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Mozilla: DOJ's Plan for Chrome Risks Hurting Smaller Browsers (uk.pcmag.com)

submitted 4 days ago by ForgottenFlux to c/technology

67 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The Justice Department's proposal to force Google to rein in and even sell off its Chrome browser business may seem like a win for competitors such as Mozilla’s Firefox browser. But the company says the plan risks hurting smaller browsers.

In their recommendations, federal prosecutors urged the court to ban Google from offering "something of value" to third-party companies to make Google the default search engine over their software or devices.

The problem is that Mozilla earns most of its revenue from royalty deals—nearly 86% in 2022—making Google the default Firefox browser search engine.

"If implemented, the prohibition on search agreements with all browsers regardless of size and business model will negatively impact independent browsers like Firefox and have knock-on effects for an open and accessible internet,” Mozilla says. “As written, the remedies will harm independent browsers without material benefit to search competition.”

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[–] [email protected] 224 points 4 days ago (20 children)

May I be frank? I suspect that, in the long run, Mozilla not getting this money will actually benefit Firefox. Sure, so exec will get pissed as they won't get 5.6 million dollars a year, and Firefox won't get some weird nobody-asked-for feature that'll be ditched some time later; but I think that they'll focus better on the browser this way. Specially because whoever is paying the dinner is the one picking the dish, and with a higher proportion of their effective income coming from donations, what users want will stop being so neglected.

Just my two cents.

[–] [email protected] 70 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Firefox won’t get some weird nobody-asked-for feature that’ll be ditched some time later

Nah, the features nobody asked for will just be limited to ones that will provide a revenue stream.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 days ago (1 children)

However once they lose the googlebux, a meaningful part of the revenue stream will be donations. And features implemented because of donators asking for them are, typically, things that we users desire.

[–] pelya 11 points 3 days ago

Donations are not sustainable. Many open-source projects tried them, and the only thing they can cover are server costs or conferences, developers are still working for free on their own time.

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