LWD

Why would a Firefox fan endorse the state coming down on the side of a Facebook made proposal? I remember when Mozilla used to be about fighting big tech corporations, not empowering them through state-mandated monopolies.

Mozilla had the opportunity to do this. Or to do something like this. GNU Taler is a thing.

Mozilla pulled a sneaky trick on his community: convincing us that context sensitive advertisement needs to be collected by the browser. It's on the back of another trick: convincing people that they can only make money through ads.

A few months ago, Mozilla officially became an ad company, so any claim they make about privacy has a clear conflict of interest with their own monetary gain. By selling advertisements as a necessary evil, they can sell you the cure.

Did you read the article? Your link supports the point it was making: Mozilla doesn't mention ad blocking anywhere. It's immediately brought up in the comments, but Mozilla itself doesn't want to broach the topic.

Years ago, Mozilla would explicitly call ad blocking a privacy feature, and proclaim it explicitly.

Now they don't.

It is Mozilla's job to show us what data is shared. Mozilla failed on that front.

If you want to be the Mozilla evangelist, then show us all on Mozilla's behalf exactly what data gets sent over, so that we can replicate it.

You know what they say about people who assume, especially when it's about a company that had to sneak their changes into the browser in a way that would make even Google executives blush.

That is correct: why would any corporation choose to sideline their current advertisement model by creating an extra solution that doesn't even tap 3% of the market, while abandoning the data collection they already have?

If you trust the advertisement company to provide private ads, they can do it without the browser working on their behalf.

And if you don't trust the advertisement company, there's nothing the browser can do to make their ads list privacy invasive... Besides blocking it.

The source to the table is me, but I can provide the article that inspired it.

The burden of evidence is on Mozilla to tell us exactly what data they are consuming, down to the byte. Otherwise, informed consent cannot be given.

And Mozilla should not be the thief of informed consent.

Companies get extra data through Firefox, which now acts on behalf of the ad corporations.

But advertisers have better options, both for reach, or for privacy. They can simply do A/B testing on their own, without involving a third party...

*If you trust the advertiser, they can do it on their own. If you don't trust the advertiser, then the additional third party does nothing.

You said

The main difference between Mozilla and Google is that Google is actually sucking up your data.

I responded to you in kind.

Wait, what solution are you proposing? That every browser becomes a centralized point of data collection for advertisement companies, and that the government mandates it?!

Google and Brave already want to do that, Mozilla is just stepping into the fray as a browser with less than 3% of a market share. There is nothing compelling to advertisers about a proprietary Mozilla solution.

Mozilla is really going for a "third time's the charm" approach on collecting extra data, aren't they.

First they silently started sucking up extra user data without consent and without warning, something not even Google attempted.

Then, they got caught, and took to Reddit to paternalistically explain why they knew better than the user, and why a consent dialog would be confusing.

And now, over a month after the initial reports come out, Mozilla triples down. What a stupid, stupid, stupid decision.

Advertisement is a business. It's not charity and it's not a publicly owned resource. It doesn't keep the Internet free, because it makes a boat load of money doing what it does. It doesn't take an expert understanding of economics to see that any belief that advertisement allows for a free Internet is smoke and mirrors. The money comes from somewhere, notably from you.

Either advertisement works, and you pay for your content by being psychologically manipulated into paying more than you otherwise would on things you don't need, or it doesn't, and businesses pay for ineffective advertisement, leading to increased prices.

Advertisement is not free. It's a trick that looks free if you ignore the entire way it functions.

- commodoreboxer

No; I have claimed that [Mozilla] doesn't collect personal data... Fakespot and Anonym are completely unrelated to PPA.

Fakespot and Anonym are completely Mozilla Corp. And their privacy policies are a clear violation of the Mozilla Manifesto.

I have named concrete actions that Google has done that Mozilla has not.

I have named concrete privacy policies Mozilla has adopted, but unfortunately you didn't want to look into them.

But go on, keep on telling people to avoid Mozilla

I am using the Mozilla guidelines on how to treat Mozilla: encouraging other people to tell them, plainly and openly, that they need to knock off their terrible behavior.