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Mozilla is a for-profit not-for-profit. And that’s all you need to know to explain everything that doesn’t seem to make sense about the chasm between what they say and what they do.
@aral I just wish there was a reasonable better option. Any...
@shine I hear you. When you live in a sewer, you reach for the least fragrant shit.
Here’s hoping we make it out of the sewer one day.
@aral
Can you explain what you mean by a for-profit not-for-profit? Those seem like mutually exclusive attributes.
@JamesDBartlett3 Yes, they are.
Mozilla is a not-for-profit that owns a for-profit that pays its CEO millions. Oh, and they also exist because Google pays them half a billion dollars every year.
Have you donated yet?
@aral
I'm a little confused about how a not-for-profit can be allowed to have a for-profit subsidiary. Seems completely out-of-line with the entire purpose of not-for-profit organizations.
No, I never donate to anything I haven't thoroughly investigated first, and I haven't looked into Mozilla lately, though it sounds like I would probably not like what I found if I did.
@JamesDBartlett3 Yeah, it shouldn’t be allowed. But, hey, capitalism is a real gas.
@aral @JamesDBartlett3 and gave its CEO a raise in the same year it laid off 250 people during a pandemic
@aral@mastodon.ar.al I've spoken to a number of ex mozilla employees over the years as my diatribes against mozilla have ramped up and one thing is super super clear now: regardless of any actual intent, mozilla has been essentially trapped by Google's unlimited privacy violation payments. There may be a desire to stop wasting hundreds of millions of Google's dollars every year in favor of wasting money they earned honestly, but it is never, ever going to happen.
Nothing they do will ever shake the fact that they can't even keep up with Chromium when Google pays them to do so, and that the second Google decides to stop funding them they are completely fucked.
I think the only responsible thing they could do at this point is fire the C-suite, shut down the for-profit company and let Google continue to fund the not-for-profit until they don't anymore. Stop trying to be profitable and start trying to make a goddamned browser 
@nyquildotorg @aral it is worth noting that if Google did ever decide to stop paying Mozilla, Google would likely be hit with a monstrous antitrust suit by the SEC, crippling chromium development.
@avrin@infosec.exchange @aral@mastodon.ar.al ok, let's do that.
@nyquildotorg @aral This is a BIZ opinion of yours. How does it reflect on the fact that FF is infinitely better in terms of freedom, privacy, morality, etc? Why clog up the web with anti-Moz crap? Sick of it.
@nyquildotorg @aral what are "Google's unlimited privacy violation payments"? Privacy fines gets the state, not Mozilla?
Also the nonprofit part of Mozilla aka the foundation makes no browser and AFAIK google does not fund it. They never did. They'd just used it to promote their search engine and maybe to prevent antitrust issues etc.
@rugk@chaos.social @aral@mastodon.ar.al Google pays browser makers for sending users to google for search by default. 90% of Mozilla's (the corp, who does make a browser) funding comes directly from Google in exchange for being able to profit from Firefox users' eyeballs
@rugk@chaos.social @aral@mastodon.ar.al $450 million dollars a year of "privacy violation money" to help Mozilla preserve people's privacy.
The Mozilla corp funds the Mozilla org. The two are inextricably linked, essentially counteracting eachother's motivations and efforts.
@rugk @nyquildotorg Goodness, would you also defend Greenpeace if it was almost wholly funded by Shell?
@aral @nyquildotorg I defended nobody, I asked questions.
@aral genuinely asking, what does Mozilla do that should warrant me to stop using them?
@aral what does Mozilla do at all? Hint, it isn't develop a browser, that is a different org, confusingly also called Mozilla that you don't have access to at all.
@aral Sorry but that's NOT all I need to know. It's an example of INNUENDO in place of information or argument.
You are accusing Moz of immoral behavior and imply not to use Firefox?
This is yet more of the bullshit that /. dumped on us for so many years - people acting like there's a moral equiv or tech hidden agenda when comparing FF and say Chrome, Edge, Safari. There's NO comparison.
This isn'tt a reasonable critique of Moz - just throwing shade and being part of an AstroTurf movement.
@jamienk Just go away. Seriously. I’m not an idiot whisperer.
(And maybe one day you’ll learn the difference between people who are trying to help you and corporations that are trying to exploit you.)
@aral Without Google’s money, Firefox would be history. Does anyone think there’s no influence by Google 
@bigmike It’s not exactly rocket science, is it? And yet still some tech folks seem incapable of understanding it.
@aral What is your stance on DuckDuck?
@Adinda I use them today. Under no illusion they will one day exit as they are venture capital funded.
@aral Thanks for the info!! 
@aral
Definitely Surveillance Capitalism at its best! While also getting 90% or more of their money from Google itself. Without that money or partnership they would go out of business.
@gnu2 Interesting. Guess you learn something new everyday :)