mozball

Apparently the same DRM is also enforced in the Apple Vision Pro as MrWhoseTheBoss discovered in his review. Except in that case, Apple's DRM pipeline extends all the way up to your eyeballs instead of your HDMI TV. That realization about what our dystopian future might hold for us seemed to hit him pretty hard :

https://youtu.be/5MhRZp2uunc?feature=shared&t=861

I am sorry but it is possible to write a privacy policy or Terms of Use that is clear, concise and reassuring to users. If a statement or word is confusing they can use the next sentence to clarify what that means. Whatever ambiguity in wording is clearly intentional on Mozilla's part. For what? Maybe for their new AI play (mozilla.ai) or their impending integration of "Privacy-Preserving-Ads" .[1][2]

Firefox is being enshittified.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30305770

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41311479

I mean nixpkgs is the largest linux repo there is.[1] I think anyone can upload a package, similar to AUR :

[1] - https://repology.org/repositories/statistics/total

edit : By official i meant something backed by and guaranteed by a reputed org, like Debian's official repo, RedHat or Arch's Core Repo.

You seem to be in the ballpark : "260 million for 'software development expenses'" : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Finances

Still that leaves ~ 400 million dollars for a privacy policy that doesn't read like it came from a sleazy big-tech company.

If people are misinterpreting mozilla's legalese, that is mozilla's fault for making these terms vague, broad and easy to misinterpret. Also i am not convinced your interpretation is correct.

Mozilla Firefox didn't have a 'Terms of Use' for 20 years. Why now?

Its quite clear they're seeking to expand their rights over their users data with their new privacy policy while simultaneously reducing user rights with this new 'Terms of Use'. i.e. Enshitification

Disabled auto-update until this is clarified or alternatives can be found.

I for one don't agree to these 'terms of use'. If people are failing to understand Mozilla's legalese, it is Mozilla's fault for making them ambiguous and difficult to understand. They earned 650 million dollars last year. Surely they have the resources for the task.

Genuinely asking : Who is behind librewolf and why should i trust them? They don't seem to be available in any official repos yet other than ones they self-published

Apple's 1 billion+ users across the world should protest this ludicrous overreach of power since the UK is essentially declaring digital sovereignty over all of them.

In the meantime maybe consider alternative cloud storage providers.

According to WaPo, the secret order demands blanket access to cloud data from any user anywhere in the world : http://archive.today/79dA3

Yeah. Basically a Librem 5 with the useability of Android.

A black sharpie over the offending led indicators will fix that. Now you can enjoy your sleep uninterrupted by dreams of manhunts and mephistophelian bargains.

I reckon at least as profitable (probably more) as every other forgettable model in the currently oversaturated market all trying to target the same segment in the race to the bottom. We don't care about cameras or games or ai. We are happy with last years specs (or older). The after-sales-support, maintenance, updates can be offloaded to the community. Sales will probably be online and not in brick-and-mortar stores since it would be difficult to market to regular people. So Marketing budget can be minimal. Just do a couple of talks at foss events. It might not be the kind of phone that gets Marques BrownLee excited but the FOSS community (which still has clout and influence among tech-elites) will be more than happy to do the evangelism for a phone that is 100% open-source and doesn't spy on you. Since sales are online it could be a kick-starter or pre-orders in batches. So 100% cash upfront before production. It could even be the halo phone for the next phone unicorn startup (ala OnePlus).

It is very puzzling. We have a plethora of brands from chinese, korean, european and american companies to kickstarter-funded projects to reskinned odm designs in developing markets,- all vying and clawing at each other to stand out in an oversaturated market with more cameras, more pixels, more features like AI, and filters and what-not. Yet not one of these companies think to release a phone that proffers to give the best rooting experience or Lineage OS compatibility - or better yet, comes with LineageOS out-of-the-box.

The native app won't work though. The problem alluded to by grandparent comment and in linked-article.

Your banking app is not going to work on Linux either. If Android is fundamentally broken then fork it. My point is, it seem smarter/easier to take Android and make it more linux-like than to take Linux and make it more Android-like. All the work is already done and paid for. Sailing with the wind vs sailing against the wind.

edit : Unless the goal is also to benefit the linux desktop ecosystem (the whole convergence meme)

Google et al pour billions annually into making android a first-class and dominant mobile OS. I think the FOSS community should leverage that and focus on liberating Android instead of trying to reinvent the wheel.

Your paranoia is warranted. Like i replied in another thread up, there are a couple thing you can do. Use multiple browser/profiles. Keep a separate profile or two with no extensions for banking, shopping, email and other important stuff. You can be install a couple addons in your 'general browsing' profile. In general install only 'recommended' and security-reviewed addons with firefox.

- An addon like vimium shouldn't need too many updates so auditing and disabling auto-updates might be worth it.

- Firefox has 'recommended' addons. In addition some of the more popular addons are security vetted (Their addon pages doesn't come with the scary "not reviewed" warning. These can be reasonably assumed to be safe.

- Also read my other reply to gp.

> These days I just use a small handful of extensions

Same here. Resisting fomo and temptations for new shiny is the hardest part but still worthwhile imo

>My understanding is that random extension is able to read and send somewhere almost all my data when I read my email, do online banking, etc.

Depends on the permissions requested by the extension but often yes. The permission "Can read all data on any webpage" means exactly that.

> Is there a way to use browser extensions safely?

Yes. Depending on your paranoia /security standards. Here's what you can do ( ordered by importance.)

1. Use more than one browser (but stay away from proprietary or less popular browsers) and/or use multiple profiles (both firefox and chrome has them)

2. Have separate profiles for banking, personal email, work and general browsing. (Also good for productivity)

3. Banking profile should have no extensions.

4. Use only mozilla-vetted 'recommended' and 'security reviewed' extensions in firefox for less important accounts. Check the permissions carefully and see if they're sane. I don't use extensions in chrome at all since google web store does no vetting at all beyond automated scanning. It's the wild west out there.

5. You can be less careful with general browsing profiles as long as you don't log into important accounts. Use firefox containers (this is more for privacy though than security)

6. If some addon is tempting but not reviewed - i try to review the code (if its small and readable enough). after vetting, i disable auto-updates. A greasemonkey script that does equivalent functionality is often preferable since the code is usually smaller and readable. Disable auto-update there too. Otherwise resist the temptation to install too many addons.

It says "using HTML5 and web sockets." Does this mean the application freezes if the connection to server is disrupted?

Could developers use this to make web-based apps along-side desktop clients? If so , Desktop frameworks like GTK and Qt should focus on this idea more to reclaim the desktop from the monstrosity that is Electron.

Is the f-droid account part of the sale too? Will f-droid users be compromised?

Many moons ago, an acquaintance sold his app account ( with apps like battery saver apps etc ) to an Israeli company. As i recall, in that case, the acquisition was for data-harvesting purposes.

In which case foreign governments, the EU and the like who collectively represent the interests of the other 7+ billion people, should start levying taxes, penalties and fines on Google and haul it and the US in front of international agencies like the WTO for unfair trade practices.

Multiple profiles is fully supported. It's just hidden behind a clunky UX.

Also check out firefox containers which is to profiles what docker is to virtual machines.

Google Search is notably absent in your list.

If this proposal becomes standard in Chrome, You can be sure Microsoft and Apple will follow Google's lead with the same or their own similar implementations.

See Microsoft Pluton and Apple's Private Access Tokens. Or read this article which provides an excellent overview of these developments. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32282305

Make no mistake. If this becomes standard on Chrome, this is going to be standard on the web.

If this isn't the straw that breaks the camel's back, there is never going to be one.

Google needs to be broken up.

They own the browser market. They own the web (through Adwords). They own Search. They own mobile. They own most of the video sharing market with 2.5 billion monthly annual users. They own a good chunk of email with 1.2 billion monthly annual users.

They have amassed an incomprehensible amount of power and influence over humanity and they have proven repeatedly that they are willing to use that power to the detriment of humanity and to entrench themselves further.

Google needs to be broken up.

If there is little money in VPNs, how is it that they are funding half the youtubers out there, potentially outbidding everyone else for the adspace.

Yes. I don't know why though. I don't understand why they can't host and run their own OpenVPN instance. Or why MozillaVPN is only available in 30 countries (mine not included), 4 years after announcement. Or why i haven't seen a single ad for Mozilla VPN anywhere on the web other than in mozilla's homepage. Or what they are doing with their 800 million dollars in annual revenue.

I visited Practical engineering and tom scott's websites and AFAI seen they embed youtube videos in their websites. I couldn't find astronaught's website. Its not even linked to in his youtube channel.

Microsoft is exactly the kind of company that would throw its full backing behind this google proposal, seeing how they have spent the last 20 years working towards the same goal. See Windows 11, Trusted Platform Module, Pluton, Palladium, SecureBoot.