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Comment by LocalPCGuy | Hacker News Reader

Don't know why Mozilla isn't making a bigger deal about the iPhone/iPad browsers. Apple pretty clearly still holds a monopoly position, at the least a majority position, but their platform is locked down. But it's ok for Apple, but bad for Microsoft?

I have a bad feeling about Mozilla's prospects going forward. If the mobile platform "single" browser model is allowed to continue, they don't really have a place in that world.

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Except that Apple doesn't have a monopoly position or even a majority position in phones. And Microsoft has a history of legally enforced access for alternative browsers on their platform.

Mozilla's long term bet in the mobile space is Boot 2 Gecko, precisely because of that model.

<disclaimer>I work for Mozilla, but not on mobile or legal stuff</disclaimer>

OK, I am using FF and love it, but what's Microsoft's market share in tablets? Practically zero. Windows RT and Windows are different, just as Windows and Windows Phone are different.

Mozilla needs to speak up about Apple and hopefully all of major tablet OS change their stance.

Of course Mozilla doesn't like how Apple behaves on iOS devices!

Do you honestly think they do, or were you just trying to be provocative?

The point is, why raise a big stink about it when Microsoft does it (which at this point, affects no one), when Apple has been doing the same thing for the past 7 years, which affects millions?

Because with Microsoft they actually have a chance of changing things. Apple are a completely lost cause when it comes to freedom.

> But it's ok for Apple, but bad for Microsoft?

Well, Microsoft are doing something worse than Apple. The iOS browser is based on the open source WebKit, which Apple contributed a lot of the code to. There is nothing open about IE.

Not that that has anything to do with choice, but it'd certainly give me more of an incentive to try replace IE than Safari.

> But it's ok for Apple, but bad for Microsoft?

Apple sells both hardware & software, one can argue that it's packed together as a whole, unlike PC.

Because if they do, no one will care except a few FOSS fans and it would get flagged to death on HN.

But it's open season on MS, that's why we have three different stories on the front page reporting the exact same story, so they know how to get people riled up.

Not to mention that iOS is not as similar to Mac OS X as Windows RT is to Windows x86.

ARM Windows will only be the Metro version with all the isolated processes, etc. While Win x86 might have that, it shares nothing else with the traditional Windows model and is it to all intents and purposes as different as OSX and iOS.

I really don't see the problem with this if people don't have a problem with iOS only allowing Safari as the default browser.

Windows RT will apparently have an implementation of the classic Windows desktop with all the traditional Windows APIs, but only Microsoft applications will be allowed to use it. In fact that's the entire point of Mozilla's complaint - the bundled IE has an unfair advantage by being allowed to use the more powerful classic Windows APIs whilst other browsers are stuck in Metro.

Mozilla does care but I guess not as much fuss has been made as there is when it's Microsoft.

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