Is Firefox Firefucked?
82 comments
·December 19, 2025softwaredoug
thw_9a83c
> I have no sense of what they stand for
There a nice Mozilla Manifesto explaining the Mozilla mission and their values [1].
Apparently, it's difficult to find a stable, independent, and effective revenue model for an open-source browser that is completely free as a product, should not contain shady ads or product promotions, does not sell user data, and always puts the user first.
This is especially difficult because there are other free browsers with a similar mission that don't need to incur the cost of developing their own web engine.
fxj
Get money from donors. Wikipedia shows how that can be done. Or get money from the EU.
Mozilla is a strawman for google that they can claim there exists another browser that is not chrome because of antitrust laws. And now that Microsoft forcefeeds win11 user with Edge it will not take long and google doesnt need firefox anymore.
For sure I would give a donation to firefox if they would build a decent browser which listens to the user but not as they do now.
just my 2 ct
BoredPositron
It's just another money redistribution scheme. Some do art ... some do browsers.
barfoure
You let them oust Brendan Eich. I have no sympathy whatsoever because you let the charlatans into the project and now you’re complaining.
Nobody stood up for Brendan. Nobody is going to stand up for you.
schmuckonwheels
That was the beginning of the end. A symptom not the cause. Once you inject politics into your organization the project is doomed.
the_biot
I have to wonder, who are you talking to?
Pannoniae
It's a bit of a generic complaint, but quite apt for the subject matter. Mission creep kills projects, and that's true across a broad range of activities.
More specifically in the case of software, egos kill projects, and expanding the scope of your project to include broader economic or social causes usually does the same.
This is correlated to a huge change in nerd culture - pseudonymity was much more common and encouraged, with people's real-life identities or views not really taken into account. ("on the internet, nobody knows you're a dog")
Social media happened, and now most people use their real-world identities and carry their real-life worldview into the internet.
This had a huge negative effect on internet toxicity and interpersonal trust, and Eich is a good example of that - auxiliary things being dredged up about someone, used as a cudgel against them for their real or perceived transgressions.
The end result is that effective project management has become a rare breed and we see all these colossal failures like Firefox...
null
LaGrange
Brendan Eich was garbage, though, and on top of that he made Brave which is basically a joke, so not exactly missing him.
Levitz
In what way is Brave a joke? I ask because it's what I look at whenever I think about finally dropping Firefox
bjord
[flagged]
mmastrac
Firefox's main problem is Firefox users. Seriously, there's nothing but griping about it but it's pretty much the only browser holding back the rendering engine monopoly (intentionally excluding WebKit).
everdrive
I think it's fair to criticize Firefox's user base, but I'm not sure their criticisms amount to very much. ie, if Firefox had a totally pliant user base it seems like Mozilla still would have driven it into the ground.
mhurron
> it's pretty much the only browser holding back the rendering engine monopoly
Maybe that's why they're complaining. Maybe they don't want Firefox spending it's time working itself into oblivion.
Of course the Mozilla Foundation isn't bound in any way to listen to them so it's going to happen anyway, but Firefox's users are upset for good reasons.
graypegg
I can't really defend Mozilla's priorities or business model myself, but I do agree that Firefox users create this massive pessimistic cloud overtop of firefox. From what little I know, the Firefox MPL license isn't restrictive at all, other than forcing you to not re-license existing MPL code. Another corporate sponsor could take on the torch, pay a bunch of ex or current mozilla devs/contributers, and make EarthTurtle or WindBird or something. Not just stripping things out of Firefox, but working on the browser engine/js engine/etc, starting from Firefox today and diverging.
Users tend to talk about mozilla like it's holding firefox hostage or something, but really the main gripe they have is building and maintaining browsers is beyond the scope of an individual. THEY couldn't fork firefox, but it's not impossible for someone with resources and connections to MAKE an entity that does. It just... hasn't happened again. Mozilla is a pretty insane freak-of-nature in the business world, and there's honest frustration about that which grows into "Firefox is doomed".
Xymist
Straightforwardly, nobody with the resources to build and maintain a browser could ever be trusted to do so, as they get those resources from somewhere, and it's going to be somewhere unacceptable (ads, trackers, Google, taxes, selling the browser or addons/features as a product, hostile nation states).
These things are far too complex and expensive to be produced as they should and as most FOSS is: for free, by a group of individuals who could fit around a breakfast table and don't answer to anyone but each other.
rationalist
If anything, it's the powerusers that disable Firefox's telemetry so that they don't know how the power users use Firefox.
(Guiltily raises hand. Although lately I've noticed a ping option, so I left that enabled.)
OscarTheGrinch
I disable everything that is of no direct benefit to me. It's shocking that so many companies don't make the case for the benefits of their systems at the on / off decision point. If you can't outline a positive benefit to the end user what does that say about your product?
cosmic_cheese
On the other hand, maybe it was a mistake for the industry to start leaning so hard on telemetry. While it can provide useful insights in some cases, telemetry is best positioned as secondary or even tertiary in the decision-making process, because it doesn’t tell anywhere close the whole story and requires a great deal of error-prone interpretation to act upon.
To be frank, I find that use of analytics as the primary determiner to be incredibly intellectually lazy. They’re being used as a stand-in for deep, holistic thought in product design, user research, 1:1 interviews with users, etc when they shouldn’t be, and it’s making software as a whole much crappier than it needs to be.
jonway
I just wanted to note that Firefox reached out to me as a user and requested a video call to discuss how I used one of their features.
I declined, but later they reintegrated their request with a servey, which I did accept.
These requests were presented through a dialog box attached to an extension (which many Firefox features are, internally, built-in extensions.)
I really want Firefox to succeed. Please enhance our security, privacy, ensure a performant browser AND I also like the project that Mozilla undertakes (rip send) hope to see more in the future.
amatecha
Holding people in power accountable is never a bad thing.
null
jalapenog
I’m not saying Mozilla ever had a chance vs Google but they clearly chose Google ad money over their user base.
triceratops
What does that mean exactly?
cogman10
Google paid Mozilla a pretty penny to make Google the default search engine [1]
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2025/03/12/mozilla_doj_google_se...
damnesian
Google as default search engine for every fresh install, perhaps?
PurpleRamen
The community today is the result of 10+ years of disappointment. Some are long enough following Firefox to remember what has been lost, and some have grown and cultivated their grudges over a long time. And people know, there will never be a golden age of Mozilla again, from this point on it's just survival. For many, it's probably just a relationship of necessary evil they have to swallow.
Loudergood
The problem is the same exact on that MS was slapped for with IE, except there are 3 major platforms now so none of them are a monopoly.
dfabulich
Mozilla's problem is unsolvable.
Firefox gets 90% of its funding from Google, putting Google effectively in control of Mozilla.
Ideally, Firefox would be financially supported by its users, like Wikipedia. But that requires ads nagging users to donate, preferably on a subscription plan.
Most of Firefox's users block ads, and they refuse to pay Mozilla a dime under any circumstances. Their users are freeloaders, providing no value to Firefox's other users or to Mozilla.
It would be nice if Mozilla could ignore the freeloaders and simply nag for donations anyway, but if the freeloaders leave and Mozilla tries to serve its donor users, they'll lose all of their Google funding and die.
h43z
Firefox is really in a sad state. The politics, ideology is getting worse and the tech is still bad. Kind of crazy that they waste everyones battery and cpu https://b.43z.one/2025-02-12/
Am I the one who is crazy and nitpicking here?
triceratops
Firefox works fine. It's my daily browser on a fairly old Macbook. No issues whatsoever, other than some websites that weren't tested on it.
rationalist
People seem to think I'm crazy in my other comments when I said I often run into websites that don't test Firefox and thus do not work properly.
eitau_1
there are some observations of mine:
- when the browser is not in the visible workspace, chromium's cpu usage actually goes to 0 whilst firefox's usually oscilates around 5%
- every new window costs 30mb of ram for chromium and 100mb for firefox
- this one is weird, but when lightly using firefox while overall ram usage spilled well into swap, often after some time terminal emulator process will get swapped-out as if firefox eventually touched memory used by every tab sitting in the background
E39M5S62
That's a fascinating bit of sleuthing! 1.5 watts is a substantial amount of energy when you're in the 4 to 5 watt overall usage range. You're not crazy and nitpicking.
Y-bar
I have never been as happy with Firefox as I am in 2025. Yet… Sometimes my fellow FF users seems to be making a worse advertisement than the ”you should rewrite this application in Rust” does for Rust, and those people have by sheer annoyance effectively made me never pick up Rust because I do not want to be associated with them.
abigail95
It's open source, use a fork if you don't like the company.
If you think the product is good keep using it - why on earth would you give up one of your most important pieces of software on your machine because you don't like the company that runs the main repo?
Zaskoda
What is the next best alternative to throw support behind? I did a very shallow search and the forks of Firefox I found don't appear to be actively maintained.
goda90
I can't speak to the quality of any of these, but these all appear to be forks of Firefox that are still receiving updates as of the last few weeks:
6031769
Pale Moon is actively maintained. https://www.palemoon.org/
pelotron
I see the Waterfox and Librewolf forks mentioned a lot for various reasons.
rationalist
A problem is no one is testing their websites in Firefox, so often I encounter websites that don't work, but work perfectly fine in Vanadium.
mmastrac
I use it daily on mobile and desktop and... this never happens (maybe once a year at most?)? The only thing that breaks pages is the adblocker and things work again when refreshing.
rationalist
No adblocker on Firefox Focus.
noman-land
This basically never happens.
rationalist
What basically never happen? People testing in Firefox, or websites not working properly?
prmoustache
often?
rationalist
Yes, in fact just today trying to use Dollar General's website to "clip a coupon". I scanned the QR code, found the coupon, tapped on it. I got a blank box (white box on gray background IIRC) in Firefox Focus, but a login screen on Vanadium.
And yesterday, same with a local club's website. Didn't even work in Firefox for Android, but worked in Vanadium. I got the website's custom loading sprinner, so that loaded and worked, but whatever was supposed to change the screen when everything else loaded, did not work.
cultureulterior
As soon as they bring back XUL I'll go back to supporting them.
ChrisArchitect
[dupe]
Discussions:
Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46288491
Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46299934
No AI* Here – A Response to Mozilla's Next Chapter
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46295268
Make Me CEO of Mozilla
kerkeslager
I'm concerned, and I am glad people keep writing about this.
But the final bit in this post is really where I'm at: I have no idea where to go from here.
Currently on mobile I use Orion--it's the only mobile browser I've found where setting up AdBlocking is reasonably easy. Maybe I'll try it on Desktop.
But this doesn't really address the issue of there being only one rendering engine out there because it uses WebKit.
username223
> But the final bit in this post is really where I'm at: I have no idea where to go from here.
That's a good question. Mozilla has something like a half-billion dollars of assets, which is more than twice what the Linux Foundation reports. Does maintaining a web browser cost more than twice as much as maintaining an operating system? Hopefully not, but maybe it's time we find out.
bjord
are you on android or iOS?
kerkeslager
I'm on iOS.
bjord
I'm a kagi fan, but my family members who I've had try orion ran into quite a few issues. Might be worth trying one of these with regular safari:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/ublock-origin-lite/id674534269...
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/wipr-2/id1662217862
on android I use firefox with the regular ublock origin extension
I just don’t understand the purpose of the Mozilla foundation any more. They’re a non profit? But seem to do the bidding of big tech?
I have no sense of what they stand for
That plus seeming to chase every hype wave (Crypto, now AI) I just don’t get why I should care about them.