• @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    1252 years ago

    Google accounts for some 80%+ of Mozilla’s revenue. Firefox struck a different kind of deal with the devil than chromium browsers, but Google is the one pulling the strings.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        42 years ago

        For an example, Mozilla being forced to use Google Location Services as default even though Mozilla has its own. I am also a Firefox user but it always makes me wonder what other TnCs forced on Mozilla as part of the search deal.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        202 years ago

        What narrative? Firefox is the only browser google doesn’t fully control. It’s the only choice if you don’t support the google monopoly.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          72 years ago

          Well, there’s Safari but that’s for apple only, and technically they don’t really control chromium-based browsers - they’d have to do yet another cycle of EEE to actually kill of competition. And firefox can survive without google for a while by downsizing massively and focusing on chinese market as they still have that baidu deal AFAIK.

          But overall, yes, Google has in fact cemented themselves as the middlemen for all things internet, on both mobile and desktop.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      32 years ago

      For default search.

      I’m sure you’re aware Firefox isn’t in the search market. They are in the browser market and need to fund browser development. They’ve used Yahoo in the past and will go with whatever deal gives the best value. They could go with Bing if they wanted.

      Funding from them does not mean control, and your insinuation is misleading and false.

    • Random Dent
      link
      fedilink
      602 years ago

      Bit of a weird thought, but I wonder also if they see Mozilla as a sort of controlled opposition too? As in, keep Firefox around so they don’t get in trouble over antitrust or something like that?

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        692 years ago

        Mozilla.org is the corpse of Netscape that Google keeps animated so that it looks like they have competition when they really don’t.

        The existence of Firefox is something they can point to to say they’re not a monopoly. The fact that 80% of the revenue Firefox receives is from Google means that Google effectively controls them. Mozilla has to weigh every decision against the risk that it will cause Google to withdraw their funding. That severely restricts the choices they’re willing to consider.

        Firefox is only 5% of browsers, so it really doesn’t matter to Google if that 5% of users considers using a different search engine. Because of the Firefox user base, many of them will have already switched search engines, and because Google is such a dominant player, many others would switch back to Google if the browser used a different default. So, maybe 10% of that 5% would permanently switch search engines if Google stopped paying. Is that really worth billions per year? Probably not. But, pretending like you have competitors in the browser space and using that to push back on antitrust, that’s definitely worth billions per year.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          202 years ago

          Google makes something like $100 Billion a year in search ad revenue. 5% of that is $5 Billion.

          It’s odd that people think Google is incredibly worried about having too large of a market share in the browser market (which they don’t make any money from) yet their 92% market share in searches is not concerning at all in terms of the potential for regulation.

          The truth is nobody does anti-trust anymore (though they definitely should) and the big corporations aren’t worried at all about it. Google makes Chrome, Android, and pays Mozilla because they want to maintain dominance in the search market. Which is the thing they make money form. What they pay Mozilla is a drop in the bucket compared to what they pay Apple to be the default search engine on their devices.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            32 years ago

            Google doesn’t directly make money from their browser, but controlling their browser means they lock in the thing that drives their revenues. They can always test it out against all their ads and make sure it works, putting out a fix if it ever doesn’t. We’ve also seen recently how they’re trying to make it so people can’t run ad blockers, something they could only consider if they lock down the entire browser market.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              English
              52 years ago

              I disagree.

              Google doesn’t “control” mozilla in that way.

              They can always test it out against all their ads and make sure it works, putting out a fix if it ever doesn’t.

              They could do this even if they weren’t funding mozilla. Ad’s aren’t exactly reliant on bleeding edge web standards anyway. You’re thinking about tracking tech, which they don’t have any input in for firefox.

              We’ve also seen recently how they’re trying to make it so people can’t run ad blockers

              Well yes, and mozilla was quite vocal in their opposition, demonstrating that Google doesn’t have much control over them.

        • trashcan
          link
          fedilink
          English
          852 years ago

          I see that as an okay compromise. Anyone who cares will also know how to change it easily.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            292 years ago

            And I actually wouldn’t have a problem with using google for searches if it weren’t for the fact they constantly do the captcha thing when I’m connecting via VPN. Captchas for a simple google search.

            I’m not against google making money off of a good product, but they’ve enshittified it too much to be considered good now.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            162 years ago

            A lot of people don’t bother with changing defaults and corpos like Google, Microsoft, and the likes are well aware of this which is why Google pays Mozilla hundreds of millions of dollars per year to be the default search engine.

            I understand the compromise at the surface level but the implications just result in Google gaining more power and data, making it harder for “alternatives” to replace it over time which puts us all in an a bad situation when they decide to pull shit like WEI.

            • trashcan
              link
              fedilink
              English
              82 years ago

              That’s a good point, though I still think the average person is already entrenched in Google. Being the default on an alternative browser isn’t really going to make the difference to the average, uncaring individual.

              In a perfect world it wouldn’t be necessary but on the bright side Google search is already doing enough itself to make the average person want to try something else.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    62 years ago

    Am I crazy for using Opera? I switched from chrome 3 years ago and have enjoyed everything about Opera even their “gamer” browser OperaGX is just a great experience.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      102 years ago

      I haven’t used Opera in a long time, but I used it heavily 20 years ago. Back then you had to pay for it or there was a big ad banner on the toolbar.

      It certainly wasn’t always Chromium based, Chrome didn’t come along until 2009 or something. Not sure when that change happened.

      If I had to go back to that job I was doing (Internet Help desk) again, I’d consider Opera again. It was fast at navigating an intranet site where all the images were cached locally, but the killer feature for me was the back/forward. If you went back, all the stuff you typed in the form was still there. So you could resubmit it if the session had timed out or there was an issue.

      I still use mouse gestures (an Opera thing) via extensions with whatever browser I have used since.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      122 years ago

      The company’s history is not that great, they’ve done some shady shit before. Vivaldi is where the original opera folks are at now.

    • Sudoer777
      link
      fedilink
      3
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      Didn’t they allow Microsoft telemetry through the tracking protection since they rely on Microsoft for all sorts of stuff despite their “avoid big tech” advertising? There’s so many better options, like Librewolf, Mullvad, Orion, Mull, even Brave if you really want a Chromium browser.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      132 years ago

      Pretty sure that’s chromium too. I’d rather just use Chrome though. I’m pretty sure duck duck go sells user data. At least with Google they tell you what they use your data for instead of acting like they are saving the world.

      Their entire business model is just reading Google’s TOS and finding some small detail to make a big deal out of that really means nothing.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        12 years ago

        Duckduckgo doesn’t have anywhere near the capacity to collect data that google does, and their ads are keyword based, rather than being influenced by other data. Their search engine is really the only thing I’d recommend using however since their add-on and browser don’t offer anything that others don’t.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          22 years ago

          Because of all their “anti tracking” stuff just borks scripts that aren’t nefarious but necessary for sites to function. Its a pain when customers use it and think that our site is broken when it’s just duck duck go

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      12
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      Anything that uses the electron framework uses chromium.

      Although in the case of steam they are using the Chromium Embedded Framework(CEF) to embed the steam store into their interface, as well as to power the steam overlays browser.

      The worst part is, the CEF really is the only way to implement browsers inside other interfaces. OBS uses it too for it’s browser source. There really isn’t any alternatives - if only FF could create it’s own Firefox Embedded Framework to compete, but that’s probably not in the cards due to costs. Mozilla is a not for profit relying on donations and grants.

      And electron is a method for creating desktop app interfaces using website code, it’s used for the interfaces of Discord, slack, teams, Streamlabs (yeah they ripped out the OBS Qt interface and replaced it with electron), and sooo many other modern applications that it’s hard to make track of. And it uses essentially the same thing as CEF at its heart.

      Basically any website can be wrapped in an electron wrapper to produce a standalone desktop app.

    • Redex
      link
      fedilink
      292 years ago

      Yeah, just wrappers. Steam wasn’t untill fairly recently, but they were slowly switching to it for some time.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          182 years ago

          Yeah, it’s weird for them to rely on Google considering how hard Valve has worked to make Steam independent from MS.

          • Redex
            link
            fedilink
            32 years ago

            I don’t think it’s too weird. So many apps today are just Chromium wrappers. It’s just easier to use a premade base, plus you don’t have to develop the web and desktop version independently, they can literally be the same code.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              32 years ago

              While that’s fairly typical and good practice in dev circles, we’re talking about a company that’s single handedly elevated an entire OS to prevent a big company taking too much power. I think the key here is they don’t really compete with Google.

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                12 years ago

                I mean what would stop a company from doing that? I get why they don’t, because a lot of changes and fixes get implemented into the code from various companies/individuals, but if you had enough manpower and money, it could be done.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              English
              62 years ago

              It’s maintained by Google, which is pretty much the same thing - in the end, they get to decide what features get implemented and what doesn’t make the cut. Sure we can fork it, and we can make our own, but in the end as long as their code is the main base, they have a lot of control over all the different forks, as usually the forks will have to keep rebasing their code off of new updates to stay as secure and up to date as possible.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            62 years ago

            It probably doesn’t matter for what they do. There isn’t really much need for an ad blocker on a browser that’s going to a store page which is essentially an ad for a product in and of itself. A steam user actually wants that store page to load, why would there be a need for a store page?

            And they could transition to something else if Google does something that affects them.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      712 years ago

      Yep, just like slack, spotify, and anything else looking fancy while wasting few gigs of ram to just open. They’re built on electron, which is practically chrome without tabs.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        242 years ago

        I wish they could bring back mozilla prism. Like all this electron web app shit is popular, so we don’t we use the faster and more efficient browser engine and use gecko!

          • setVeryLoud(true);
            link
            fedilink
            1
            edit-2
            2 years ago

            Nice, I didn’t know Servo was still being developed!

            This whole Chromium fiasco is partially Mozilla’s fault, they let Google grab the embedded browser monopoly by making Firefox hard to componentize and letting Electron take all the market share. No competition.

    • nyoooom
      link
      fedilink
      62 years ago

      Safari might have better performance than others but I feel like the UI is pretty clunky, and as a développer, god I HATE safari and all their differences with every other major browser.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        22 years ago

        A developer friend told me the same… it’s a shame because it’s so handy with continuity between devices and all. Probably I’m just used to it

      • Sudoer777
        link
        fedilink
        2
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        There’s Orion browser, which is made by the Kagi search people. It is based on Safari, has vertical tabs, has built in ad blocking, and supports Chrome and Firefox extensions so you can install uBO. It doesn’t fix the developer issues, but you might like it better than Safari, and it’s not Chromium based like Arc browser.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    22 years ago

    Real talk, if even Steam is Chromium-based, how can I escape? Is there a non- or less-evil, but similar launcher? I’m trying to shift away, but it’s really difficult since everyone I know uses at least one, usually many of those programs.

  • Resol van Lemmy
    link
    fedilink
    242 years ago

    Safari still uses the WebKit engine… right?

    Google Chrome used to use WebKit before switching to their own weird engine that a whole bunch of other browsers now use.

  • m-p{3}
    link
    fedilink
    582 years ago

    Mozilla doesn’t make it as easy to use the Firefox / Gecko engine in other projects, which doesn’t help for adoption.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      92 years ago

      I’m way out of the loop, but is the issue that they actively make it difficult to use the rendering engine or is it that the cost to modularize it isn’t worth the payoff to Firefox itself? A subtle but important distinction IMO. I always felt it was the second, but maybe I was being dense?

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        42 years ago

        They don’t try to make it difficult, but they make code changes that make it clear they have no concern for anyone who might be trying to use the engine anywhere other than in a retail build of Firefox, without providing things like deprecation warnings or upgrade paths.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        62 years ago

        Back in the days it was possible to use Firefox engine to create apps. It was called XUL. Heck, Firefox itself was just a XUL app! But then they decided it wasn’t worth it for whatever reason and now their engine is tightly integrated.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          42 years ago

          I believe it might be still possible with UXP - a hard fork made for Pale Moon project.

          Pale Moon is based on a derivative of the Gecko rendering engine (Goanna) and builds on a hard fork of the Mozilla code (mozilla-central) called UXP, a XUL-focused application platform that provides the underpinnings of several XUL applications including Pale Moon. This means that the core rendering functions for Pale Moon may differ from Firefox (and other browsers) and websites may display slightly different in this browser.

  • [email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    562 years ago

    Firefox is kept alive by Google default search money AFAIK otherwise why don’t they sue google for showing different search results page in firefox

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          4
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          They do have an extension that forces the new search results page, but I’ve noticed it freezes the browser if I tap on an image result, so I have it disabled.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            12 years ago

            I completely forgot I had added that extension (back when Google actually looked ugly on Firefox on Android without it) just disabled and oh my god not only does it not freeze it actually feels usable again (I hate the weird AI suggested tabs at the top in the chromium UI).