TLDR: Mozilla makes money from Google paying it to be the default search engine on Firefox. If that practice is outlawed, Mozilla will not have any income stream even close to replacing that.
It may kill Mozilla, no reason to say it will kill Firefox itself. Perhaps Firefox would flourish a lot more if it is finally released from Mozilla's clutches.
> US federal and state competition authorities recently asked the court of appeals to overturn the part of Mehta’s ruling that permits these payments.
You get the "competition authorities" you pay for. Decades of government-bashing, bureaucrat-bashing, sidelining and shit pay give you this level of institutional competence.
I love Firefox but feel little pity for Mozilla which receives $400+ million a year on search placement in their browser but spends only a tiny fraction on its development. The rest is wasted on greedy management and frivolous projects to give that same management an excuse to give themselves multi-million dollar payouts.
Everyone's only in it for the money. There are no good or bad people anymore, only...unfortunates. (that last line I stole from The Equalizer 2).
Mozilla should start exploring a subscription business and tout its continued support for the full uBlock Origin among other extensions. I would pay a small amount annually to support its development and I bet I'm not alone.
Like many here, I think Mozilla has done a terrible job managing their money and they are largely to blame for the pickle they are in.
However, I don't see who picks up the reigns if Mozilla dies. Like it or not, Firefox is essential for a somewhat (increasingly less) open web, and (at least for now) Mozilla is essential to Firefox. For those who want to see Mozilla die but Firefox live on, what are the more likely outcomes in your opinion if Mozilla went down? Do you see a big corp (which it increasingly seems is the only way to keep up with the needed pace for a browser) stepping up?
for all the PR that mozilla floats about them being the guardian of free internet, i would wager that, today, most non-tech folks will have hard time configuring firefox properly. it used to be simple back in the days, now they have made it so complex to tie all of them together.
also, previously on android, when apps were cleared from desktop, the browser used to quit. now you need to go to menu->quit. otherwise it will keep opening new tabs.
a non-tech friend of mine was once complaining about their phone being very slow. i looked at their chrome and -- i kid you not -- it had 800 tabs open.
non tech folks are a goldmine for the data stealers, and firefox likely implemented that 'enhancement request' to make it easy for them, not for the user.
Chrome should be split, Firefox or its forks (if Mozilla continues to mismanage) should be able to receive funds from Google but Chrome should not be allowed to be paid for Google search engine placement at least for the next 5-6 years.
I'm sure many other players will play top dollar to be the default on a browser that virtually commands all the market. That'll let us discover the real price of search engine defaults because the Mozilla payout is partly due to antitrust reasons.
In that case, I think we'll also see a visible decrease in "bugs" affecting Firefox on Google's properties.
Sounds like poor prior proper planning enabling piss poor performance (the 7 Ps) on Mozilla's part.
They need to figure out how to break away from Google. It's clearly an abusive relationship.
Mozilla also manages itself horribly. They need to do things differently. For one, stop paying the CEO an inappropriate amount of money. Second, stop loading up the browser with garbage features, hyperfocusing on side quests nobody cares about (VPNs, Pocket, AI garbage, etc), and get back to basics. What they were doing in the 2000s was glorious and they need to return to that.
18 comments
[ 0.26 ms ] story [ 26.4 ms ] thread> US federal and state competition authorities recently asked the court of appeals to overturn the part of Mehta’s ruling that permits these payments.
You get the "competition authorities" you pay for. Decades of government-bashing, bureaucrat-bashing, sidelining and shit pay give you this level of institutional competence.
Everyone's only in it for the money. There are no good or bad people anymore, only...unfortunates. (that last line I stole from The Equalizer 2).
No. People imagined this for some reason.
However, I don't see who picks up the reigns if Mozilla dies. Like it or not, Firefox is essential for a somewhat (increasingly less) open web, and (at least for now) Mozilla is essential to Firefox. For those who want to see Mozilla die but Firefox live on, what are the more likely outcomes in your opinion if Mozilla went down? Do you see a big corp (which it increasingly seems is the only way to keep up with the needed pace for a browser) stepping up?
also, previously on android, when apps were cleared from desktop, the browser used to quit. now you need to go to menu->quit. otherwise it will keep opening new tabs.
a non-tech friend of mine was once complaining about their phone being very slow. i looked at their chrome and -- i kid you not -- it had 800 tabs open.
non tech folks are a goldmine for the data stealers, and firefox likely implemented that 'enhancement request' to make it easy for them, not for the user.
Not their first foray into this case I suppose:
https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/internet-policy/amicus_b... (May 2025)
https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/internet-policy/defendin... (Sep 2025)
I'm sure many other players will play top dollar to be the default on a browser that virtually commands all the market. That'll let us discover the real price of search engine defaults because the Mozilla payout is partly due to antitrust reasons.
In that case, I think we'll also see a visible decrease in "bugs" affecting Firefox on Google's properties.
They need to figure out how to break away from Google. It's clearly an abusive relationship.
Mozilla also manages itself horribly. They need to do things differently. For one, stop paying the CEO an inappropriate amount of money. Second, stop loading up the browser with garbage features, hyperfocusing on side quests nobody cares about (VPNs, Pocket, AI garbage, etc), and get back to basics. What they were doing in the 2000s was glorious and they need to return to that.