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Comment by black_puppydog | Hacker News Reader

This is Microsoft using their desktop operating system market share to drive their web browser market share. That's pretty much what they got sued for before. Given, their market position in desktop might be a different one now than back then. But it's still quite close to what antitrust laws were written against.

Also saying "oh all corps do stuff like that calm down" is a really bad defense IMO.

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Try using any Google property without chrome, or try using any iOS device without safari.

This is pretty harmless in my opinion.

Your reasoning does not make it harmless, it makes Microsoft the same as Google and Apple.

People defend the walled garden of Apple.

But I think it's just post purchase rationalization.

People enter the walled garden expecting a walled garden and desiring a walled garden.

Microsoft’s behavior is like taking a stroll in a forest or open field and suddenly having walls erected around you and cameras pointed at you.

harmful is google purposefully blocking their properties to mobile edge when everything worked with changed U/A string.

Concerning at best, since they're using first party grounds for advertising but that does not make it harmful.

Google doesn't bother me if I set Firefox for Android as the default browser.

It does on my S8, try any google website and you'll get notifications and I've even gotten emails every time I sign in on a device with a gmail ID but don't have the google apps on that device.

I am an occasional user of Maps, YouTube, Blogger and Translate. Never used Chrome, and all of these properties work just fine and have not tried to push Chrome.

I'm also using a stock Android and have never used Chrome on it. Play Store, Play Games, Find my Device, and the Google app work just fine and haven't tried to push Chrome either.

I guess I should prepend these observations with "Yet", as I'm not at all of the opinion that it'll never happen.

Have you tried using Translate for a web page recently, instead of just a couple sentences of text? Some time ago, they removed that functionality, instead instructing users to use a browser with native translation capabilities to translate pages. It's a pretty blatant push to get people over onto Chrome.

No they didn't. Paste a URL and hit the icon next to it.

https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&tab=TT&sl=auto&...

Hm. It may have been as part of something temporary, but I definitely ran into that message recently. Good to see it's back.

> all of these properties work just fine and have not tried to push Chrome.

Historically Google has relentlessly advertised Chrome to Firefox users on Youtube and their main search page ... probably the most valuable advertising space on the Internet. Maybe they've cut back, for some or all users.

Or you've grown immune to it, because I work on Windows and occasionally setup new VM builds to test things and I always get these banners.

What's even worse is that their CAPTCHA stuff prefers chrome/chromium users off the bat with reliability scores.

What's the problem? I use Firefox and Firefox Focus as my only web browsers on my Android phone.

Don't most linux distros come with Firefox preinstalled? How is that not pushing the other way? OSX comes with Safari. Every time you visit youtube with another browser it nudges you to install Chrome. Why is Microsoft singled out here?

The suit was based on the (at the time) pervasiveness of MS-windows. These other things are not near as ubiquitous yet.

No. peak market share of Windows XP was 80%. market share of chrome is hovering around 65%. search engine share of google is like 90%.

No Linux distribution is a monopoly at the moment. The matter is: are you a monopoly? Then special laws are applied to you.

On the theory that every heavily-commented, front page item critcial of Microsoft produces the same defensive comments along the lines of "but everyone else is doing it", I decided I would search this thread for the phrase "singled out". I arrived here.

What is funny in this case is that Microsoft is going after Firefox users, specifically, so, similar to how an HN commenter would ask "Why is Microsoft being singled out?", we could actually ask, "Why is Mozilla being singled out?" Why not target the users of some other browser.

It should be obvious that this type of question is not aimed at producing a useful answer. I predict we will see this suggestion of "unfairness" again in the next heavily-commented, front page item that is critical of Microsoft. It has been remarkably consistent.

Linux distros preinstall Firefox just like Windows preinstalls Edge. A fact that I've never had a problem with, from an ethical or user-friendliness aspect.

For your comparison to be valid, a Linux distro would have to be showing antagonistic adverts when its mandatory telemetry gathering detects that you are not using Firefox, and doing so to increase their market share. They do not and distros are not Mozilla, so the comparison falls flat.

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