Mastodawn

Tonks Moriarty Apr 11, 2024

In 2020, Mozilla signed a deal with Google for them to pay $450 million a year until 2024 to be the default search engine. This is 50% higher than what Mozilla got from Google a decade ago, despite a shrinking market share for Firefox. To make it even more painfully obvious how much Mozilla gets from this, this money makes up roughly ninety percent of their income.

Oh, yes, did I mention this contract is due to be renewed in 2024? I wonder if that has any bearings on this AI push by Mozilla. I wonder if there’s a risk that the Google money will dry up?

Mozilla is desperate to divest its income stream because it is reliant on essentially being a controlled opposition to Chrome to survive.

Mozilla may be a non-profit, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need money and it certainly doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to pay it’s costs. Mozilla is based in San Francisco, and therefore needs to pay the going rate for the developers and staff it needs (not to mention real estate). It needs to play with and against the other big boys in California, while also being a non-profit.

ch0ccyra1n is leaving fedi soon Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j robs a bank and donates all the money to Mozilla there I fixed it

neocat_think_googly

ExperiencersInternational

🇵🇸Apr 11, 2024

@[email protected] Yaseen what have you done with your icon

holly Apr 11, 2024

@experiencer @yassie_j a new iteration upon the Yaseen™ Standard

holly Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j i heard they partnered with Qwant, so this may change

holly Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j ah yes, here: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/products/firefox-partners-with-qwant/

Empowering choice: Firefox partners with Qwant for a better web | The Mozilla Blog

Your tech choices matter more than ever. That’s why at Firefox, we believe in empowering users to make informed decisions that align with their values. I

@pinkcreeper100 that’s interesting. I wonder how much that deal is worth.

Krutonium://Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j Meanwhile they're YoY increasing the pay of their CEO, by about $2 Million USD/year, while they're actively *losing* marketshare.

Never has there ever been a better reason to find someone who wants the job not for the money but to actually keep the company afloat.

@krutonium this is correct. Their last CEO earned a cool 6.9 million USD, despite doing nothing to increase Mozilla market share. That’s a failure.

Krutonium://Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j Seriously infuriating. If I'm doing my job so badly that I lose 30 Million Users, I do *not* think I should be getting a $4,000,000 Raise in that same time frame.

@yassie_j I do doubt this to change because with #GoogleChrome's market dominance, #Google paying @mozilla is way cheaper than them getting #ShermanAntitrust'd by #FTC if not forced to split apart in the #EU by @EU_Commission ...

That being said, #Mozilla needs to get their act together and stop alienating it's users and supporters by pushing AI bs...

Kevin Karhan :verified: (@[email protected])

Instead of blowing a shitload of donation money on #AI bs, how about you actually focus on what *really* matters, @[email protected] ? Like: - making #Firefox great and not a *marginally less shitty browser* compared to #Google #Chrome / #GoogleChrome... - making @[email protected] / #Thunderbird a really good #mail client and not a *marginally less shitty #eMail program* than #Microsoft #Outlook / #MicrosoftOutlook and #Apple Mail #AppleMail ... --- Seriously: 1. log off 2. get outside 3. touch grass 4. take a good and long sleep 5. rethink what you just posted 6. undo the harm you just did. Sincerely, A longterm Firefox and Thunderbird user.

Infosec.Space

cobweb 2026 edition Apr 11, 2024

Yassie: girls are pretty uwu

Also Yassie: << on point analysis of complex tech market disasters that are looming >>

dfug Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j feels like mozilla has been in this situation for 10+ years now, I don't expect the AI hype machine to give them an alternate revenue stream

And if it does they'll fuck it up, it's a testament to the devs current iteration firefox is as good as it is tbh

neocat_flag_trans

@yassie_j interestingly enough, they just announced a partnership with Qwant

They haven't really elaborated to what extent this is a partnership - whether it might replace the search engine, whether it is related to funding, or anything else :/

Empowering choice: Firefox partners with Qwant for a better web | The Mozilla Blog

Your tech choices matter more than ever. That’s why at Firefox, we believe in empowering users to make informed decisions that align with their values. I

@cyrus I wonder how much it’s worth - definitely not half a billion a year.

neocat_flag_trans

@yassie_j well I for sure think it won't be 500m a year, but considering the timing, the wording of the title, and (IIRC?) the fact they got a new CEO:

This might, for once, actually spell good news for Mozilla, at least partially

Victoria (Tactical Shitposting Unit)Apr 11, 2024

@[email protected] Nah, they're just marketing to the notoriously AI-loving FOSS community. it's not that deep

Natomic Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j I wonder if *just maybe* we shouldn't have made browsers more complex than fucking operating systems and that might've allowed actual competition by open source but no companies needed their 10 millions lines of js and wasm now too

__ol Apr 11, 2024

@yassie_j if only Mozilla figured out how to pay its CEO less, maybe it wouldn't have to fire all those employees