There have been multiple submissions. I guess this one wins because it's the original source and was posted first. But since corporate press releases leave much to be desired (<a href="https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=corporate%20press%20release%20by:dang" rel="nofollow">https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...</a>), I've pilfered the title from <a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/mozilla-lays-off-250-employees-while-it-refocuses-on-commercial-products/" rel="nofollow">https://www.zdnet.com/article/mozilla-lays-off-250-employees...</a> via <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24121166">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24121166</a>.<p>Please note that this thread has multiple pages of comments. To reach them, click the More link at the bottom, or like this:<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120336&p=2">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120336&p=2</a><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120336&p=3">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120336&p=3</a>
[I am a Mozilla employee, and yes, I <i>do</i> recognize how my position influences my perspective.]<p>One thing that always frustrates me a bit whenever Mozilla comes up on HN or elsewhere is that we are always held to impossibly high standards. Yes, as a non-profit, we <i>should</i> be held to <i>higher</i> standards, but not <i>impossible</i> standards.<p>OTOH, sometimes it just seems unreasonable and absurd. Stuff like, to paraphrase, "Look at the corporate doublespeak in that press release. Fuck Mozilla, I'm switching to Chrome."<p>Really? That's what's got you bent out of shape?<p>Sure, Mozilla has made mistakes. Did we apologize? Did we learn anything? Did we work to prevent it happening again?<p>People want to continue flogging us for these things while giving other companies (who have made their own mistakes, often much more consequential than ours, would never be as open about it, and often learn nothing) a relatively free pass.<p>I'm certainly not the first person on the planet whose employer has been on the receiving end of vitriol. And if Mozilla doesn't make it through this next phase, I can always find another job. But what concerns me about this is that Mozilla is such an important voice in shaping the future of the internet. To see it wither away because of people angry with what are, in the grand scheme of things, minor mistakes, is a shame.<p>EDIT: And lest you think I am embellishing about trivial complaints, there was a rant last week on r/Firefox that Mozilla was allegedly conspiring to hide Gecko's source code because we self-host our primary repo and bug tracking instead of using GitHub, despite the fact that the Mozilla project predates GitHub by a decade.
Mozilla management has me puzzled. They have a position that is incredibly strong, lots of dedicated users that would rather quit the web than switch to Chrome or Edge.<p>"But we know we also need to go beyond the browser to give people new products and technologies that both excite them and represent their interests"<p>Is exactly what they should stay away from. Work on the bloody browser, forget about the rest. There are bugs open for the browser that cost them marketshare every day (WebMIDI for instance) driving people to Chrome.<p>Spreading their focus thinly, causing their main product to be somewhat neglected and behind when it comes to comparing it with other browsers. And that's before we get into the re-write and forced upgrade and breakage of lots of important plug-ins.<p>It's not so much the changing world that is the problem here, but a ship that has become rudderless and that does not treat the browser landscape like the war it really is.<p>The world needs Mozilla, healthy and under good management. I'm not sure if that is a luxury we will have for much longer if they are going down hill this fast. On the plus side, it's open source and will - hopefully - continue to work for many years as long as there are people willing to keep it alive.<p>So as far as I'm concerned this post highlights the problem in the post itself, this is <i>not</i> what's needed.<p>Laser focus on the browser at the expense of all the fluff. Forget about 'internet activism' and 'building new products'.<p>Get the most secure and most user friendly, privacy first, standards compatible and feature rich browser out there and you'll survive for another decade at least. Get distracted by new and shiny stuff and I'd be surprised if it lasts another five years.
Over the past decade, Mozilla has capitulated over and over again on critical issues. They failed their users and the ecosystem by not standing up to industry pressure for h.264 and EME. They also ended up following rather than leading on key privacy issues like third-party cookie behavior.<p>In every case, they defended these decisions by saying that they couldn't risk losing users, arguing that these issues weren't hills worth dying on. And now, because Mozilla didn't choose a hill to die on, they are going to die on no hill at all.<p>When they aren't the browser that is standing up for interoperability and the freedom and privacy of their users, they have no way to differentiate themselves. Firefox is just another browser, and it's one that is architecturally dated and under-resourced compared to its rivals.<p>I had assumed that when Mozilla had nothing left to lose as Firefox marketshare crashed, they would go back to being the scrappy underdog who advocates for the right thing. The fact that they've chosen to focus on revenue instead says everything you need to know about how far Mozilla has fallen.
“We need to focus...” followed by 5 different areas to focus on.<p>That’s not focusing.<p>“[We] need to go beyond the browser to give people new products and technologies that both excite them and represent their interests.”<p>What? Mozilla needs to build great products that solve people’s problems better than Google or whomever else does. That’s what Firefox did when it came out. It was objectively better than IE in ways that people could immediately grasp.<p>“Representing interests?” WTF are you even taking about? If you mean privacy and ownership of my personal data than say that.<p>“To start, that means products that mitigate harms or address the kinds of the problems that people face today. Over the longer run, our goal is to build new experiences that people love and want, that have better values and better characteristics inside those products.”<p>Mitigate harms? Again, WTF are we even talking about? Better values? Maybe this is the open source roots showing? But the majority of your business is based on selling default search engine rights to one of the most invasive harvesters of personal info, so let’s not pull that “values” thread too much here Mozilla.<p>Make awesome products and solve people problems better than your competitors. If you competition is doing scummy stuff, then tell people why your approach is better. Apple is doing an awesome job messaging the importance of privacy.<p>Come on Mozilla. Get in the damn game
That's the last call for anybody who thinks "it's good that Mozilla exists, and its mission is important, but I'm still using Chrome and derivatives". Mozilla can't exist solely because people think it has a good mission: it needs products that can pay the bills, or at least a large population of active users.
Mozilla, with revenue of $27M last year, is mainly responsible for Firefox and a few related applications [0].<p>Apache meanwhile, has revenue of less than $1M, and has over 350 projects with huge adoption like Cassandra and Kafka and Lucene and Maven and that eponymous HTTP server [1].<p>In 2017 Mozilla paid their CEO $2.3M and their treasurer (who only worked 6 months) $1.2M [2].<p>Mozilla is a foundation which owns a for-profit corporation. That corporation had revenues of $450M in 2018 [3]. I double checked this shocking amount.<p>Most of that revenue comes from their search partner, which was switched back to Google recently [4].<p>How is all of this possible given the relative contributions of these software non-profits?<p>[0] <a href="https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products" rel="nofollow">https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products</a>
[1] <a href="https://projects.apache.org/projects.html" rel="nofollow">https://projects.apache.org/projects.html</a>
[2] <a href="https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2017/mozilla-2017-form-990.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2017/mozilla-2017-fo...</a>
[3] <a href="https://www.ghacks.net/2019/11/26/mozilla-revenue-dropped-in-2018-but-it-is-still-doing-well/" rel="nofollow">https://www.ghacks.net/2019/11/26/mozilla-revenue-dropped-in...</a>
[4] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Google" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Google</a>
Sounds like Servo, the next-generation browser engine that brought the world Rust, is one of the teams being destaffed:<p><a href="https://twitter.com/SimonSapin/status/1293231187167784960" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/SimonSapin/status/1293231187167784960</a>
Mozilla needs to stop prattling on about being a "world-class, modern, multi-product internet organisation" and being "diverse" and "inclusive" and "battling systemic racism" and get back to developing its core products which people actually want to use.<p>Stop with the fluff and the airy blog posts and societal ambitions and get back to doing actual engineering which gets people back using your products. You may have a "new focus on community" but it means nothing if there's no product to have that community built around.<p>You might claim to be a "technical powerhouse of the internet activist movement" (whatever that is !? ) but soon you're going to be nothing at all because Firefox is, as much as it pains me to say it, still merely following and not leading while Mozilla leadership goes back and forth and seems more interested in writing blog posts about global issues than the technology that actually makes it a viable business.<p>Focus on Firefox. Build a product that's truly competitive once more. Build a product. Not endless blog posts about trust and "authenticity" and "leadership" and whatever else appears on the RSS feed today; get some actual leadership together and start looking at what you're actually doing, which of late has been not a lot at all.
250 people, roughly 25% of the company, were laid off today.<p>This is on top of the 70 laid off in January (discussion of that at <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22057737" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22057737</a>)
This has wayyy too much corporate doublespeak in it. I try not to be negative on companies with a good mission, but this fluff-filled announcement tells my spidey senses that they're about to do something that people won't like.
I find this sad, Mozilla is really an advocate for the open web and web standards. Since web browsers are free, they can't make much. They might be able to sell something like Thunderbird; if they improve it and make it more into a service, like Hey! for example. They could also try the sponsorship model that a lot of open source projects are doing. They already have sponsors, but maybe sponsors for their open source frameworks might be better than asking for donations at a company level.
That's sad, many of them would have joined Mozilla not just for money but genuinely believing they are working for social good and they did.<p>I understood how bad Mozilla, for lack of a better term 'sucked' at making money when I saw how the small team of KaiOS picked up the remains of Firefox OS and not only turned it to be a viable business but did so in the ruthless, hyper-competitive market of Smartphone OS ecosystem where even Microsoft had failed.<p>IMO Mozilla should have gone full throttle on Thunderbird Enterprise with support structure, Something for Microsoft Teams equivalent and finally embracing DDG with open hands.
Mozilla 2010: "join us, don't work for the man, work for mankind!" (this was their actual slogan)<p>Mozilla 2020: "well actually, work for the man" (or woman in this case)<p>Sadly, even with Mozilla Foundation getting 40M in donations they need the Corporation to pay the bills (including Mitchell Baker's 2.5M/y salary)<p>The fact that this makes it less likely Firefox continues to be competition for Chrome is bad news for the web ...
"Focusing Firefox On Users In order to refocus the Firefox organization on core browser growth through differentiated user experiences, we are reducing investment in some areas such as developer tools, internal tooling, and platform feature development, and transitioning adjacent security/privacy products to our New Products and Operations team."<p>So what is the impact on things like Servo/Rust, and the core browser?<p>I guess they are setting up for a post-Google-pays-to-keep-us-going world, but not sure that Pocket or Hubs or VPN are going to set the world on fire.
I feel for everyone who will lose their job here. That's never a pleasant thing, particularly so in current circumstances.<p>Notwithstanding that though - and with no disrespect to anyone being laid off - I'm actually really encouraged by this. The key quote from the announcement is this one:<p>"Furthermore, Mozilla's contract with Google to include Google as the default search provider inside Firefox is set to expire later this year, and the contract has not been renewed."<p>Mozilla's reliance on Google is a major detraction from delivering privacy-focused products.<p>I've said before, and I'll say again: I'd gladly pay a fee for Firefox if it meant (a) it was funding the product so that (b) there was no need for them to peddle in surveillance.<p>I really wish Mozilla all the best. Commit to provacy, show me where to pay and I'll gladly sign up<i>.<p>--<p></i>I'm aware they accept donations and have already donated. But that's different from paid-for products.
4.5 months severance for the laid off employees.<p>Doesn't say anything about any cuts to executive compensation however.<p><a href="https://blog.mozilla.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Message-to-Employees-Change-in-Difficult-Times.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://blog.mozilla.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Message-...</a>
While I definitely think Mozilla is great for the internet, their main product is terrible from a business perspective. Trying to monitize a piece of free software that you are selling on this privacy benifits is a loosing battle. The reason free software is free is _because_ it can sell more valuable ads by using your data. Products that you pay directly for don't need to worry about selling ads so they don't have to do tracking and such.<p>A paid browser at this point is realistically impossible to sell at any sort of scale because chrome is free. IMO Firefox Mozilla needs to make a new product that is paid. Someone on HN suggested email and/or other services that compete with Google's user product suite? At that point you are selling server space so its easier to get people to pay for it.
The reduced spending on dev tools makes me sad. Their efforts in the past, for example their unparalleled support for CSS grid, have set the standard for web developer tools. I hope they find a way to continue to innovate in this space.
The CEO mentions that COVID devastated their revenue but doesn’t elaborate. Did COVID somehow impact their market share? Are fewer people buying and as such they get less rev share? Something else?
Mozilla should offer a way to make donations that are earmarked for direct use on Firefox engineering.<p>Not marketing, not new services, none of that... just engineering the core product.<p>Other expenses can come out of the general donation fund.
The browser space is extremely competitive because it has been driven for decades by corporations <i>seeking</i> to dominate the field, and that naturally leads to Byzantine complexity and high barrier for any competition.<p>Mozilla really needs to find ways to generate profits and in turn, channel the lion's share of those profits into their browser. But this is a hard proposition when giant corporations give away their browsers for free and even bundle it hard with their operating systems. The unfairness of Mozilla's browser endeavour is stark when you stop to think about it.<p>Maybe we the collective really do deserve our corporate overlords because we can't be bothered to pay for something when a free version <i>also</i> exists. This not only applies to Firefox but is a big reason why nearly all the top OSS are struggling to reach parity with their commercial counterparts.<p>How many of us will pay Office/Adobe licenses but if LibreOffice or Gimp ask for payment, we won't? The reason is vendor lock-in and feature-wise inferiority of the open source counterparts, but if no one uses them, then like the proverbial chicken-and-egg, they will never be able to compete, and will only slowly fade away.
I was watching Troy Hunt's weekly update[0] where he reveals he's open-sourcing Have I Been Pwned (HIBP). He also talks about the failed M&A process:<p><pre><code> We get all the way with an organisation who we thought was a very good fit.
[...] which due to confidentiality reasons I have to describe as "a change in
business operating model" happened that killed the whole [deal], in February.
</code></pre>
Mozilla would have been a perfect fit for HIBP. Could it be that the failed M&A partner was in fact Mozilla, who are now revealing their "change in business operating model" (ie: focus on commercial products)?<p>This comment from 5 months ago has the same idea [1].<p>[0] <a href="https://youtu.be/2-wgY3Fqfos?t=2160" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/2-wgY3Fqfos?t=2160</a><p>[1] <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22471374" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22471374</a>
Here is how that press release should have read:<p>First paragraph: Get to the point (layoffs are happening) immediately, and state the concrete reasons why they are necessary.<p>Second paragraph: Thank the people being laid off, call out some of their good work, and talk about the things you are doing to help them find a new job.<p>Third paragraph: Mention the steps you are taking to avoid having to have layoffs again. Be as specific as possible. When mentioning "focus", that means focusing on one, possibly two, very specific things.<p>Last paragraph: Motivation for the future. Renewed commitment to making Firefox better.
The "make Firefox a secondary goal" faction has won again.<p>"Mozilla exists so the internet can help the world collectively meet the range of challenges a moment like this presents. Firefox is a part of this. But we know we also need to go beyond the browser to give people new products and technologies that both excite them and represent their interests. Over the last while, it has been clear that Mozilla is not structured properly to create these new things — and to build the better internet we all deserve."
I wish they would get their "Send" feature up & running again. It's so simple for one-off's, better than DropBox.<p><a href="https://send.firefox.com/" rel="nofollow">https://send.firefox.com/</a>
The cost of building and maintaining a competitive browser is huge and it's hard for Mozilla/Firefox to compete with Google/Chrome. Firefox saw its monthly active users go down by ~14% in the last 8 months [1]. I think Mozilla should consider stopping Firefox development and fork Chromium to focus on accessibility and privacy (both in and out of the browser). It's far from ideal--there'll only be one popular browser engine--but it's a trade off that could help Mozilla put more money and time towards its true mission: "to ensure the Internet is a global public resource, open and accessible to all". The cost of building/maintaining Firefox is holding them back from putting more money and effort toward that mission (and I think that's why they're reducing their workforce [2]).<p>[1] 244M MAU in Dec. 2018 and 209M MAU as of Aug. 2, 2020 <a href="https://data.firefox.com/dashboard/user-activity" rel="nofollow">https://data.firefox.com/dashboard/user-activity</a><p>[2] "Today we announced a significant restructuring of Mozilla Corporation. This will strengthen our ability to build and invest in products and services that will give people alternatives to conventional Big Tech. Sadly, the changes also include a significant reduction in our workforce by approximately 250 people."
Anyone remember when companies were straightforward about layoffs and firings? You know, text like "Sales are slow, so we need to lay some people off", not "We’ll meet people where they are" (whatever that phrase-du-jour even means).<p>If that letter is a guide to leadership at mozilla, there's not much hope for the future of the organization. It might be a good idea to ask the remaining technical people what they would like to build, and let them go from there.<p>It's time to excite people with products. They got the browser to be nearly as good as the alternatives (I try every new release of FF, only to switch back to Safari when I see the terrible effect FF has on power consumption).<p>How about a better alternative for remote meetings? Start with the basics: respond to reduced bandwidth by focussing on audio, not video. I want to hear what someone is saying, not to see the titles on their bookshelves. In my experience, zoom is pretty bad at this, and so (to a lesser extent) is microsoft/teams. Watching TV news, I've learned that webex and skype are also poor. Given the poor alternatives, and the high demand, I am surprised Mozilla has not already produced a kick-ass product, and I was disappointed not to read of this (or any other technical idea) in this management-speak firing letter.
Surreal. Even the <i>Servo</i> team was disbanded. Mozilla Research effectively no longer exists. That alone says everything.<p>This is a dark day for the open web.
'The coronavirus pandemic “significantly impacted our revenue,”' -<p>Most of their revenue comes from search engines paying to be the default. Are there any details on why the pandemic would have a significant impact on that?
> Economic conditions resulting from the global pandemic have significantly impacted our revenue<p>This is baffling. How? You make a web technology and everyone is stuck at home.
For all it's flaws, and with the exception of a brief 18 month stint, I've been a dedicated Firefox user since 2004. I sincerely hope that this project finds its new groove and continues to provide a viable alternative to Chromium. The world truly needs it.
Thought it would be another political activism post, turns out to be a dressed-up corporate layoff announcement:<p>> Sadly, the changes also include a significant reduction in our workforce — approximately 250 people of exceptional professional and personal caliber who have made outstanding contributions to who we are today.
Mozilla should have a Mozilla club. Today, you can go to <a href="https://donate.mozilla.org/" rel="nofollow">https://donate.mozilla.org/</a> and you can donate monthly, but you get nothing for it except the warm glow of helping Mozilla.<p>Instead, Mozilla should have a private Discord for dues-paying club members, where participants have direct access to Mozilla decision makers, who should show up on a regular basis and do AMAs.<p>Furthermore, the Mozilla club should nominate a user ombuds who can sit in on Mozilla's board meetings.<p>Throughout this thread, I see folks criticizing Mozilla for not writing code / fixing bugs they care about, without providing a constructive way for Mozilla to fund their favorite initiatives. I think a Mozilla club could cut some of these tricky knots.
I wonder what this means (and fear) for important projects like <a href="https://commonvoice.mozilla.org" rel="nofollow">https://commonvoice.mozilla.org</a>, that do not seem to have been concerned with a business case at all. Best case I can currently see is that some other organisation will take it on, though I'm not sure which.<p>And I'm also curious how the pandemic has impacted them. As I understood it, still by far their major revenue sources were the search engine deals - has their value changed due to the pandemic?
> I've been told that a large part of Mozilla's security team has also been laid off, which seems like a big issue especially after Mozilla launched a VPN offering last month.<p><a href="https://twitter.com/campuscodi/status/1293200453736570881" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/campuscodi/status/1293200453736570881</a>
This makes me feel worried. I have come to rely on Firefox as the antidote to Google's data collection machine and it would be unfortunate if Firefox also goes the same way with this new focus.
I just wish they shift their focus again to technical solutions, instead of political/social issues. I don't know why software company has need to act like NGO/activist group (doesn't matter if I agree with their stances or not).
They were doing fine until Chrome ate up all the market share.<p>Google shouldn't have been allowed to do that. It's very anti-competitive for them to have a browser that defaults to Google search and disables plugins that support adblocking.<p>Google is destroying Mozilla. Their monopoly is making the web worse.
If this makes you sad or pissed off, the best thing you can do is donate. I just donated for $15 for the first time.<p><a href="https://donate.mozilla.org/en-US/" rel="nofollow">https://donate.mozilla.org/en-US/</a>
As someone who very much wants to like Pocket, but finds it immensely frustrating,[1] how 'zactly does Mozilla plan to monetise it?<p>________________________________<p>Notes:<p>1. "Pocket: It gets worse the more you use it" <a href="https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5x2sfx/pocket_it_gets_worse_the_more_you_use_it/" rel="nofollow">https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5x2sfx/pocket_...</a> and "Pocket: The worsening continues" <a href="https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/688oc9/pocket_the_worsening_continues/" rel="nofollow">https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/688oc9/pocket_...</a> There's been some progress and backsliding, most of the complaints still apply.
> Sadly, the changes also include a significant reduction in our workforce — approximately 250 people of exceptional professional and personal caliber who have made outstanding contributions to who we are today. To each of them, I extend my heartfelt thanks and deepest regrets that we have come to this point. This is a humbling recognition of the realities we face, and what is needed to overcome them.<p>What a load of bull! How many people did she save from firing by taking a pay cut? I agree that it would have been an insignificant number of the 250 people fired, but it would have made a difference in the life of the employees not fired and it would have given meaning to her words.<p>Words are extremely cheap (including the ones I'm writing right now). Statements only become principles when they imply a personal cost, otherwise they are just ideas.
> <i>We love the traits of it — the decentralization, its permissionless innovation, the open source underpinnings of it, and the standards part — we love it all. But to enable these changes, we must shift our collective mindset from a place of defending, protecting, sometimes even huddling up and trying to keep a piece of what we love to one that is proactive, curious, and engaged with people out in the world. [...] and seeing how the traits of the past can show up in new ways in the future.</i><p>If my US corporate-speak decoder works halfway decently this paragraph reads really scary. When exactly have decentralization, permissionless innovation, open source and web standards become things to remember fondly while you move on? This honesty reads like an admission of defeat.
These posts always make me wish that hackernews has a way to block posts from certain users.<p>These kind of posts always bring out the hateful comments and if I look at their posting history a lot of times they seem to post mostly hateful comments. Call it a filter bubble if you want but I would rather not waste my time trying to convince them they are wrong and would rather be able to block them.
I say it again:<p>- I can support Mozilla today if I know the money goes to fix and improve Firefox<p>- For almost everything else I'll prefer to send the money directly<p>I sent a reply back to the last fundraising email I got and they still cannot promise that the money will go towards Firefox.<p>To me however Firefox seems to be their biggest chance of achieving their mission:<p>"Our mission is to ensure the Internet is a global public resource, open and accessible to all. An Internet that truly puts people first, where individuals can shape their own experience and are empowered, safe and independent."<p>For this reason I find it deeply ironic that donation money somehow cannot be used to develop Firefox when that should be the core purposes.
I worked at Mozilla from 2013-2017, then moved into clean tech. I currently manage software engineers for a technically-not-cleantech company that is extremely effective at selling life-changing products, especially solar energy, in the global South. While I don't have open slots on my team, I'm happy to chat about software job hunts in general, and the amazing opportunities available right now to fight climate change in particular. There are dozens of legit companies that can use your skills—you just have to find them. If you need a #mozillalifeboat, feel free to get in touch. "sampenrose" on Google's email service.
John Carmack (<a href="https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/1293227109738061826" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/1293227109738061826</a>):<p>> Just last night I was thinking about how it was possible that, given the relative trends, Mozilla’s greater legacy might turn out to be Rust, not Firefox.
This means a 1/3 reduction from where they were last year. And now with remote work being the norm, I could see a company like Mozilla preferring that to save further costs.<p>Their Google deal has not be renewed yet and that has accounted for a lot of their revenue in the past (the article mentions a 90% figure).<p>I just hope Mozilla Co & Mozilla Foundation survive.
Always struck me that this nonprofit has some of the most beaucoup waterfront real estate down at EMB/Harrison. And that it shared the building with one of its partners, Google.<p>Is that scaled down / restructured too?
>That means reducing investment in other areas, though, such as in building out developer tools.<p>Damn, big mistake. So this is what triggered the creator of the awesome CSS grid tools to join Apple and Safari?
750 employees with $350 million or more in revenue. It seems like they're just restructuring and using covid as cover. Maybe I'm wrong, but it kind of looks like that on the surface.
This is obviously very sad for the folk being laid off from Mozilla, and they have my sympathies and best wishes for finding alternate employment.<p>Separate to that, and I realise I'm shouting at the sky since this is just one comment among over 1200 others... CAN WE PLEASE STOP GIVING THE WEB TO GOOGLE.<p>Apple's iOS browser engine policy is basically the only thing that stands between Google and complete dominance of the web. That's right, an anti-choice, walled-garden decision to force WebKit on all iOS users, is the only defence against Chrome supplanting the ideal of The Web, with itself.<p>Firefox and Safari are basically the only browsers left that don't use Chromium, and they are making the sensible decision to hold back Google's frenetic sprint to expose our entire computers to JavaScript. I'm confident that Apple can hold the line if it wants to, but I have to assume that Firefox will be dead within 5 years, which means the entire dream of an open web, rests solely on Apple's whims. This is not healthy in any way.<p>To all of you who say things like "Safari is the new IE", or bemoan the lack of particular Chrome APIs in WebKit, or who solely target Chrome and don't care if your sites break in Firefox/WebKit.... you, all of you, individually and collectively, are killing the web. Stop sleepwalking all of us into a future where Chrome is the only "OS" that matters on any platform.
I came here to ask a question, hopefully one other people would like answered also:<p>If the funding for the FireFox web browser combined with all Mozilla projects/products, or is there some separation?<p>I would like to donate just to support development of the FireFox browser. Is that possible?<p>FireFox containers is a very important feature to me and supporting FireFox and containers is something I would like to support at a higher level than the few random Mozilla donations I have made in the past.
Just give me a $10 subscription to all the services in one package. If I got pocket + VPN in my browser for that. Win.<p>Also, focus on how to share with a family, not under one login ID. $20/mo I get 3 logins under one household to hand out.
I personally think that Mozilla have been making poor decisions, but I can't believe that people would say they they are quitting Firefox because of it.<p>Mozilla might be going through a rough patch, and they now need our support more than ever. Hopefully Firefox will be around a lot longer than the people currently running the show.<p>I will not stop using Firefox, and will continue to try and help people move away from Chrome.
The new vision sounds like the old, current vision for the most part. I might be missing subtle changes in items 1 through 4. But item 5 is interesting:<p>> <i>New focus on economics. Recognizing that the old model where everything was free has consequences, means we must explore a range of different business opportunities and alternate value exchanges</i><p>I think combining this with the momentum behind things like the Federal Reserve's new inter-bank payments system (linked on HN yesterday) could finally make micropayments or something analogous mainstream. I would really enjoy shifting some of the advertising-funded model back to direct revenue from customers. I would like to be considered a "customer" again in more walks of life, generally. Not just a "subject." I think the customer-vendor dynamic is much more healthy when I am indeed the customer.<p>If there's anything hopeful to take from this announcement, I think this is it.
Maybe it's a cultural problem but many of their products are aimed at consumers when they have the opportunity to tune them for enterprise (lockwise?). They could make more money with better and paid consultation projects. Many open source projects they own can be sassified (voice project?).
A shame, the internet could use a product like Firefox.<p>`an open and accessible internet is essential to the fight.`
can't agree more. Unfortunately just having that is not enough to get people to use your product. VLC maintainers seems to have understood this. To paraphrase JB Kempf "if you want people to use your open source product, build a great product that is also open source."<p>Not sure where Firefox went wrong. And for sure the inclusion of default browsers in various OSes did not help (or even the automatic install of Edge whether you want to use it or not) but it seems like there are deeper problems with this product.<p>I really hope they can get act together and start gaining marketshare again.
I am curious how COVID impacted a company like Mozilla? Their main revenue comes from search partnerships, there were more people at home searching things during lockdown. In the internal message Mitchell Baker said:<p>“We started with immediate cost-saving measures such as pausing our hiring, reducing our wellness stipend and cancelling our All-Hands. But COVID-19 has accelerated the need and magnified the depth for these changes. Our pre-COVID plan is no longer workable. We have talked about the need for change — including the likelihood of layoffs — since the spring. Today these changes become real.”
I was told about 10 years ago that management at Mozilla was a shitshow. They have had layoffs, project cancellations, and internal strife for a long time. Sounds like more of the same.
The cynic in me can't help but wonder if this "new focus on making money" is why they suddenly decided to cripple the android version of firefox.
I feel for everyone who will lose their job here. That's never a pleasant thing, particularly so in current circumstances.<p>Notwithstanding that though - and with no disrespect to anyone being laid off - I'm actually really encouraged by this. The key quote from the announcement is this one:<p>"Furthermore, Mozilla's contract with Google to include Google as the default search provider inside Firefox is set to expire later this year, and the contract has not been renewed."<p>Mozilla's reliance on Google is a major detraction from delivering privacy-focused products.<p>I've said before, and I'll say again: I'd gladly pay a fee for Firefox if it meant (a) it was funding the product so that (b) there was no need for them to peddle in surveillance.<p>I really wish Mozilla all the best. Commit to privacy, show me where to pay and I'll gladly sign up.<p>--<p>I'm aware they accept donations and have already donated. But that's different from paid-for products.<p>EDIT: cross-posted comment above from duplicate thread [0]. Don't think that's against guidelines - apologies if so.<p>[0] <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24121166" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24121166</a>
On one hand, it's of course kind of a bummer that these folks are losing their jobs--never an easy thing to see.<p>On the other, I'm excited about the products that may end up coming out of this. I'm already paying for the Mozilla VPN + Browser Extension (I think that totals something like $8/mo), plus another few dollars for additional storage on my personal Google account at the moment. I would be immensely enthusiastic about putting that (and more) money towards a privacy-respecting Mozilla-hosted email/calendar/file storage system instead.<p>That obviously not an insignificant engineering challenge, but there's a bunch of open-source work in that area already that could probably be used as a template. I only hope that whatever products they put out, they spend some time making sure they're not damaging the enormous amount of goodwill they've built up in the community about privacy and Internet ethics.
I find this sad news. I highly recommend mozilla to others due to its focus on user privacy and open nature of organization. I know it is not an option for a complete browser with its own js engine, rendering tool kit and kind of whole app eco-system is not possible to survive on donations and small income channels.<p>But, I would have highly recommended mozilla do it in a way to release a community and enterprises services. where Enterprise will lead the future path of browser with its own industrial/enterprise offering to customer sets like governments, Developers and big companies, parallel maintaining the community version of browser as its now, may be two feature cycle behind with some less but fully open features.<p>If I had an option to buy a paid version of mozilla service which gave me better functionality for application support and development I would have gladly paid for it.
I wish, It is the path they chose.
I like the new focus on how they will make money. While it's nice to be a mission-driven org they always straddled that line of being aspirational and being "for profit." It makes the value proposition tough to define. Putting an emphasis on revenue will better define the business without needing to sell their souls.
It really stinks that 250 people lost their jobs, I don't want to downplay that. But I think overall this is a good move for Mozilla. For them to be product-oriented will allow them to uphold their own privacy advocacy ideals. Most notably, they may eventually be able to remove Google as Firefox's default search engine.
I’ve always thought of Mozilla as a “force for good and change”, never as a money machine. This has maintained <i>some</i> balance for allowing Google to go largely unchecked. If Mozilla moves in a direction more focused on profit and more products, there’s no balance and the overdue regulating has to kick in fast.
I you think projects like Mozilla and Firefox are important donations can really go a long way. If enough people even donated ~$5/mo to projects like this, which is less than lots of people spend for Spotify or buying coffee, it would make open source privacy respecting projects a lot more viable.
All the hand wringing here is kind of pointless without pointing out that it appears that Google has not renewed its contract, which accounts for almost 90% of Mozilla’s revenue.<p>It’s obvious and necessary for Mozilla to consequently focus on revenue earners and put infra dev on the back burner.
Also, why you (Mozilla) are at it (Firefox): Please make Firefox the premium development tool for webdevs. Headless should work as with Chrome. I am forced to use Chrome when running Puppeteer.<p>Why create a separate "Firefox Developer Edition"? It's just a distraction.
What exactly does this mean? Will I be forced to find a new browser in the near future? Not that I was completely content with what happens for many years now, of course, it's just that I don't know anything better (or even not worse).
This is one of the most pathetic layoff releases I have ever seen. Its extremely, soul crushing, heart wrenchingly depressing to see Mozilla succumb to the the get woke go broke mentality.<p>They should be focused on making good tech period nothing else.
The internal message to employees says:<p>> Investing in New Products
We are organizing a new product organization outside of Firefox that will both ship new products faster and develop new revenue streams. Our initial investments will be Pocket, Hubs, VPN, Web Assembly and security and privacy products.<p>This is very much welcome, and I look forward to more products with paid tiers. Mozilla Corporation must have ways to get revenues from end users through different means, and combining that with Mozilla’s vision is a good thing. If there’s one thing missing for me in this list, it’s an email service that combines the best of other paid email providers.
Here is a (selective) look at the management of Mozilla in the recent past.<p>From Mitchell Bakers blog <a href="https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2018/08/07/in-memoriam-gervase-markham/" rel="nofollow">https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2018/08/07/in-memoriam-gerva...</a><p>“Gerv’s faith did not have ambiguity at least none that I ever saw. Gerv was crisp. He had very precise views about marriage, sex, gender and related topics. He was adamant that his interpretation was correct, and that his interpretation should be encoded into law. These views made their way into the Mozilla environment. They have been traumatic and damaging, both to individuals and to Mozilla overall.”<p>From <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2018/07/29/gerv.html" rel="nofollow">http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2018/07/29/gerv.html</a><p>“I bring up Gerv's open-mindedness because I know that many people didn't find him so, but, frankly, I think those folks were mistaken. It is well documented publicly that Gerv held what most would consider particularly “conservative values”. And, I'll continue with more frankness: I found a few of Gerv's views offensive and morally wrong. But Gerv was also someone who could respectfully communicate his views. I never felt the need to avoid speaking with him or otherwise distance myself. Even if a particular position offended me, it was nevertheless clear to me that Gerv had come to his conclusions by starting from his (a priori) care and concern for all of humanity. Also, I could simply say to Gerv: I really disagree with that so much, and if it became clear our views were just too far apart to productively discuss the matter further, he'd happily and collaboratively find another subject for us to discuss. Gerv was a reasonable man. He could set aside fundamental disagreements and find common ground to talk with, collaborate with, and befriend those who disagreed with him. That level of kindness and openness is rarely seen in our current times.”<p>Here is an article another person who knew Gervase Markham who refutes Mitchell Bakers account <a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/762345/" rel="nofollow">https://lwn.net/Articles/762345/</a> . Worth a read.<p>Brendan Eich on the jump in executive share since he was let go:
<a href="https://twitter.com/BrendanEich/status/1217512049716035584" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/BrendanEich/status/1217512049716035584</a> and <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058629" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058629</a><p>Here is Brokedamouth on the two class system now at Mozilla <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22061500" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22061500</a> Comment replicated here (it is worth looking at the whole discussion):
“I was at Mozilla for a while and it was a two-class system. The execs flew first class, stayed in fancy hotels, and had very expensive dinners and retreats - sometimes in the high five-figures. This is not even included in comp. One time, the CFO sent out a missive urging everyone to stay in AirBnB to save money and the execs (literally the following week) booked $500/night rooms at a hotel in NYC. I think the moment that made it clear as day was during a trip to Hawaii for the company all hands. The plane was a 737 so you had to walk past first class. These all hands are a huge deal for families - many were struggling down the aisle, carrying booster seats, etc. And they were passing two of the C-levels sitting in giant first-class seats sipping tropical cocktails. The rule in the military is that men eat first, officers last. Mozilla has always reversed that rule and the result was a pretty toxic culture, all around.”<p>The people saying this is full of corporate doublespeak look to be very true, especially when you have a memory and can look up what has gone on before.
> "Recognizing that the old model where everything was free has consequences, means we must explore a range of different business opportunities and alternate value exchanges," Baker said.<p>> We must learn and expand different ways to support ourselves and build a business that isn't what we see today.<p>Perhaps I am wrong, but to me this reads as Mozilla plans to give up on not being evil and to do whatever it takes to make money. Sounds like Mozilla products will soon become toxic including Firefox if not forked. Also, looks like their hand is being forced by google.<p>Edit: formatting - also I hope I am wrong.
It's definitely not a requirement for companies to go into minute detail when making these sorts of announcements, but Mozilla is a non-profit and I think it would be good IMHO if they were to shed some light at least on the skillet of those being let go relative to the new direction being taken.<p>If Mozilla is charting a path forward as a "technical powerhouse" and focusing on Pocket, Hubs, VPN, etc. (as per the linked memo), I would hate to imagine even a single SWE being laid off for reasons not performance-related.
It worries me that nobody in power at Mozilla seems to have the first clue how to make money from Free Software and so they have made "commercialism" a corporate fetish.<p>Making money and looking commercial are not the same thing, team. For the some organizations they can be diametrically opposed. Mozilla, for example.<p>Mozilla need a CEO who knows how to make money for the company rather than just receive it in their paycheck. Ideally one who eats up less than the revenue from the first 50,000 VPN subscriptions.
I don't find this that surprising as well.<p>Good intentions or ethicality aside, I don't find Firefox as a browser convincing. It is just not as good as Chrome in handling navigating web pages.<p>I'd say focus on making Firefox better experience wise should always been their priority, but the neglection of it has been lasting too long. Now Chrome becomes the even bigger monster than IE uses to be, Firefox will have a much harder time to justify its own existence in a financially substainable way
Mozilla's ace up the sleeve, which I'm sure has been a temptation to them many times - and seems more and more inevitable the more they brand themselves as the privacy browser - is to make ublock origin a default and baked-in feature out of the box.<p>I see this as an if, not when situation. Google may pull funding immediately if they do so but the surge in users would be extreme, possibly forcing big G to reconsider or lose an ever increasing market share to Bing and DDG.
>> To start, that means products that mitigate harms or address the kinds of the problems that people face today.<p>So no more Firefox browser then? What does that statement even mean?
I was surprised and saddened when Mozilla gave up their mobile Firefox OS. They should have been "The Web Company". Google and Apple have competing interests with their proprietary native apps. They would much prefer the entire web shift to apps. Mozilla could have been the open mobile app platform. Maybe one of the purposes of Chrome OS is to ensure someone like Mozilla doesn't do it.
Without Firefox though <i>everything</i> is Chrome.<p>Skype, Zoom, Slack, Discord, Chrome itself, Safari, Edge, Opera, VS Code, Atom...<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SCfNhyIo_U" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SCfNhyIo_U</a><p>We need to encourage competition even if companies continue to spew this kind of cringe. Firefox is the last holdout.<p>Good luck Mozilla, you're our old hope.
I am already paying a very high price (mostly in time) to keep the data thieves from stealing my precious data. I would pay a pretty high monthly fee to someone who I could trust to take care of it for me. That's why I pay the Apple tax. How about a free browser for those who want to DIY privacy and a premium for those who don't want to spend their time?
I wonder why they didn't ever try to make it as a cloud provider, it would fit their mission well to provide cloud services, it would just be for the server side instead of the client side. Guess it's about a decade too late to pivot there, but firms like Cloudflare shows that it's possible to compete with the big actors with enough focus.
Can they just focus on the browser? Firefox has been falling behind for years now, especially on mobile. And it's not all because of Google's questionable advertising. Chrome is simply better in many ways.<p>Mozilla is failing it's core mission chasing so many vanity projects. It's a non-profit, not a startup. Flush management and start over
"New focus on economics": It was bad enough seeing terrible clickbait in the "Recommended by Pocket" section displayed on every new tab. Now I have to go into settings to opt-out of Sponsored Stories so I don't have to see ads for Honey.<p>All to fund the so-called "internet activist movement"?<p>I just want a web browser, not an ideology.
The free open source software approach has its own limitations. Developers and companies need to make money to be viable. Software is a class of product; it takes work and resources and simply can’t be all free.<p>This is going to be a problem going forward. I feel bad seeing developers sometimes begging for donations. Why should software be free?
Are there any lists of people looking for work during this round of layoffs? It sounds like a lot of good projects got cut and there's some companies growing that are finding it hard to locate talent. The pandemic is making people weary of switching jobs and at my company it's been very difficult.
Huge fan of Firefox. I’m working on an initiative to help people who laid off today at Mozilla<p>If you lost your job today add your profile here -> <a href="https://airtable.com/shrkd3WXxreIdgruV" rel="nofollow">https://airtable.com/shrkd3WXxreIdgruV</a>
While we are focusing in technology, once need to look into their Finance team and how they push leadership on terms of income/cash flow. Recently one ex-Google guy joined as COO not after a very successful gig in Cloud, hope he helps leadership this time.
What's the relation between Mozilla Corporation and Mozilla Foundation? Corporation is for profit and Foundation is non profit so they don't share revenues? But why they don't merge and become one for profit company, they would much stronger.
Vivaldi Browser.<p>Founded by former Opera devs, when Opera was sold to a Chinese company.<p>Vivaldi is a fully employee owned company, based on Norway.<p>The browser had tons of ready-to-use configuration options.<p>Very good privacy options, no external ad blocker needed.<p>A great option if you want to stop using Firefox (like I did a few weeks ago).
It feels like my hopes for ever seeing the Library window get fixed are being dashed against the rocks. How can they ever hope to change the world when they can't even rewrite a history/bookmarks GUI? I'm genuinely concerned for Firefox.
Dear Mozilla, I would gladly sign-up for monthly patronage payments that go towards the development of Firefox features that the community chooses. Firstly, "installable" PWA support on Linux and Android. No one cares about your VPN or Pocket.
I've used & loved Mozilla forever but at some point I am starting to wonder: when you fire 1/3 of your workforce & have obvious mismanagement problems, how can you still guarantee the security of such a complex piece of software?
I wonder why Mozilla can’t make their own meta search engine like duckduckgo and start something like carbonads.<p>It’s obvious that browser + search engine + ad bids are a money minting machine.<p>Why is Mozilla not doing that? Depending on Google for revenue is a losing game no?
I wish the EU would get behind Firefox development. It would certainly be in their courtyard, given how much energy they've spent battling monopolies and toward creating a market in which there is competition.
Can someone tell me how COVID situation explicitly affected Mozilla's revenue to such an extant? If anything, Internet companies were the least affected or in-fact has been benefited from COVID situation.
A door closes a window opens. Does not look good, but neither does the current status quo. Might just be the blessing in disguise that kicks off some actual competition in the browser space.<p>Feel bad for the laid off though.
Looks like Servo may be done, :(<p><a href="https://twitter.com/lindsey/status/1293243218331439107" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/lindsey/status/1293243218331439107</a>
Would defiantly move from proton to Mozilla’s VPN the minute they make it available in Europe. Would love to cancel my iCloud storage too, if Mozilla offered an hosted NextCloud or something similar.
I want to read something at <a href="https://www.jwz.org/blog/" rel="nofollow">https://www.jwz.org/blog/</a> in response to all this.
Add features to your smaller products (Lockwise, Notes, Monitor, Pocket, etc.) and put them behind a paywall, while keeping the core features free to use.<p>I'd pay triple the price of Pocket's premium / Mozilla's VPN ($15/month) for a Mozilla/Firefox app pack.
Web browsers should be considered public utility, funded by tax payers money and developed by independent organization. Core web browser should have minimal set of features, just enough to safely browse internet and do every day tasks, like online banking. Open source "core" web browser could be extended by companies and provided as commercial software with various additional features (VPNs, news aggregators, etc.) that might be useful to some users who have means to pay for them.
The mentions of “racism”, “advocacy”, etc on this post make me want to puke. All while firing people from servo, rav1e, etc. Make a bloody good browser and stop meddling with politics, dunces!
Glad they spent time replacing the facist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, white supremacist verbiage "master" instead of ensuring their white and Asian employees had jobs.
This is a previous thread about something similar that happened a few months ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22057737" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22057737</a><p>tldr (if I remember correctly): the higher ups is still paid a shit-ton of money despite firing their employees and begging for donations. Along with abandonware being created all the time (some of them were good ideas even).<p>More specifically <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058534" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22058534</a><p>> 2.5 million for the executive chair of Mozilla in 2018
Anyone else concerned by a browser manufacturer claiming to build products by mixing tech with their "values"? This seems like the exact opposite of what I want with utility software.
They're already knee-deep in some ideology bullshit (instead of working on actual browser that people want to use) and now they cover laying off 250 people with corporate garbage talks.<p>I really hope that Firefox has a future, but that kind of events make me thing otherwise.
Mozilla's support model was left too weird, too long. Baker is to blame, this should have been rectified years ago.<p>What does Mozilla really bring to the table with this new focus? The world is full of VPN vendors.
I love Firefox but I'm going to start exploring other options for open source browsers.<p>It's obvious from this layoff that their priorities are off. The CEO should be fired.
Corporate cancer[0] strikes again. Mozilla took on a lot of social justice projects over the years. They hung around their ankles like a boat anchor. Good on them for jettisoning that excess baggage and refocusing on their primary business.<p>[0]: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Cancer-Miracles-Millions-Company-ebook/dp/B081D58P1X/" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Cancer-Miracles-Millions-Co...</a>
> I'm just disappointed about what Mozilla has become over the years.<p>I think that train started rolling when they forced Eich out as CEO.<p>Ever since then, Mozilla seems to be less about best-in-class technology, and more about virtue signalling.
Are we now stuck with this vacuous corporate virtue signalling forever, or just until the globalist/leftist/whatever-ists finally achieve the absolute tyranny they seem to be seeking?
Why does Mozilla even develop their own browser? There is inherently nothing wrong with everyone using Chromium as a foundation. Mozilla could use Chromium as renderer while still doing all the privacy preserving stuff they do. There is absolutely no correlation between the rendering engine and privacy. And they few interlinks (fingerprinting, etc.) can very likely be addressed through patches that are rebased over Chromium.<p>Firefox with its own renderer is dead anyway on iOS already, where everyone is forced into Webkit. It seems like a loosing battle to spend so much money on something that doesn't give the average user ANY benefit whatsoever. Yes, Chrome will be a monopoly, but Microsoft already bought into that monopoly. What's the point of fighting a loosing battle? Focus on integrating Chromium and make it into a rock solid privacy-first browser.
Mozilla was dead to me the moment they decided to financially support the encrypted communication services of antifa (riseup.net). Even though that donation was a drip compared to what the CEO pulls out of the organisation.<p>I straight up deleted it! And I make sure that any organisation I get into won't bother optimizing or even testing for FF since it has such a small user base these days that its not worth bothering with it, testing on the default android browsers and safari has higher priorities these days.<p>If the end users complain, we tell them to use ANY other browser now and they are happy with it.<p>This is what you get when you pose as an NGO that stands for values such as free-speech and openness while you do nothing but stiffle it behind the curtains. (Helping professional political agitators, that are renown for attacking peaceful protests etc is the opposite of supporting free-speech, so is getting your own CEO booted for having an opinion, controversial or not!)
"combatting a lethal virus and battling systemic racism"<p>WTF?! I mean, maybe you should actually build the best web browser instead of doing politics.
While I really hate to suggest this, the best way to make money might be to sell space on newly opened tabs (with an option to turn off ads for something reasonable like USD$24.95 per year).
Did anyone find anything in this post about Mozilla refusing to take money from Google?<p>I can’t find it.<p>Mozilla, stop taking money from Google and letting them be the default search engine!<p>Please don’t enable and legitimise surveillance capitalism.