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Comment by danjoredd | Hacker News Reader

Mozilla has been frustrating, at least to me lately. I want to support them, but very little of the money given to them goes to the browser itself or even their research projects, and the "phoning home" aspect also annoys me. On top of that they are also heavily funded by Google. My personal theory on why they do that is so they don't get hit with an antitrust. Its concerning to me though because that means Google has influence in Firefox, so "using the alternative" still means being affected by Google's decision making. They have stood against some of Google's decisions like their web DRM, which is great! But I do wonder if any lower-profile changes might have been pushed through on Google's request.

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>but very little of the money given to them goes to the browser itself or even their research projects

They can't take money given to a 501c3 charitable organization and use it to fund the expenses of a for-profit corporation (Mozilla Corp). That would be tax fraud. On the other hand the Mozilla Corp has to exist because otherwise it would be legally challenging to do a lot of things they need to do such as business deals. Exceedingly few Foundations work that way without doing something akin to what Mozilla does.

>Its concerning to me though because that means Google has influence in Firefox, so "using the alternative" still means being affected by Google's decision making. ... They have stood against some of Google's decisions like their web DRM, which is great! But I do wonder if any lower-profile changes might have been pushed through on Google's request.

HNers say this often but nobody has ever freaking pointed to anything. It's nothing but FUD at this point and it's incredibly tiring.

I disagree that its FUD. The fact of the matter is that Google is their biggest financial contributor, and that means by proxy Google can influence them. I don't have any examples right off the bat, but that doesn't discount the fact that it's a clear conflict of interest.

>The fact of the matter is that Google is their biggest financial contributor, and that means by proxy Google can influence them. I don't have any examples right off the bat,

Exhibit A.

Fine, it's a potential conflict of interest. But there's still a step between having a potential conflict of interest and being compromised by Google / influenced by proxy. You don't get to jump from point A to point B. That's FUD.

There are near-monthly examples of Mozilla going against Google on big-ticket items, and nobody seems to be able to point to any examples otherwise, but we're supposed to criticize them for being too dependent on Google while ALSO criticizing them for profitable side-projects or cross-marketing that diversifies their revenue (like VPN, Pocket, the Disney movie thing, etc.)

Simultaneously:

* "how dare they work on something other than Firefox even if it makes money" and

* "how dare they monetize Firefox" and

* "how dare they take so much money from Google"

> Simultaneously: "how dare they work on something other than Firefox even if it makes money" and "how dare they monetize Firefox" and "how dare they take so much money from Google"

Yes. Perhaps you've heard of the concept of a non-profit? Specifically a foundation, organized and operated exclusively for charitable purposes?

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501, subsection (c)(3).

okay, and Librewolf is a fork of Firefox. even if I was worried, I'm not exactly reassured that Librewolf would be peachy if Mozilla got hit hard by something.

I'd rather Google does pull that trigger so we can get some anti-trust going. They've been overdue for years on that front.

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/ability-to-donate-money...

> but very little of the money given to them goes to the browser itself or even their research projects

hi, do you have a breakdown or some stats for this?

not him. but there's this person whose paycheck is 7digits. pretty sure the person in question doesn't know a lick about rendering engine or other nitty gritty details of how browser works.

Am I misreading the financial statement linked by your sibling comment? It looks like they spent in the $250,000 or so range on all salaries combined in a given year, but maybe I’m misreading it.

It's in thousands so it should be $250,000,000? I don't know that I'm reading it right either.

https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html

You are reading it right.

Remember how the new CEO upon joining fired 250 employees and simultaneously upped her own pay to 2.5 million? (Its much more now)

And it is nothing remarkable compared to any other tech company CEO's salary. Sure, shitty thing to do, but to smear Firefox's name over it..

I am saying the IT workers receiving low pay or being outright fired while non-tech gets paid more has precedent under the current CEO. Besides its not Firefox thats being smeared, its the CEO who is, and should be smeared for acts such as this. Firefox the software is still mostly fine.

Here is Mozilla's 2021 Audited Financial Statement [PDF]:

https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-202...

> "phoning home" aspect also annoys me

That thing is so minuscule and more of an everyday feature that I really don't see all the fuss about it.

Also, it is a game theory "both would lose if stopped" situation with google, so no, google has no way to affect Mozilla directly. If they were to stop it, Firefox might stop being developed and Google definitely gets sued, and it is basically free money for Firefox, setting the default search engine is no big deal.

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