AstralSerenity

ThunderMail from Mozilla can't come soon enough.

For all the shit they get, every controversy they've ever had has boiled down to a comms issue. They've been consistent for decades and I trust them, even if they often make weird business decisions.

No, not at all. Arcane was on par with Andor, if you want a gaming example. Fallout is a fine watch, but it is a cut below.

Orion? No, the closest thing to Arc in Zen. I don't believe that's up for debate -- nothing else has the same level of feature parity.

Interesting to see how this has evolved. Mozilla had conducted a detailed investigation on this topic by carmaker a few years ago: https://www.mozillafoundation.org/en/blog/privacy-nightmare-...

There is a weird standard Mozilla is held to that doesn't exist even for other privacy-minded companies.

There is also a layer of hypocrisy when people beg for Mozilla to generate greater revenue diversity, but then an immediate scoff whenever they try anything unrelated to Firefox -- where there is no money beyond search deals since Mozilla can't go down the Brave crypto route.

Gosh, Pale Moon? That browser is a security nightmare IIRC.

I'm personally fine with that. Mozilla Corporation (Firefox) remains the largest part of Mozilla.

As the cash cow, it will always receive what it needs, but it will also act as the vehicle for funding possible avenues of diversity.

Mozilla is never going to be independent off of Firefox alone -- that revenue simply doesn't exist.

I wish Mozilla had taken Proton's approach, but regardless, I hope they manage to throw something that sticks.

A fully financially secure Mozilla would truly allow their organization to shine.

It's also easy to understand why.

Google is not the same company Mozilla partnered with decades ago. You can listen to retrospectives from Mozilla engineers, and you sense a desire to bite the corrupted hand that feeds.

However, for Mozilla to be the bold, it needs funding diversity, and that isn't going to come from a browser alone.

I have not agreed with everything Mozilla has thrown against the wall, but I sincerely hope something sticks. We need it to.

On the bright side, at least we know it was typed by human hands!

This is ridiculous. Not only does Mozilla support BYOM with Smart Window, but do we seriously expect your average user to be able to locally run it with ease?

Imagine for a moment the complaints that would arise the very next day because their browser is now revving up their laptop fans and hoarding precious RAM.

Local models aren't yet light enough to handle the required processing at the lowest end, so Mozilla chose the most responsible stewards they could find. There is no news here.

You guys are awesome, thank you.

I would throw serious money at them both if this collaboration happened.

This is the exact approach Mozilla has taken to Firefox with the AI "killswitch". It has been well received.

Well, both League of Legends and Minecraft come from 2009 and remain incredibly popular -- so who says you'll be stuck in the past?

While I remain anxious about the dystopian future AI may ultimately deliver to us, this has been a clear silver lining in my eyes.

I have an old Wyze Scale that restricts advanced features behind a proprietary mega-app, forcing users to swipe past their other services. I've now been able to reverse engineer their Bluetooth protocol which can be used with tools like OpenScale.

In an older world, this would have been a prolonged endeavor for juice that ultimately isn't worth the squeeze. Now it can now takes place in an afternoon.

Yes, you!

Using web apps on Firefox really is the way given its support for uBlock Origin.

Screen real estate is precious on phones, so being able to permanently block "Install our app!" and even entire navigation categories (shorts on LinkedIn) is quite valuable.

Then you can "install" the site on your home screen or simply place it in collection folders so it's sitting ready on your "New Tab" page.

People have been saying this forever. It will never happen. Republicans and Democrats alike love Social Security. All that needs to be done to fix it is raise the cap.

They did end up releasing Windows Subsystem for Android via the Windows Insider Program, which was enough for the OSS community to take it over after it was abandoned. It still exists and has worked quite well for my use case: https://github.com/MustardChef/WSABuilds

Everyone properly informed on the topic now understands the Mozilla ToS debacle was a complete nothing burger and simply a result of California law, miscommunication, and Mozilla being careful. Not one thing changed in actuality.

Brave is a Thiel-funded, VC-owned private company with far more egregious monetization efforts.

Ultimately I know everything at Mozilla is completely controlled by the mission-driven non-profit parent -- something they've recently double-downed on.

Brave does not have those same assurances and cannot be trusted.

No, Mozilla is a non-profit -- you may just misunderstand charitable structure optimization. It has a for-profit public-benefit subsidiary called Mozilla Corporation (Firefox).

This is common in non-profits for a number of reasons: protects the foundations assets, allows for engaging in commercial operations (Mozilla VPN, Anonym), greater flexibility, etc.

It is not a true for-profit company. All "profit" flows up to the non-profit and the non-profit parent retains complete, absolute control while being tied to the Mozilla mission.

Sometimes you make decisions based on principle and future risk. Brave Software is a for-profit company that funded its start through Peter Thiel.

Even if fine in the present, you cannot guarantee me the future of a Thiel-funded, VC-owned firm.

Mozilla, in comparison, is a mature, non-profit with substantial goodwill and operational transparency.

Everything past these details are just noise.

From what I know personally, Firefox truly is responsible with user data. Though -- to steel man your point -- all the data Firefox sells is through their subsidiary Anonym, which goes through great lengths to anonymize all user data that can't be tied to any individual.

Example: selling market preferences of a town rather than the individual people in it.

The modified version I use disables all telemetry. I'm also doubtful my Pihole wouldn't just black it anyways. And ultimately, I use Firefox on Android with Ublock and strict tracking protection, so it doesn't seem I would be susceptible to this particular cookie interception Meta relies.

That said, I see your point. I wouldn't use Instagram if I couldn't do these things. If Google cracks down on user choice to a degree that even adb can't work around, then I'm out. Motorola's Graphene OS phone can't come soon enough.

Peter Theil was an angel investor in Brave. That alone is all the reason privacy-minded users need to avoid it.

I use Instagram on Android because it's heavily modified and stripped to its bare essentials just for responding to friends. Prior to this I used the web app. If those two disappeared I would be done.

Note my comment on size. I think folks forget how lean Valve is with only ~330 employees. I love Valve, but it's not quite apples to apples. Their flat, lean structure doesn't function like a typical corporation, and their industry-leading margins and functional monopoly (one that I enjoy) places far less pressure on their need to monetize.

That said, if we're trying to hinge our discussion on moderation, anyone who plays CS knows players to this day can utter the most reprehensible, racist garbage and expect no punishment. There is a reason Valorant, in comparison, has an incredibly diverse gender pool. I've heard from plenty of women about how "enjoyable" it is to use voice chat in CS.

This also doesn't even touch on Valve's role in gambling addiction...

I still stand by my original statement as it was intended.

Honestly, I strongly disagree. I've played a wide breadth of games, and I can't think of a game studio the size of Riot that is as community-engaged and pro-consumer.

Examples range from the quality of their patch notes, dev articles and videos, to their constant presence on reddit, and willingness to walk back decisions based on public outcry (Hextech Chests, League Classic monetization, etc).

Heck, after Riot gave up on Hytale, they were willing to sell the IP and assets back to the original creator while providing extremely generous severance packages for the entire team. I genuinely don't think any of the other companies you listed would have done the same.

It's frustrating because I truly believe they are well-meaning, honest actors. Every single "controversy" surrounding Mozilla can be directly attributed to miscommunication rather than malice. They do often struggle to read the room.

That said, the takeaways from this report are exciting, and I do feel that Mozilla now has the right lens in their assessment of OSS AI and their own approach to ensuring interoperability and setting open, modern standards.

This used to be my attitude, but I do feel like Firefox has made good ground in 2026.

I've also become sympathetic to their AI strategy. They don't seem delusional in their approach. They're not building models or selling slop, they're building OSS compatibility layers.

I don't want to see a world of vertically locked AI, so if Mozilla truly can dust off the old playbook for OSS AI, we'll all be better off for it.