this post was submitted on 26 Jul 2023
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Privacy
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Get out of here with that defeatist attitude lol. There's this little browser called Firefox. They take privacy and ad-blocking very seriously, and the browser is excellent and faster than Chrome now.
I made the switch about six months ago and never looked back, and I am deep in the Googlesphere.
Isn't the issue that the website will go through with this and firefox has to either comply or just not be able to view the webpage?
Chrome has enough of the marketshare that websites probably don't have to be concerned with whether firefox can support them or not.
Incorrect. Some companies supported IE5 when we had IE8 because market share was greater than 5%. We need to get Firefox to above 5%, and keep going to 10% and 15% as a real middle finger to say, DON'T EVEN TRY OR YOU WILL LOSE MONEY!
...the example is some companies supported Internet Explorer 5 when it had a market share of 5% vs... Internet Explorer 8
...so what was Netscape Navigator's marketshare at the time?
It is irrelevant to the point. The point is companies won't implement webDRM if their firefox userbase is too big and it's going to cost them money and users. If Firefox is used by 10% of users, the decision to implement it would potentially cost 10% revenue.
I'm highlighting how companies make these decisions and how this can kill WEI.
Okay, so here's why it's not irrelevant:
IE5 is still IE. Microsoft has an obligation to make it look good (so dumb users don't bunk newer versions in with it) and browers have the same issue (Well i'm using the internet explorer so why isn't it working?)
This same perception (which I can absolutely assure you as someone who has supported older users does happen) Is not a perception that happens with different products altogether. If you're using Netscape, they'd just tell you to use IE. If you're using Firefox, they'd just tell you it was made with "Google" in mind.
Using an example where the two products are in fact different versions of the same product is a significant difference.
But still in regards to the argument about revenue, the gaming market is constantly showing that companies will definitely implement DRM under the assumption that it is providing them revenue, even if they lose customers because of it.
Gaming is very different. Losing a battle with DRM on gaming does not mean losing it on the web is a certainty. People can still choose DRMless games, and GOG is still going so it's not a lost battle.
I know IE5 and IE8 are the same browser, I'm saying that company support decisions are made on market share and revenue. Any browser over x% is a supported browser. Over y%, it's a partially supported browser. We need to make Firefox a supported browser through market share.
A retail website will not implement something that will cost them traffic, because they'll lose more than they gain. My biggest concern is the first movers will be the streaming giants, and it's probably a case, that people need to take a stand here, and cancel subscriptions if they get blocked, but it won't even be coded if it costs more than it gains. They aren't going to sacrifice 10% of their revenues, if they don't gain more. This project will fail if no website supports it. The mission is to ensure websites don't support it and it dies. If Chrome market share dies in the process, awesome.
It. Doesn't. Matter. What. Firefox. Does. What part of google controls 3/4 of the web don't you understand? If google puts it in Firefox has no choice, do it too or die. 5-10% of browsers not using it will not change anything except to lower that number to less than 1%.
"Google controls 3/4 of the web, so not only am I going to roll over and take it, but I'm going to lube myself up for their convenience."
FTFY
Moving to firefox would still be rolling over and taking it though. If they don't comply, you just don't have permission to view the web page. It's not like they're going to go around that in any way.
Unless you find an alternative to the website itself you're out of options.
The only ways of "not taking it" that I would see are either you find a way to ignore the DRM and view the site anyway, or you make the site drop the implementation, neither of which switching to Firefox does.
Or just don't visit websites that have DRM. Any website willing to work with Google on this DRM thing is a website I have zero desire to ever visit.
That kindof argument is just naïve bordering obnoxious. It's like an ostrich putting their head into the ground.
It's going to spread, more sites will use that DRM, and even if you decide you can keep off of them on principle, most people won't.
If it were remotely going to end up that way we wouldn't have chrome being able to do this to begin with
It makes it more expensive to implement the DRM. Companies always consider things in terms of return on investment. If implmenting it gains x, but loses y% share of users, they will weigh it up, the more %ge of users on Firefox, the more it will cost and the less likely companies are to roll this out.
I mean...have you seen the gaming market on DRM? People point to arguments and research that it doesn't even work and it still gets implemented in the AAA games...Firefox is going to need a lot more than outrage to build a share that threatens that.
DRM in games exists because their market accepts that. There is no real opposition. They already shed the people that cared about that. They can make more money from the DRM and extra stuff. This isn't clear in browsers.
As for AAA, it's dead to many, and indie game dev is getting stronger and stronger.
I really doubt that, but I guess we'll see.
Oh fuck you.
Oh great, now you're getting emotional.
You aren't providing reasonable criticism to the argument. It's completely unrealistic and ignoring how we got here to begin with.
He's right to respond emotional when you just make a completely unrealistic argument.
Well then it's back to non-commercial platforms like here in the fediverse. The people who care about this stuff will find a way and those who don't won't care. Its more or less like in the days of the old web.
It will because companies generally support anything above 5% otherwise they're damaging revenue. Everyone needs to move to FF ASAP and don't look back. Get all your friends and family on firefox.
Unfortunately this little browser called Firefox has an insignificant amount of user share and pretty much no say in anything. While they might take privacy and ad blocking very seriously, they don't take feedback and their users seriously at all, being very aimed at the "let's make our userbase even smaller" after each decision or change.
Also, Firefox is only faster than Chrome on synthetic tests on Windows 10, not reflecting real world usage in any shape or form, and on Android it's just comically slower than any other browser available.
And as a disclaimer, I'm a Firefox user for ever 10 years now, but I fully understand that while we might win some battles here or there, the war is already lost and it's only a matter of time now. I'm also getting really tired of all the upkeep Firefox demands of me to be usable by my standards and all of Mozilla's shenanigans.
Based on your the start of your post, I find it very hard to believe you actually use Firefox.
One of those: "Firefox is sooooo bad, but trust me, I use it".
The war isn't lost, and we need to get everyone using Firefox, it just seems that you are contributing to Google's mission. It's a bit like saying "as a Ukrainian, we are already lost, let's give up". "No, thanks, we won't". We gonna kill this thing like AMP.
We all know this is true because browser user share never changes over time based on user experience or anything.
When's the last time you used it? I just did a comparison against Chrome on multiple different websites, and besides Googles own sites they were essentially equal. Even if it were slightly slower, I'd still use it over any other option since I have full fat ublock origin installed on it.
I use it every day to browse Kbin, the only extension I have is Greasemonkey with KES and Redirect Amp to HTML scripts. My adblocking is done via NextDNS for a system wide blocking. For everything else I use Samsung Internet, and now I'm trying out Vivaldi, and the difference is astounding. Firefox takes at least 10 seconds to start loading any page, it lags to a halt when scrolling and it constantly thinks I'm trying to pull to refresh (yes I know it can be disabled).
I don't know what to tell you, then. I don't have any of those issues now. It's been probably a good two years since I've had loading speed issues, never had the scrolling issues, and only had issues with the pull refresh when it first launched in Nightly.