shall I list them, OR would that "offend" a NOBODY unidentifiable ANONYMOUS troll like you, using FACT that always BLOWS YOU AWAY?)
APK
P.S.=> I didn't say new sites registered are mostly used for malware - the inventors of the VERY 1st ANTIVIRUS did (& yes, they're right) in GDATA https://www.gdatasoftware.com/... & I agree w/ them - I block them as they are discovered (very effective, see 2nd link above & I cover 5++ MILLION of them here - do you? Doubt it)... apk
Innoculate
"classic Windows hosts trick to block the Coinhive or Crypto-Loot domains" - https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/a-new-player-joins-coinhive-on-the-browser-cryptojacking-scene/ - BLEEPING COMPUTER
ZD NET http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-use-a-hosts-file-to-improve-your-internet-experience/ "Hosts files really shine by letting you block ads, spyware sites, malware sites, & tracking sites"
SANS ("A related approach to the DNS issue is to create a hosts file on each system that sends requests for spyware to some place else" hosts by myself & RAMU right @ START of "malware explosion" mid 2005 on) https://isc.sans.edu/forums/di...
Aryeh Goretsky/ESET/NOD32: hosts = good security https://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7442373&.cid=49747129/
Oliver Day (SYMANTEC/SECURITYFOCUS) http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/491/
Spybot S&D uses hosts.
APK
P.S.=> Malwarebytes' hpHosts hosts & RECOMMENDS my program forum.hosts-file.net/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=4290
See subject: When a JEALOUS "Lil' Jowie" YOU does better than I https://news.slashdot.org/comm... ? Then talk, TALKER (all you DO is TALK & spew bullshit like the LOSER you are, lol).
* I haven't forgotten (that You're a joke - exemplary of "idle hands = the DEVIL'S workshop")! ... & me on the other hand, by valid comparison, creates a multiplatform solution vs. threats that SPEEDS YOU UP 2 ways (local fastest possible kernelmode resolution too in hardcoded fav sites you spend most time @ + adblocking (as well as blocking out malicious threats of most ALL kinds + protects you vs. DNS redirect flaw poisoning & dns request logs + 3rd party script trackers)).
APK
P.S.=> Don't you have ANYTHING BETTER to do than be a do-NOTHING zero in life & online like you are? Apparently not (or is it the FACT you lack the SKILLS to do good things others like/use/praise w/ 100,000++ users to my name?)... apk
What substantial difference exists between free Chromium and proprietary Google Chrome other than Flash Player, supported CDMs for EME (HTML5 video DRM), and how crashes are reported? Two years from now, Google plans to drop Flash Player from Google Chrome, leaving even less difference.
I didnt read your post. Ess Pee Aitch.
I also have a usercustomizable falsepositive FILTER list you the user can customize to block ANYTHING you want from being in hosts you yourself tune (beyond what I have in it, like /. sites, antivirus + OS update sites etc. - et al).
* YOU LOSE (again as SECURITY PROS disagree w/ you bigtime https://news.slashdot.org/comm... & STILL MORE AGAIN on ESET noting KODI was indeed GITHUB hosted (can you TRUST that domain OR ANY Subdomains & what comes from them? I don't) https://news.slashdot.org/comm... & apparently, neither do security pros...)
APK
P.S.=> No "small wonder" you STALK me by UNIDENTIFIABLE anonymous like the LOSER you are - all you KNOW HOW TO DO vs. me? Is LOSE... apk
Proof I give users what they want (& yes, use) https://slashdot.org/comments.... see post parent to it - would you like more like that?
Ask & "ye SHALL receive" (by the dozens from our own REGISTERED /. peers (who aren't trying to IMPERSONATE a /. editor like YOU are no less)).
* Bitch all you like about ME (& yes, you are, unquestionably) but WHY DON'T YOU DO BETTER THAN THAT YOURSELF?
APK
P.S.=> The ONLY THING holding you down on that note is YOU (& your lack of will to do so)... apk
They failed in all new tech, except in cloud-computing, but where they had to actually offer Linux. As such, MS is not just an ordinary computing company, no better than its competition. Past experience shows however that MS has consistent sub-standard quality and could only survive on a monopoly. That monopoly gone, MS is dead. As any giant, it will take quite a while to die though.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
See subject: That's all I need w/ proof of it https://news.slashdot.org/comm... - THIS may help "INSPIRE YOU" as it did me (that's what GREAT FOLKS DO, it's their GREATEST ability imo) https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
* ... & YOU need to believe in yourself & do the same (or better than I have)
(1st 2 minutes says it all - what a GREAT person (speaking as a former NCAA 1st string athlete myself albeit in the sport of Lacrosse for a soon to be THEN national champion)).
APK
P.S.=> What I do know is that with a LITTLE EFFORT, desire & "intestinal fortitude" ANYONE can do good things - why don't YOU try it vs. BITCHING as you did "wannabe BeauHD" https://news.slashdot.org/comm... ? I don't "brag" either - I merely state FACTS w/ backing proof (the ULTIMATE WEAPON vs. naysayers & trolls)... apk
Your software is just fine - well written, functional... I'm going to continue using the Host File Engine by mmell February 17, 2017
Your premise that hostfiles are a good way to deal with advertising and malvertising is quite valid - by JazzLad April 20, 2016
his hosts program is actually pretty good by xenotransplant August 10 2015
his hosts tool is actually useful for those cases in which one does indeed want to locally block stuff outright while consuming minimum system resources by alexgieg September 25 2015
I like your host file system by Karmashock September 09 2015
that APK guy, I use his host file by rogoshen1 Tuesday March 03, 2015
I personally use a HOSTS file blocker produced from a genius called APK by 110010001000 October 27 2017
* SEE SUBJECT & TELL US: How does EATING YOUR WORDS taste?
APK
P.S.=> You're already VASTLY OUTNUMBERED but many more are coming
Apk has the answer for that - really... kill automatic updates by adding a hosts file entry setting updates.steam.com or whatever to 127.0.0.1. You have to find the right hostname for each software you want to block updates on by raymorris (2726007) on Friday July 06, 2018
APK your posts on this and the hosts file posts, and more, have never been in error and/or bad advice by BlueStrat (756137) on Wednesday June 21, 2017
I support APK's stand on the hosts file and can't see why it's not used more than it is. My hosts file is 144247 lines long (4,332 Kb) it & a firewall serves me very well - by Trax3001BBS (2368736)
ABP is insufficient as a solid hosts file does everything APK reminds us about fast turtle September 17 2013
You need APK's hosts file - by Teun (17872) on Wednesday August 06, 2014
APK
P.S.=> You EATING YOUR WORDS != GOOD NUTRITION... apk
APK is totally right on this count. Adblock Plus on Firefox mobile is a dog on older, or lower end, phones. A hostfile based adblocker makes for a much better experience in this context. Of course, your phone has to be rooted, which isn't the case with Firefox + adblock." - by chihowa on Saturday May 16, 2015
APK solution STILL relevant Thud457 June 11 2015
In a footnote, I would like to note that I find your hosts file admirable - by vel-ex-tech (4337079) on Tuesday November 24, 2015
APK's monolithic hosts file is looking pretty good at the moment - by Culture20 on Thursday November 17
you're right about hosts files - by drinkypoo (153816) on Thursday May 26
APK, I know people give you a lot of shit regarding hosts, but please don't ever stop - by nasredin (958927) on Friday June 12, 2015 @03:34PM
APK
P.S.=> Are you ENJOYING the taste of EATING YOUR WORDS yet?... apk
(APK) is still right a hosts file really does work. It even blocked a some of the video ads that were inserted into a stream OrangeTide February 10 2016
the Host File Engine performs exactly as promised - by mmell (832646) on Thursday February 16, 2017
I do use APK's host file on all my systems at home by OrangeTide December 01 2017
I've never tried to belittle (APK's work), I've flat out said it's good - by BronsCon (927697) on Thursday February 11, 2016 @06:48PM (#51491263)
* Toss on 100,000++ users worldwide too!
APK
P.S.=> You still haven't said how EATING YOUR WORDS tastes? apk
APK is kinda right... I've given up on JS based adblocking and gone to blackholing in /etc/hosts, just like it was back in the 90s. The computational load has gotten intolerable for any ad-blocking using JS. I've tried his hosts file generating software. It works. - by bmo (77928) on Thursday October 15, 2015
get around to 'installing' a hosts file list, not sure which one, likely the one from someonewhocares.org. If it works as well as what I used for a while about ten years ago, I'll be happy. And grateful to APK for the lesson and the reminder. - by kermidge (2221646) on Wednesday March 27
I actually went and downloaded a 16k line hosts file and started using that after seeing that post, you know just for trying it out. some sites load up faster. - by gl4ss (559668) on Thursday November 17
dammit MS, you proved APK right about something by lgw
APK
P.S.=> Your words YOU'RE EATING: You choking on them yet?... apk
See subject & PROOF what I do works & WHY (not "ne'er-do-well" chatter like you - I get a job done) https://news.slashdot.org/comm...
* :)
(You WISH you were me & ME? I don't just WISH to be as great as I can be (like a hero of mine Marcus Allen) - I get out there & DO IT & it works (proof's all there))
APK
P.S.=> I never said "hosts protect vs. all things" (nothing does) - only that hosts do MORE for FAR LESS & natively vs. "Bolt-on-'MoAr'" ILLOGIC-LOGIC that is full of security issues & SLOWDOWN + resource hogging (DNS/Antivirus e.g.) & that hosts DO work (plenty of proof of that) - you've done BETTER? Hell no, lol... apk
The rendering engine is just one piece of what makes a browser. You know they will have to make major tweaks to it to implement the corporate Active Directory security policies. Then they'll try to find a way to make it compatible with SharePoint, and ActiveX. By the time they're done, it won't look or act anything like Chrome.
Google is helping al-Qaeda censor the internet.
They and their partners intentionally rig information services to control elections so that the winners won't prosecute them, they will suppress their political opposition, and they keep getting government funding.
Google Is Not What It Seems
Don't choose to take a proprietor's side or believe that monopoly power is somehow outside the realm of possibility. Monopolists (which every software proprietor is for that software) have the power to choose what that software does, leaving users out. Decisions like what Opera, Microsoft, and Google are embarking on with their proprietary derivatives of Chromium put those proprietors in power.
It took the world's largest antitrust trials to make Microsoft behave a little better in some respects, but by other perfectly reasonable measurements nothing substantive has changed—Windows, MSIE, and most of the software Microsoft has released remain proprietary (nonfree, user-subjugating). The software most computer users use on their own computers is proprietary. Thus there's no clear signal that proprietary power over the user is now undesirable.
Digital Citizen
Their market share is solidly under 5% now. When they decided to kill the chrome/xul-based addons last year, they have been losing what little market share they had. What they say really doesn't matter anymore.
Seriously, a champion of script kiddies being a brat again.