jwzJan 19

RE: https://social.vmbrasseur.com/@vmbrasseur/115922995190919975

Mozilla wants your input. Here's mine:

Mozilla should be doing two things and two things only:

1: Building THE reference implementation web browser, and
2: Being a jugular-snapping attack dog on standards committees.
3: There is no 3.

Mozilla should have NOTHING to do with AI. Nobody wants it. Stop forcing AI into every corner of every project because your VC-brained management have completely lost the plot.

https://mozillafoundation.tfaforms.net/201

Show threadKevin McFaddenJan 19

@jwz Firefox market share is <6%. Zen is trying to port the much-loved features from the now stagnant Arc, but the result so far is clunky and I've returned to Arc because it's more perfect right now for how I work and play.

Mozilla needs a mission bigger than just a standards-based browser. It should be experimenting with new UX. Not Liquid Glass UI/UX, but Arc-like UX.

Perhaps they should be experimenting with AI, with the goal of making AI invisible to the user without boiling the oceans.

Show threadjwz
@n3bulous NO
Jan 19 at 11:43pmWeb
Show threadKevin McFaddenJan 19

@jwz What is accomplished with an irrelevant Mozilla? What are FF and Mozilla in 10 years being only a standards based browser?

My original post agreed with points 1 and 2, but I trimmed them due to length. I believe those are noble goals, but you are effectively killing FF. Maybe you want EFF but for the Web.

That said, I didn't really agree with any of the question choices so I posted only a comment.

Show threadjwzJan 20

@n3bulous How you judge the success of a commercial product is by counting users and counting ad revenue.

How you judge the success of a reference implementation is by standards compliance and code reusability.

I guess you think Mozilla should be a company making a product rather than a nonprofit whose mission is the open web, with a reference implementation existing only in service of that goal.

Show threadKevin McFaddenJan 20

@jwz I see where you are coming from. I was operating from where they are now, and you are saying they shouldn't be doing most of it? That would be fair.

At one point, as you know, people were concerned with being compatible with Firefox/Navigator. My perspective is that was because a significant marketshare used it. Right now, it seems most companies target only Chrome and hope for the best with others (while forcing excessive amounts of React down our tubes).

Show threadmirthJan 23
@n3bulous @jwz I think you have a point about user base being the basis for influence on standards but the wrong proposal. Web browsers as a product are mature, and adoption is mostly driven by platform control. UX changes and random bolt on features won't make much difference to adoption because most people don't think about browsers, they just assume the internet button will be available and work. All is not lost. Embedding in apps, app shells like Electron, PWAs, still ways to grow.
Show threadmirthJan 23
@n3bulous @jwz Expanding on that slightly, those are all areas where tool choices are made on a partially technical basis and a a better answer than Chromium will be welcome. Users may not know why their computer is slow but at least some product managers care if its their app causing the problem. Robust, predictable behavior is a big plus when it's code becoming a part of an app you're responsible for.
Show threadOn My WalkFeb 22
@n3bulous
As I see it, where they are now is they are the only web browser that is not dependent on big tech (not chrome-based, their own rendering engine, etc.). I'd love to see a campaign pitching this independence to the masses in a way that sticks. We need a non-adversarial, full-stack, independent browser to persist thru the big tech mess, and Firefox seems best positioned to be it and stay it. And also, f*ck AI 😁
@jwz
Show threadLorraine LeeJan 20

@jwz @n3bulous EFF but for the Web is basically IceCat. I like IceCat, even though it's basically unusable. IceCat is unusable because of how websites are implemented, not because of how IceCat is implemented. I like to fire it up every now and then just to update my mental friend/foe list. Privacy Badger (also supplied by EFF) is also very educational in that way. The Tor Browser has a similar but different usability/unusability pattern. Retail websites block Tor exit nodes about as aggressively as news media websites accuse tracker blockers (such as Privacy Badger) of being ad blockers (which it absolutely is not).

People speak of tools like Privacy Badger "breaking" certain websites. The message discipline I use reverses this. I describe tracker-dependent sites as "breaking" Privacy Badger. With such tools amplifying the contrast between "figure" and "ground" (breakage and non-breakage), you can practically see the outline of various business models. It's as entertaining as it is educational.

What I really want is the pre-Web Internet. Do the young people even know that the Internet is older than the Web?

Show threadKevin McFaddenJan 20
@lori @jwz I date back to the before times (infinitesimally important compared with JWZ), and while there are many enticing aspects, I'm unsure I'd want to go back that far. Mostly I wish humans didn't suck so much.