> The obvious choice would have been to put all your effort into making a good mobile browser on other mobile OSes[0], but instead Mozilla decided to make a whole OS.
Firefox was losing market share to Chrome on desktop platforms which Google did not own and which did not bundle Chrome. It was not and is not obvious a better Android Firefox would have halted the decline. And any Windows Phone effort would have been wasted.
Some people think Mozilla gave up Firefox OS too soon.
In another history all iOS browsers are Safari, all Windows Phone browsers are Internet Explorer, and all Android browsers distributed through Google Play are Chrome. HN comments say Mozilla were foolish to bet this would not happen.
> Now, let's look at Rust and Servo. Those are critical developer tools. Firefox is built with them. But Mozilla jettisoned them, unceremoniously, even though they were delivering tangible improvements to the browser.
Firefox includes components prototyped in Servo. It is not used as a developer tool as far as I know. Many tangible improvements to the browser were delivered without Servo.
Many companies rely on Rust without funding it. Mozilla passing Rust to an independent foundation was painful for Rust. It is unclear it harmed Mozilla.
> Zawinski's plan seems too radical now because Mozilla larded themselves up on side projects like Boot2Gecko and acquisitions like Pocket and Anonym, while tossing things like Rust and Servo out the window. To be clear, if Mozilla had used Pocket to make themselves Google-independent, I wouldn't be complaining about it, but instead they shut it down.
Why do you call Firefox OS its development name? Boot2Gecko may have been a side project. Firefox OS was the main project according to people who worked for Mozilla then.
Mozilla shut down Pocket to refocus on Firefox because Pocket was unprofitable or insufficiently profitable apparently.
Mozilla acquired Anonym last year. I think Mozilla owning an advertising company will enshittify Firefox. But how did you determine so soon it was dead weight?
> Zawinski's plan
Does Zawinski's plan mean Building THE reference implementation web browser, and Being a jugular-snapping attack dog on standards committees? The 1st part is a vague objective. Not a plan. And the 2nd part depends on the 1st part.
Firefox was losing market share to Chrome on desktop platforms which Google did not own and which did not bundle Chrome. It was not and is not obvious a better Android Firefox would have halted the decline. And any Windows Phone effort would have been wasted.
Some people think Mozilla gave up Firefox OS too soon.
In another history all iOS browsers are Safari, all Windows Phone browsers are Internet Explorer, and all Android browsers distributed through Google Play are Chrome. HN comments say Mozilla were foolish to bet this would not happen.
> Now, let's look at Rust and Servo. Those are critical developer tools. Firefox is built with them. But Mozilla jettisoned them, unceremoniously, even though they were delivering tangible improvements to the browser.
Firefox includes components prototyped in Servo. It is not used as a developer tool as far as I know. Many tangible improvements to the browser were delivered without Servo.
Many companies rely on Rust without funding it. Mozilla passing Rust to an independent foundation was painful for Rust. It is unclear it harmed Mozilla.
> Zawinski's plan seems too radical now because Mozilla larded themselves up on side projects like Boot2Gecko and acquisitions like Pocket and Anonym, while tossing things like Rust and Servo out the window. To be clear, if Mozilla had used Pocket to make themselves Google-independent, I wouldn't be complaining about it, but instead they shut it down.
Why do you call Firefox OS its development name? Boot2Gecko may have been a side project. Firefox OS was the main project according to people who worked for Mozilla then.
Mozilla shut down Pocket to refocus on Firefox because Pocket was unprofitable or insufficiently profitable apparently.
Mozilla acquired Anonym last year. I think Mozilla owning an advertising company will enshittify Firefox. But how did you determine so soon it was dead weight?
> Zawinski's plan
Does Zawinski's plan mean Building THE reference implementation web browser, and Being a jugular-snapping attack dog on standards committees? The 1st part is a vague objective. Not a plan. And the 2nd part depends on the 1st part.