I just saw a post complaining about the Mozilla layoffs.
I wanted to point out that the vast majority of their income (over 85% in 2022) is from having Google as the default search engine - Ironically, the anti monopoly lawsuit against Google will end this.
Expect things to get worse.
Please don’t assume it was just a cruel choice.
Mozilla CEO is paid 7million a year. I don’t have the number for the rest of the board, but it should be in the same range. I think that when people say this was a cruel choice, they talk about firing people instead of decreasing executive salaries.
Mozilla does not look any reliable for people that loves FOSS, yet our current web seems like it’s either Firefox/Gecko or Chrome/Chromium browsers. I wish people were more aware of emergent projects like Servo or Ladybird - even better if they could donate to them. I’m positive either of them could be a serious competitor to the Chrome hegemony.
You are really underestimating the complexity of the task of building a web engine.
Another problem is that Chrome is already ubiquitous and most of the web sites are simply ignoring the Gecko and only optimise against Chromium.
Don’t get me wrong, I truly wish we had more completion and I hope those projects take off and with time become a viable alternative of Chromium but I am somehow doubtful.
You’re right about the fact that building an engine is hard, but Socraticly speaking, then why are there so many blink-based browsers and so few gecko-based ones? The answer is because blink is easy to embed in a new project and gecko isn’t.
If Mozilla really wants to take back the web (and I honestly don’t think they actually do), then what they should really be doing is making gecko as easy to embed in a new browser as blink is. They don’t do this, and I suspect that they have ulterior motives for doing so, but if they did, I think we would be much closer to breaking chrome’s grasp on the web.
Because let’s face it: Mozilla makes a pretty damn good browser engine. But they don’t really make a compelling browser based off it. Ever noticed how Mozilla has been declining ever since they deprecated XPCOM extensions? It’s because when they provided XPCOM, it enabled users to actually build cool and interesting new features. And now that they’ve taken it away, all innovation in browser development has stagnated (save for the madlads making Vivaldi).
They need to empower others to build the browser that they can’t. That’s what would really resurrect the glory days of Firefox in my opinion.
You’re right about the fact that building an engine is hard, but Socraticly speaking, then why are there so many blink-based browsers and so few gecko-based ones? The answer is because blink is easy to embed in a new project and gecko isn’t.
Okay, that’s an interesting point. I mean, there are forks galore of Firefox so I’m not entirely sure I understand. But certainly chromium-based browsers have been getting more traction.
But wasn’t the original point something about how hard it is to make a browser?
And if I have this right you’re suggesting that it would be achievable for Firefox to make an accessible browser tool kit but they’re not due to ulterior motives?
I’m not sure I understand that, either in terms of motive or just impractical terms what it is you think they’re doing to make it hard to develop.
chrome enshitification made me switch back to firefox after 7ish years of using it as my daily driver and likewise was true for netscape.
those two previous experiences tell me that i need to start making preparations to switch away from firefox; but i can’t bring myself to do it because all of the other viable alternatives are chrome based. since google already has begun publicly enshitifying chrome further i think i’ll end up going with just about any other browser project that i can find and i think that these two are the two most likely candidates.
are you aware of any others?
Its in a very alpha state, but check out Zen browser. Based on Firefox, incredibly fast and customizable. Their github page: https://github.com/zen-browser/desktop
Various websites suck in one browser or the other or simply don’t work in more than one single browser. We’re not that far away from the days when Internet Explorer (IE) was the only thing that loaded a site (often for something work-related… groan)
That said, if you need Chrom(e/ium) and want a non-data-sucking version, I think Ungoogled Chromium is your best bet currently.
For the Firefox side of things, there are already several forks that aim to do things differently/better. Floorp is one I see recommended regularly. There seem to be a larger number of Firefox forks focusing on security/privacy than Google forks, but this is the most well-regarded from my research.
Simultaneous post-enshittification from both Chrome/Chromium and Firefox is probably (hopefully) leading towards more active development/contribution to these (and other) forks!
Mozilla does not look any reliable
People keep saying this, but why? Because if it’s anything like what people have been saying in these Lemmy threads, good god.
Ironically, the anti monopoly lawsuit against Google will end this.
People are quick to assume this, and there’s a very good chance that they’re right, but I don’t think we should take it as a given. It’s always possible that there could be some sort of court decision that allows Google to keep funding Mozilla after the “breakup” is complete.
In any case, we don’t yet know what the outcome of the antitrust case will be, so I think it might be best to avoid making statements of certainty like this until we see how things really shake out.
We should definitely take the possibility of this happening very seriously though.
Found the one sane comment in this entire thread.
Google may or may not stop paying Mozilla as part of the antitrust scrutiny. I have no idea if there’s actual reporting to this effect, or any form of legal analysis suggesting this is the most plausible outcome. If anything, antitrust scrutiny might lead to this funding being more secure and more robust.
So this might not happen, but this whole threads carrying on like it’s a fait accompli.
I think one thing you guys should keep in the back pocket, is that Mozilla jobs are the outlier. The average Open Source Developer salary is very close to the US Federal poverty line. They’re paid mostly in comped passes to conventions. Most of the “averages” you see are compiled from data from companies like Mozilla. OSS devs are typically make around $30k in pure cash, even for ones working on large projects. The only OSS devs that make between the $95k and $150k (25th and 75th percentiles) you’ll see online are ones that work for Mozilla, or Intel, or whoever.
What makes this possible is MIT licensing models that corpos shilled in the 2000’s and 2010’s that directly benefit corperate engineering costs, but don’t contribute back nearly the value they extract. If the majority was GPL + copyright assignment, there would be income streams for leveraging OSS projects in closed source applications via licensing deals.
But the genie is out of the bottle on most of these things. See how Amazon is effectively forking an destroying existing OSS models via AWS provisioning of things like redis and elasticache.
Why keep people on a payroll if you can get volunteers, for free!? People here really that dumb?
