Two days ago, I broke the news that Mozilla removed several Firefox extensions from the add-on store in Russia, after pressure from Russian censors. Mozilla provided me with an official statement, which seemed to highlight that the decision was not final, and it seems I was right – today, probably helped by the outcry our story caused, Mozilla has announced it’s reversing the decision. In a statement sent to me via email, an unnamed Mozilla spokesperson says:
In alignment with our commitment to an open and accessible internet, Mozilla will reinstate previously restricted listings in Russia. Our initial decision to temporarily restrict these listings was made while we considered the regulatory environment in Russia and the potential risk to our community and staff.
As outlined in our Manifesto, Mozilla’s core principles emphasise the importance of an internet that is a global public resource, open and accessible to all. Users should be free to customise and enhance their online experience through add-ons without undue restrictions.
By reinstating these add-ons, we reaffirm our dedication to:
– Openness: Promoting a free and open internet where users can shape their online experience.
– Accessibility: Ensuring that the internet remains a public resource accessible to everyone, regardless of geographical location.We remain committed to supporting our users in Russia and worldwide and will continue to advocate for an open and accessible internet for all.
↫ Mozilla spokesperson via email
I’m glad Mozilla reversed its decision, because giving in to a dictatorship never ends well – it starts with a few extensions today, but ends up with the kind of promotional tours for China that Tim Cook goes on regularly. Firefox is a browser that lives or dies by its community, and if that community is unhappy with the course of Mozilla or the decisions it makes, especially ones that touch on core values and human rights, it’s not going to end well for them.
That being said, this does make me wonder what would’ve happened if the forum thread that started all this died in obscurity and never made its way to the media. Would Mozilla have made the same reversal?
A for-profit corporation doesn’t have to care about this (to the contrary, the board has a fiduciary duty to maximize company profit), the government(s) that regulate corporations in their jurisdiction should care. Although China is so big now that if Apple had to choose whether to do business in the US or China, they’d probably choose China, so that ship has sailed.
Is Mozilla a community, a not-for-profit, or a corporation? Let’s not forget that Mozilla’s structure is weird, with Mozilla Foundation wholly owning Mozilla Corporation, and Mozilla Corporation being dependent on Google for most of its revenue. Given Mozilla’s miniscule market share today (which means Google doesn’t really need the search engine sponsorship anymore), who has more power in Mozilla Foundation, the community or Google?
I still like Mozilla for the fact Firefox is truly open-source (no proprietary syncing code), allows true adblockers, allows the Video DownloadHelper extension to download from YouTube, and doesn’t force you to use a Google Account to sync, but let’s be real, Mozilla is in a position they are heavily dependent on Google, not the community.
Not that any of this is related to Russia, just putting it out there that calling Mozilla a community or saying Mozilla is beholden to the community might not be true.
Mozilla was a community, but it was one under siege from all directions, and could not hold. Users have dried up because they have fallen for the dark patterns and shady practices that have led to Chrome and it’s descendants ascension, Donations have dried up for the same reason. Compatibility has suffered due to so many pages optimized for chromium. The community turned their back on Mozilla and went back to sucking on the corporate teat as soon as MS was defeated and chrome appeared. Mozilla lack the funds and the access to get themselves installed as a default browser on anything other than Linux, and even there, it’s replaced with chromium by most people. We put Mozilla in this position, by not using Firefox (and Thunderbird), and by not supporting them so they could be more independent.
I am sorry, but as Firefox supported since it was called Firebird, who has his name on the NYT add, Mozilla f*cked up by making a worst product.
They keep spending money on big salaries for their management team while they say they don’t have the resources to make FF icon for Windows the same size as everyone else’s icons.
Of course that is a very simplistic example.
It is a very simplistic example, and this is a complex problem. But at the end of the day, users==support in this situation, and Firefox users jumped en mass, and as chrome gets crappier all the time, they, for whatever reason, won’t switch back.
because what you think is crappier is not for the general population?
Hi.
Unfortunately, Firefox suffered from staying single-threaded and crash-prone for far too long, and by the time Mozilla fixed this with Quantum, it was too late: Firefox had gotten the reputation of being “the new IE”, which is sad because Firefox is an excellent browser since Quantum.
And yet, we still have greybeards arguing in the opposite direction, arguing that Firefox should have stayed on the old codebase, complete with support for XUL plugins (aka crash generator plugins).
It wasn’t too late. i’ve never heard anyone refer to Firefox as the new IE, but chromium is definitely that, and MV3 is going to be the proof in that pudding.
Hi.