Chromium (Google Chrome’s base) is also open source.
And yet, we’re still at a corporation’s mercy as to whether everything Chromium-based gets ruined by Google’s fuck-what-the-users-want policies. Like with Manifest V3. And JXL support. And extensions on mobile.
You can easily branch off from before manifest v3, and some browsers do. The problem with manifest v3 is that most users do not care. But let’s say chromium loses its ability to use tabs, you can bet it gets rolled back before it reaches news media.
Users don’t know what the fuck Manifest is period. They just click the internet button. And for the longest time that meant the E with a loop around it. Now that means the multicolored circle.
I get what you’re saying, but the average person has no idea what it is, why they should care, or anything about it. All they see is Google making their extensions stop working. And when that includes some of the most popular extensions, that directly affect Googles revenue, they’re going to think that’s the reason.
The overwhelming majority of users get their extensions from the Chrome Web Store… Which Google has full control over. Users expect them to be blocking almost all malicious extensions before they’re even available to download.
This. Google is pushing MV3 to single out and neuter the more robust and customizable ad blockers, like uBO. They’re trying to appease their advertising investors by force feeding ads to you and they’re plugging the leaks/workarounds savvy developers have created to block them.
If Firefox ever gets popular enough, what do you wanna bet money bags Google, their primary monetary contributor, will put a condition on the next round of funding that they stop support for MV2?
Because it makes a majority of users that use Chrome much safer. Do you do any basic research? Do you need me to point you to the getting started guide?
No it doesn’t. Different licenses dictate what you can and can’t do with open source software. Some are more restrictive than others. Open source simply means that the source code is freely available.
I’m grateful for FF, but they also annoy me at times. Just little stuff probably not worth bitching about in detail. But also a peek at the potential for problems that you’re talking about.
So of course I’ll bitch about it.
I call it the “stop whatever you think you’d rather do right now and pay attention to our product” type shit.
Imagine you have a combination wrench and whenever you take it out of the toolbox it starts yammering at you about how great of a wrench it is and all if its shiny features. Fucking ridiculous, right?
So why do we tolerate software that does that?
Way too much software does this pushy shit. Just stay outta my face and do your actual job, software.
Because people have the attention span of a goldfish and if you aren’t reminding them every 5 seconds of the features they have available they’ll forget they do in fact use them and then complain to support because they can’t spend 5 seconds on the help page.
I say this, not in defense of mozilla, but in frustration at having to deal daily with these kinds of issues. You can put giant screen-size arrows on where to go / what single “do the thing” button to press and people will still forget 5 seconds later.
Good point. That’s true, there is definitely that side of it. I think what you’re talking about is less obnoxious than the stuff that feels forced and make-the-boss-happy promotional. Push notifcations for no reason, etc. It’s a spectrum from necessary to uneccessary, and there’s too much of the latter IMO.
Yeah, it’s strange just how readily the blinders go up wherever Mozilla is concerned. They’re a corp, just like any other; if they had the money and leverage, they’d be just as aggressive as Google. Have people already forgotten that time they laid off 200+ employees and then gave all the execs bonuses?
E: Apparently y’all have forgotten. In 2021, Mozilla laid off a few hundred employees. CEO’s salary doubled that year. Fuck Mozilla, they’re no more your friends than Google or Microsoft; they’re the same evil, just smaller-scaled evil, is all.
Absolutely, but Mozilla is pretty much owned by Google anyway, and falling in love with these companies as wide eyed fanboys never looks good when they eventually turn.
I’m not shilling for anyone. If you want to discuss actual technical details I’m happy to do so. If you’re here just to share your feelings absent facts then I don’t care what you have to say.
Librewolf is a fork of firefox that removes bloat and telemetry. You can “harden” firefox to do the same thing, but librewolf comes out of the box hardened.
By the way, If you’re on win7 and don’t want to upgrade, Linux Mint might be a good alternative. It looks and feels similar but isn’t a security risk to connect to the internet.
A summary from its site and known technical details:
no telemetry by default
includes uBlock Origin
has sane privacy-respecting defaults
prepackages arkenfox user.js
relatively well-maintained fork of Firefox that keeps up with upstream
No major controversies AFAIK
As for Windows 7, nobody should really need to install Librewolf anyway on such a device. No device running Windows 7 should have access to the internet at this point. If you are asking about compatibility intending this use case, you have bigger problems to worry about than your choice of browser. If you just need to view HTML files graphically, even Internet Explorer or an older firefox ESR will do.
Main features:
…
Continued support for NPAPI plugins like Silverlight, Adobe Flash and Java
Picture this in your minds eye: a Windows 7 machine running a browser with still working Flash and Java plugins, connected to the internet in 2024.
what do you see?
i see a flourishing ecosystem of worms, viruses and rootkits, all trying to be the one species to get to be the one who does the most damage to the prey species, the common user.
You’re overreacting. Firefox knows their users. I am a huge “stan” for Firefox, but I will delete it like a time traveller if they make it impossible to ignore ads. I will salt the earth and poop on Firefox’s grave and actively avoid it everywhere… However. If I’m wrong, there will be a Next Thing…
Yeah I’m using Fennec, which doesn’t have that. But as long as it’s a flick of a switch to disable, I don’t really mind. Still a million times better than manifest v3.
If you use a DNS solutions you can block all the telemetry shit. Frankly FF has been phoning home in a lot of undesirable ways for many years even before this, like most browsers.
Firefox is no longer an adversary to Google for the browser market, if it ever was. FF has become a vassal of Google that with its tyranny is dictating the course of the internet, such as WEI that as far as I know it was abandoned at least for now.
Anyone else been having issues of not being able to load YouTube videos past the first few seconds on Firefox using ublock? I couldn’t find any recent information online. I don’t know if this is part of the war on ad blockers, or unrelated.
Firefox my beloved.
Saying this about any corporation’s product is guaranteed not to age well.
It is open source so not really a corporation’s product.
They just maintain it, and the moment they screw up, a fork will take over from there.
Chromium (Google Chrome’s base) is also open source.
And yet, we’re still at a corporation’s mercy as to whether everything Chromium-based gets ruined by Google’s fuck-what-the-users-want policies. Like with Manifest V3. And JXL support. And extensions on mobile.
You can easily branch off from before manifest v3, and some browsers do. The problem with manifest v3 is that most users do not care. But let’s say chromium loses its ability to use tabs, you can bet it gets rolled back before it reaches news media.
Except now you have to maintain a branch that’s missing everything after that release upstream.
And that’s exactly what is happening to some chromium-based browsers.
Yeah you can probably do periodic merge or rebase etc. But then you have the fun of merge conflicts
Users do want MV3. The people complaining about it are in the minority.
Users don’t know what the fuck Manifest is period. They just click the internet button. And for the longest time that meant the E with a loop around it. Now that means the multicolored circle.
Users know that they want more security. MV3 makes a major of users that use Chrome safer from malicious extensions.
I get what you’re saying, but the average person has no idea what it is, why they should care, or anything about it. All they see is Google making their extensions stop working. And when that includes some of the most popular extensions, that directly affect Googles revenue, they’re going to think that’s the reason.
The overwhelming majority of users get their extensions from the Chrome Web Store… Which Google has full control over. Users expect them to be blocking almost all malicious extensions before they’re even available to download.
This. Google is pushing MV3 to single out and neuter the more robust and customizable ad blockers, like uBO. They’re trying to appease their advertising investors by force feeding ads to you and they’re plugging the leaks/workarounds savvy developers have created to block them.
If Firefox ever gets popular enough, what do you wanna bet money bags Google, their primary monetary contributor, will put a condition on the next round of funding that they stop support for MV2?
Stay small and crazy customizable Firefox.
Why the hell would a user want MV3?
Because it makes a majority of users that use Chrome much safer. Do you do any basic research? Do you need me to point you to the getting started guide?
It doesn’t though. An adblocker is your VERY most important tool in a good security posture. Googles playing any users who ask for MV3 for fools
The average user is and always will be an ignorant and careless user. And they are the majority. As in over 50%
the minority of people complaining about it are the only ones who know what it even is
So is Android. So is Chromium. So is React, and Flutter. So is Java.
Open source doesn’t mean FOSS.
These are maintained by corporations, but for every screw up, there are superior forks maintained by someone else.
The best forks of android are degoogled forks. The best forks of chromium are degoogled forks.
Open source does mean FOSS. It doesn’t mean community-oriented.
No it doesn’t. Different licenses dictate what you can and can’t do with open source software. Some are more restrictive than others. Open source simply means that the source code is freely available.
It absolutely does. Open source is not simply source-available, it means that it follows the open source definition. https://opensource.org/osd
I’m grateful for FF, but they also annoy me at times. Just little stuff probably not worth bitching about in detail. But also a peek at the potential for problems that you’re talking about.
So of course I’ll bitch about it.
I call it the “stop whatever you think you’d rather do right now and pay attention to our product” type shit.
Imagine you have a combination wrench and whenever you take it out of the toolbox it starts yammering at you about how great of a wrench it is and all if its shiny features. Fucking ridiculous, right?
So why do we tolerate software that does that?
Way too much software does this pushy shit. Just stay outta my face and do your actual job, software.
Because people have the attention span of a goldfish and if you aren’t reminding them every 5 seconds of the features they have available they’ll forget they do in fact use them and then complain to support because they can’t spend 5 seconds on the help page.
I say this, not in defense of mozilla, but in frustration at having to deal daily with these kinds of issues. You can put giant screen-size arrows on where to go / what single “do the thing” button to press and people will still forget 5 seconds later.
Good point. That’s true, there is definitely that side of it. I think what you’re talking about is less obnoxious than the stuff that feels forced and make-the-boss-happy promotional. Push notifcations for no reason, etc. It’s a spectrum from necessary to uneccessary, and there’s too much of the latter IMO.
We’re so fucking used to ads we don’t even always realize we’re getting pushed propaganda
Mmm mmm mmm, Bill Cosby tells me to love my puddin’ pops!
…i feel sleepy…
Firefox is a foundation, not a corporation. And I’m already using Fennec instead of the official release.
No. Firefox is a product. Mozilla is a corporation AND a foundation.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation
Yeah, it’s strange just how readily the blinders go up wherever Mozilla is concerned. They’re a corp, just like any other; if they had the money and leverage, they’d be just as aggressive as Google. Have people already forgotten that time they laid off 200+ employees and then gave all the execs bonuses?
E: Apparently y’all have forgotten. In 2021, Mozilla laid off a few hundred employees. CEO’s salary doubled that year. Fuck Mozilla, they’re no more your friends than Google or Microsoft; they’re the same evil, just smaller-scaled evil, is all.
But they haven’t threatened to undercut ad blocking yet, so as a comparison they are better.
Absolutely, but Mozilla is pretty much owned by Google anyway, and falling in love with these companies as wide eyed fanboys never looks good when they eventually turn.
It’s okay to like them while they do good and then change your mind when they turn evil.
I wouldn’t say “owned”, but the rest… yeah:-(
Who provides the majority of their funding?
You forgot to also mention that they are a cult where you get attacked if you say anything negative about Mozilla.
Looking around, I don’t think that’s true. Lots of bad things are freely said about Mozilla and the people running it.
You forgot to not shill for an actual corporation
I’m not shilling for anyone. If you want to discuss actual technical details I’m happy to do so. If you’re here just to share your feelings absent facts then I don’t care what you have to say.
“this is way safer for users” may as well be feelings. It’s not backed up by anything but a clear boner for Google
It is literally explained in the first part of the uBOL GitHub page:
https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home#description
It’s like you haven’t even done the most basic research that anyone with anything useful to say would do. Why?
Librewolf, my beloved.
This is the first I’ve heard of LibreWolf. Is it compatible with Windows 7? And also, why is it good?
You really shouldn’t connect windows 7 to the internet.
Librewolf is a fork of firefox that removes bloat and telemetry. You can “harden” firefox to do the same thing, but librewolf comes out of the box hardened.
By the way, If you’re on win7 and don’t want to upgrade, Linux Mint might be a good alternative. It looks and feels similar but isn’t a security risk to connect to the internet.
https://librewolf.net/
A summary from its site and known technical details:
As for Windows 7, nobody should really need to install Librewolf anyway on such a device. No device running Windows 7 should have access to the internet at this point. If you are asking about compatibility intending this use case, you have bigger problems to worry about than your choice of browser. If you just need to view HTML files graphically, even Internet Explorer or an older firefox ESR will do.
Looks like it should run on Windows.
Edit: sorry, didn’t read far down enough. It’s only built for Windows 10, but they recommend this?
Picture this in your minds eye: a Windows 7 machine running a browser with still working Flash and Java plugins, connected to the internet in 2024.
what do you see?
i see a flourishing ecosystem of worms, viruses and rootkits, all trying to be the one species to get to be the one who does the most damage to the prey species, the common user.
Sounds like an interesting experience to me. Admittedly I hadn’t looked that far into it. If Win 7 is a must I’d say just go with latest Firefox.
❤
You’re overreacting. Firefox knows their users. I am a huge “stan” for Firefox, but I will delete it like a time traveller if they make it impossible to ignore ads. I will salt the earth and poop on Firefox’s grave and actively avoid it everywhere… However. If I’m wrong, there will be a Next Thing…
Yeah I’m using Fennec, which doesn’t have that. But as long as it’s a flick of a switch to disable, I don’t really mind. Still a million times better than manifest v3.
If you use a DNS solutions you can block all the telemetry shit. Frankly FF has been phoning home in a lot of undesirable ways for many years even before this, like most browsers.
Firefox is no longer an adversary to Google for the browser market, if it ever was. FF has become a vassal of Google that with its tyranny is dictating the course of the internet, such as WEI that as far as I know it was abandoned at least for now.
Yeah I know. https://blog.windscribe.com/windscribe-expose-mozilla/
🧐
At least link the full article and not just the headline… smh. Here is also the follow-up article with comments from Firefox’s CTO. https://www.heise.de/en/news/Firefox-defends-itself-Everything-done-right-just-poorly-communicated-9802546.html
Not entirely true.
Anyone else been having issues of not being able to load YouTube videos past the first few seconds on Firefox using ublock? I couldn’t find any recent information online. I don’t know if this is part of the war on ad blockers, or unrelated.
It’s been a side effect of the server side ads apparently, but reloading the page fixes it for me.
Yeah, yesterday. I just kept refreshing. FF + unlock + not signed in, seems to trigger it
I watched several videos today on Firefox with ublock origin and no issues. Haven’t run into issues with ads yet.
Haven’t had that issue, nope
Besides the fact that Mozilla sucks, Firefox is an amazing piece of software. It’s PITA that it’s about to be enshittified.