It's a fair point, but what is the pitch meant to be now? "We're reskinned Chrome"? If I wanted reskinned Chrome I'd use Brave. Which in fact I do want and do use.
Firefox isn't owed a market. Google have proved themselves, so far, to be better stewards of the world's browser engine than the people at Mozilla. It might have a new era in the sun one day, but right now there really isn't much of a niche for Firefox. And the fact that Chrome overran Firefox does sit with the Mozilla, whatever the argument is about competitive practices. Chrome was (likely: still is) just technically better.
If Google did that, we'd be better off with the Mozilla corporation taking over Chromium development than continuing to develop Gecko.
The erosion of interest in Firefox over the years raises a pretty basic question: if Google followed through with that scenario, how effective would Firefox be? They're got steamrolled in the last decade with massive amounts of funding (from Google).
Brave is literally showing that if someone wants to compete with Google, they're going to start with chromium as a base. Your argument is similar to "if someone wants to compete with Google, they need to be able to use Gecko/Webkit!". People with skin in the game are saying whatever the theoretical merits are to your argument, it is wrong. Gecko isn't part of the competitive equation any more.
Why does the world need another Chromium reskin? What's the point of a Firefox that's just Chrome? How is it competing to slap your brand on top of a competitor's product like you're reselling wholesale electronics from an overseas manufacturer?
Look at Edge's market share and explain to me how Mozilla is going to deliver a better Chrome reskin than Microsoft with a tiny fraction of the budget.
Well it's a little bit of both so I think he has every reason to also attribute competition. Firefox has definitely borrowed a few ideas and motivation from Chrome, and vice versa.
The competition between firefox and chrome is friendly competition. They're both opensource browsers that follow web standards so we aren't losing much by chrome gaining market share at the expense of firefox.
If it were losing ground to internet explorer that would have been another issue though. As a result I don't really see the need for a fork of firefox. All they need to do is just focus of making a great browser. We're all fighting on the same side.
(FWIW, I don't give a crap about up/downvotes, I want to engage in a deep discussion.)
Back in the day when it was FF vs. Microsoft Internet Explorer the need for a competing FOSS browser seemed very compelling, but I don't think FF won marketshare on that, rather it won on merits: FF was better than IE.
Today the situation seems different. To me it seems to make sense to let the engine become a standardized component (developed FOSS-style) incorporating work by Google for speed, security, and reliability, and let the diversity and competition happen on a higher, more user-facing level, in terms of policy and politics and UI/UX and so on.
The so called 'open web' has been a myth for years (and it still is) and the exchange of dominance between Microsoft's Internet Explorer hated by the tech crowd and have now instead cheered on the dominance of Google's Chrome Browser has been an example of not only history repeating itself but also rhyming.
Mozilla's Firefox was ahead of IE at one point, but then they did absolutely nothing to keep it up and stop Chrome's ascension to the browser throne and perhaps they themselves believed that they didn't need to fully depend on Google millions of $ at one point. [0] That was in 2007, it has been 15 years and they are still dependent on them which is a complete failure in moving the needle to stopping and moving away from them.
Mozilla hasn't even been effective at stopping anything that Google pushes into Chrome such as the DRM proposals and they still implemented it anyway despite push back from their 'users'. That decision already has destroyed this 'open web' narrative.
It is not early days anymore and the billions of people do not care about Firefox and even if you gave them that choice on iOS, they are very likely to choose Chrome or a Chrome-variant as their browser; at worse Safari will become their second choice. On Android, we already have seen this browser choice in place and the result? Is is still exactly them same. Chrome wins again.
On the desktop, Brave tried to use Firefox Gecko as their engine years ago but gave up and switched to Chromium's engine. The rest of the other Firefox-derivations are either outdated or dead. Perhaps the problem is Firefox itself not being able to be competitive enough and just got lazy on Google's money.
So here we are once again, Mozilla is still crying to congress about their inability to compete. Sounds like an indication that Firefox is getting increasingly irrelevant.
The browser space is extremely competitive because it has been driven for decades by corporations seeking to dominate the field, and that naturally leads to Byzantine complexity and high barrier for any competition.
Mozilla really needs to find ways to generate profits and in turn, channel the lion's share of those profits into their browser. But this is a hard proposition when giant corporations give away their browsers for free and even bundle it hard with their operating systems. The unfairness of Mozilla's browser endeavour is stark when you stop to think about it.
Maybe we the collective really do deserve our corporate overlords because we can't be bothered to pay for something when a free version also exists. This not only applies to Firefox but is a big reason why nearly all the top OSS are struggling to reach parity with their commercial counterparts.
How many of us will pay Office/Adobe licenses but if LibreOffice or Gimp ask for payment, we won't? The reason is vendor lock-in and feature-wise inferiority of the open source counterparts, but if no one uses them, then like the proverbial chicken-and-egg, they will never be able to compete, and will only slowly fade away.
Ugh, really? Perhaps the author hasn't checked the latest market share statistics for Internet Explorer? If FireFox couldn't kill IE when it was the technologically superior browser, then why would Chrome kill Firefox?
I'll tell you why: Google has lot's o' cash and just might start paying OEMs to install Chrome in place of IE. That's something that Mozilla can't do (at least, not on the same scale as Google), and most people use the browser that's installed for them anyway. So what should Mozilla do?
Well, here's a thought: once Google starts paying OEMs to install Chrome, Microsoft is going to have to take a long, hard look at what they're doing in the browser space. Once they do that, they'll find there's no compelling reason to keep draining resources into the black hole that is Trident. That leaves them two choices: WebKit or Gecko. WebKit might be the obvious choice, since it would bring them close to feature parity with Chrome, and isn't controlled by an ex-arch-nemesis.
On the other hand, the Mozilla foundation could write a couple of nice, soothing, "I'm sorry for that whole anti-trust litigation deal" letters to Ballmer. That way they could swap one sugar-daddy (Google) for another (Microsoft), give Microsoft the rendering engine they so desperately need, and continue to develop XUL and Firefox off on their own.
So why doesn't the government get in and break apart that monopoly that is Chrome, today?
Chrome has the highest market share of internet browsers ~this side of the great firewall~ worldwide (just checked, still is the case in China today, assumed it changed)! Far worse has been done to companies with less control over their respective markets.
I am being a bit facetious when it comes to features though, fully admit, FF is better in getting a few of those, and don't deny history especially with Firebug.
Yes that's a fair point agreed . If every platform were like that then Mozilla would never have even existed, but Chrome gaining even more market wouldn't be great either
Of course not. But perhaps they should have been ;-p. In 2010 Firefox's market share peaked[1]. Chrome has spanked Mozilla for a decade and Mozilla haven't effectively competed (to me apparently by choice of their focus).
Meanwhile the Chrome team has beaten Mozilla at open source, which should be Mozilla's strength (V8, node.js, Electron, closure compiler, remote debugging, Samsung browser, Edge 76, Chromium, etc etc). The brightest non-browser component to come out of Mozilla to me is rust, which is a tour de force (Mozilla does have some serious technical chops), and as a developer mdn is superb.
Mozilla chased multiple dead-ends during that time, perhaps most notably Firefox OS (even though gonk was based on Android? [2]).
that may be so (although i thought that firefox has diversified recently and doesn't depend as much on google anymore) but:
who else is going to do it?
firefox still has the best chance.
the more popular firefox gets the easier it should be to get alternate funding.
a premium browser would not sell. browsers are like operating systems. they only provide value through the content snd applications they enable. browsers are no longer interesting in themselves. noone actually cares. the only thing that matters is, how many websites are not broken.
that's why edge is building on chrome. it's the only way to ensure that they stop breaking websites.
brave has an interesting business model (and i am not saying i like it) by motivating its users to pay for content and taking a cut.
If there is at least one alternative that is significant, then by definition it's not "effectively a monoculture".
In any case, market share is the least important factor here. As long as we have an intolerant minority (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27262240) that does not want be subject to Chromium as the only open source project, we will be fine.
Mozilla is screwing up badly, and I switched to Brave mostly because I believe that they are building a stronger artillery to fight surveillance capitalism (as in, Mozilla gives you wishy-washy feel-good words, Brave gives you money), but this does not mean that Mozilla needs to go away. Quite the opposite: I still hope that we see a "Next acquires Apple for negative $400 million" story. If Firefox builds integration with Brave's network and also adopts BAT, I would go back to it in a heartbeat.
> I disagree that (...) would hinder evolution. Competition in this space will continue to drive innovation even with a single agreed upon rendering engine.
God, no! The worrying thing is not that the development of the web specs would stagnate. The problem is that the development would only happen in the direction that benefits them and that they would be completely unchecked.
An argument to choose FF over Edge, or other chromium based browsers is to try to maintain diversity in the browser market share. Right now Chrome dominates, but if the domination switches a split between Chrome, Brave, and Edge, there is no new diversity in the rendering and Javascript engines. Google can still push things that aren't friendly to an open and standardized web.
But Chrome already has a stranglehold on the majority market.
In my opinion, Mozilla should put the vast majority of their energy and resources towards targeting power users and developers - they've already lost the other battle.
My thinking was that Mozilla could have a significant market share (30%+) through a better browser, therefore having a say in standards. It would also implement and adapt the Mozilla Chromium branch in its best interest.
Vs now having Google do whatever it wants as most people use Chrome anyway.
Let’s be honest here. If that happens , Chrome wins cause developers interest do not align with consumer interest but money interest. Understand I’m not saying that Developers go for the money, I’m saying the majority of companies that employ developers do and they will target chrome. Firefox by itself is not enough to fend off Chromes “standards” and the only thing ironically stopping Chrome dominance is stagnation not completion.
And they do need to do that. Browser makers having alternative revenue streams and reasons outside the browser-as-a-window to exist is necessary. One reason Firefox was losing market share is that it was just a window. Google, Apple, MS all provide a competitively good window but have other footprint on the web and can provide integrated services as a result.
One of the best parts about Brave is that they are trying to build independent revenue streams from things like integrated Jitsi features, an independent search engine and the like. Vivaldi builds in things like mail clients, RSS readers and a rudimentary notetaking tool.
In that vein, Pocket is a really good thing, and also helps combat link rot. The vocal Firefox userbase is moronically hostile to add-on services though, even if they are the ultimate key to Firefox's health.
.png){kind=link}
Firefox isn't owed a market. Google have proved themselves, so far, to be better stewards of the world's browser engine than the people at Mozilla. It might have a new era in the sun one day, but right now there really isn't much of a niche for Firefox. And the fact that Chrome overran Firefox does sit with the Mozilla, whatever the argument is about competitive practices. Chrome was (likely: still is) just technically better.
reply