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Comment by dao- | Hacker News Reader

> People using colorways after the feature was removed? Well, that sounds like a failure of the feature then.

> The whole crux upon which the colorways marketing rested, was they were temporary! You get to change your theme for a few months, and then later on at some random point, it changes again as it's taken away from you.

It was sort of a marketing gimmick, one I wasn't particularly fond of. (I was the lead engineer for colorways.) What it really meant is that we'd offer the onboarding screen and colorways built into about:addons for a limited time. The intent was never to remove them once users installed them. We have since migrated them to AMO where they can still be installed: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/collections/4757633...

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Yes, and when people complain about colorways, the marketing gimmick is what they are complaining about. No one objects to colored themes, and adding a UI "hey this is a feature" isn't a thing people really dislike either beyond a few.

People know when they are being sold to and emotionally manipulated, and they don't like it, even if it's effective.

That's why colorways was a failure, complained about years later, even if "the metrics look good". People don't remember what you did, they remember how you made them feel.

There's for sure a lesson to be learned in here. The product owner who had decided and pushed for making it seem like colorways were ephemeral has long left Mozilla, so you're preaching to the choir at this point.

I still don't consider colorways a failure, all things considered. To me, the fact that colorways are still some of the most used themes outweighs you remembering that you were angry three or so years ago, but thanks for the feedback.

I think perhaps we are using the same words to talk about different things.

It may well be that colorways are used and loved by many users and that's a success. You made something people like; well done!

That we are having this conversation at all I think could be considered evidence, though, that it was a strategic failure for Mozilla. How much public opinion is worth burning for how much increased usage of a new theme feature? In my opinion, very little.

That colorways work well, that the people who use them continue to do so, that they were technically well designed and well engineered, is one yardstick by which to measure success/failure. By that measure they are certainly a success. But another yardstick is "did they have a net-positive or net-negative effect on the organization", which is where I think it came up short.

Based on the things you've said it sounds like you and I are more or less on the same page.

> How much public opinion is worth burning for how much increased usage of a new theme feature? In my opinion, very little.

I think we're squarely in the "very little" range here in terms of how much public backlash we saw. You might be overestimating how widely folks got angry the same way you got angry, or perhaps we weren't monitoring the right forums and channels when releasing the feature, who knows.

Most of the Firefox adoption I've seen has been driven by tech evangelists pushing it. It's a vocal minority that is upset but it's also a vocal minority that was responsible for a lot of growth.

Firefox Mobile is great, it has uBlock Origin. I'm not recommending it to people though.

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