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dude, just use librewolf, firefox without any bullshit. done.
edit: okay. no mozilla = no librewolf. funny how the only alternative to google's browser depended on google for its survival. i don't have a solution, and it sounds like no one else does either.
Librewolf kinda depends on the existence of Firefox
The librewolf maintainers have written some patches, scripts and config to remove some specific bits of Firefox and bundle a few extensions. They will not necessarily have the ability to develop a whole web browser on their own
if the solution to mozilla's money problems involves selling their users, then i guess it's time for them to die, along with firefox and librewolf. at that point i guess i'll just have to use the best available option, like i've always done
If Firefox dies, the entire Internet goes with it because Google's hegemony over web standards will go unchecked.
wow. guess i better enjoy having internet while i can then
"ah nuts, well nothing for it, best just give ourselves willingly over to our google overlords when the time comes"
for real? you're not even gonna try?
try what? give mozilla money? sure, i'd buy a browser, maybe even a reasonably priced subscription. but would that guarantee a bullshit-free product? i'm skeptical. also, they'd never make enough money that way
this thread is full of lamenting over google's global takeover and downvotes for me not stomping my feet about it, but i've yet to see an actionable suggestion for what to do about it
Giving your money to Mozilla wouldn't even guarantee it went to Firefox. First 6M have to go to its CEO.
If firefox is not maintained, librewolf dies too.
Bullshit. It'll become the new firefox without Mozilla.
Mozilla has around 750 full-time employees. LibreWolf is a few volunteers in a trenchcoat. There is absolutely no way they'll just take over that work, not to mention without a source of income.
You think if mozilla dies its users are just going to start using chrome, brave and safari? And the devs are just going to move on to those projects? No shot bro
Will people slowly stop using an outdated browser? yes
will people who are out of a job no longer do their job? also yes
I am not saying that. What I am saying, is that the vast majority of those devs cannot continue full-time work on Firefox when they need to work another full-time job to actually earn money.
If you're expecting Mozilla to implode and then LibreWolf to be overrun by donations over night, so they can hire all those devs, well, there's the first problem that LibreWolf doesn't accept donations. But even if they did, they'd have to hire the management and such of Mozilla, too. It would be Mozilla in a trenchcoat immediately.
I guess, a Mozilla that suddenly can rely completely on donations, can make more decisions that are popular with those making donations. But yeah, you can already donate to the Mozilla Foundation, and so far, people largely don't.
But even if they did, they'd have to hire the management and such of Mozilla, too. It would be Mozilla in a trenchcoat immediately.
Hiring them wouldn't be mandatory. Look at Godot. They figured their shit out right quick after whatever it was that the other game engine pulled. LibreWolf will have the time to prepare for this. Courts move slowly.
Thunderbird got millions in donations and are free of Mozilla. When you donate to Thunderbird, guess where that money goes. That's right, Thunderbird. Not some CEO who takes 6M in bonuses. Librewolf can provide a harbor for firefox devs if they decide to get their shit together when clouds start forming.
Of course it's possible that another org will swoop in.
Donations to Mozilla do not go to the CEO. You donate to the Mozilla Foundation, whereas the CEO that we're talking about is heading the Mozilla Corporation.
The latter is a subsidiary of the Foundation, so if the situation should get really dire, then the Foundation could hand them some money, but since the Foundation is legally a non-profit, it doesn't have much more than pocket change.Incidentally, yes, donations to Mozilla generally do not go towards Firefox development. The Foundation rather works on lobbying governments, as well as community work (which may help win some open-source contributors for Firefox), but they often also just award donation money to less publicly known open-source projects.
And who will develop it?
Do you know where 99% of the code in Librewolf comes from?
Where do you think development resources are going to go to once there is a void? They're just going to go poof and never work on a project again? Or do you expect a new contender to pop in with a full shaped org to sweep them up?
Developers tend to like to get paid. In the absence of an organization that isn't giving them money to do something as complex as work on a browser engine they tend not to do so out of the goodness of their hearts. They tend to look for jobs at actual companies.
alas everything dies at some point. if mozilla goes away because they couldn't live without google, then i'll observe a moment of silence for firefox and librewolf, and find something else
I will browse the web with raw curl commands
OK buddy Stallman
Just use Lynx.
Deyr fé, deyja frændr, deyr sjalfr it sama, ek veit einn, at aldrei deyr: dómr um dauðan hvern.
Just wait until Ladybird kicks off, then Mozilla can die.
Oh, the complete pipedream that has an ambitious release date of 2026?
And that has already gotten its lead maintainer into trouble over claiming the use of gender-neutral pronouns in the documentation is "political"?
If the Mozilla Foundation isn't working on Gecko and Firefox, there isn't a Librewolf.
there are other options, none of them perfect, nor immortal. but if mozilla's days are numbered, then it is what it is.
maybe i should have said "use the thing that's not exploiting you for money," librewolf being one option. either way, don't fall into becoming a fanboy who simps for software. enshittification is inevitable for all platforms, as evidenced by...all platforms
This would be true, if there were any other viable options. There aren't.
it sounds like no one else does either
Maintaining a browser that doesn't rely on someone else's upstream code is quite an ordeal. Of the four main browsers (Chrome, Edge, Safari, Firefox), 3 are built by large for-profit enterprises and the other relies on money from a large for-profit enterprise. Browsers are very complex pieces of technology and can't be maintained by 3 guys on GitHub in their spare time.
in other words, we're fucked.
it was fun while it lasted