A fresh new Firefox is here

Firefox is still generally faster and I have less issues with it than Chrome, so I will continue using it. UI is still okay once customized a bit. Chrome, Edge, etc. have a shit GUI. Actually everything has a shit GUI now. I guess the art of making something functional was lost about a decade ago.
 
TLDR and I'm sure I'll get flamed for this.... but why not Chrome? Other than the memory BS and probable G spying... not like any of that is new.

I used the hell out of firefox way back bc IE was garbage, but since chrome... not so much

I'm talking about PC not mobile stuff
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
WTF. Did anyone else's Firefox just unprompted switch the default search engine to Google?

Somoene needs to be prosecuted.
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Hmm? They do have a "would you like to nuke your settings?" prompt that comes up sometimes. Maybe you (or someone else who uses the computer) accidentally said yes. Like with most annoying firefox crap, there's an about:config setting to turn it off.

(Google is of course the default because they pay. That's the firefox business model.)
 
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Burticus said:
TLDR and I'm sure I'll get flamed for this.... but why not Chrome? Other than the memory BS and probable G spying... not like any of that is new.

I used the hell out of firefox way back bc IE was garbage, but since chrome... not so much

I'm talking about PC not mobile stuff
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My sentiments exactly!

Chrome does nearly everything I want with minimal post-installation configuration. Hell, even the settings and plugins that I do have are saved to my account. As soon as I log in everything just works. That's all I need.

At this point it doesn't matter to me what Microsoft or Mozilla do with their browsers. I'm simply not in the market to change. I might consider it if:
•I found believable mainstream evidence that Google was using telemetry data without permission in a way that specifically harmed or oppressed innocent people. I wouldn't put this past any publicly traded company, but I also have better things to do with my life than being actively paranoid about things that aren't happening yet.
•They start pushing updates that interfere with the simple task of browsing websites. I wouldn't put this past any idiot project manager trying to cram their pet features down our throats so they can write about them in their annual reviews and get promotions for them. Google literally invented OKRs, so they're no strangers to out-of-touch rewards structures which incentivize these sorts of unnecessary changes.

All is well for now.
 
scojer said:
How?
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Still waiting for an explanation myself.

Maybe it's a scam from a developer's perspective, like how it blocks third-party cookies, trackers, and most ads natively.
 
Following this thread, just tried Brave and I'm not hating it (coming from Chrome so not much of an interface difference). Does seem to use more memory tho given the same set of open tabs by about 300+mb: that's with roughly 21 tabs open, pretty normal for me.
 
Brave has a few niggles but nothing you can't work out. It has some powerful tracking/ad blocking and should side step manifest v3. The crypto stuff is OFF by default and you can turn off the telemetry. You can add custom block lists to its built in add blocker. I delete the services/tasks it installs and its been awhile but last I checked it wasn't talking to anything with the way I have it configured. FF sux ballz, I dumped that piece of shit back in 2011, I was an early adopter the first few months it came out. It was sad to see them fall so far until I stopped caring. If you're afraid of Brave check out Librewolf or ungoogled chromium.
 
PeaKr said:
Brave has a few niggles but nothing you can't work out. It has some powerful tracking/ad blocking and should side step manifest v3. The crypto stuff is OFF by default and you can turn off the telemetry. You can add custom block lists to its built in add blocker. I delete the services/tasks it installs and its been awhile but last I checked it wasn't talking to anything with the way I have it configured. FF sux ballz, I dumped that piece of shit back in 2011, I was an early adopter the first few months it came out. It was sad to see them fall so far until I stopped caring. If you're afraid of Brave check out Librewolf or ungoogled chromium.
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If you haven't used Firefox in over a decade your opinion on it is invalid.
 
Armenius said:
If you haven't used Firefox in over a decade your opinion on it is invalid.
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You would be incorrect, I read what others in the industry have to say on occasion. I think their opinions matter. FF fkn sux, even if you add popular privacy configs. It's basically become a chrome clone running on a different engine. The folks at mozilla are getting filthy rich running it into the ground, google pays them to. They are constantly adding crap that no one asks for, including spyware, while removing useful features and mucking up the UI on the side. Their user base is at an all time low you just haven't figured it out yet, look it up.
 
PeaKr said:
You would be incorrect, I read what others in the industry have to say on occasion. I think their opinions matter. FF fkn sux, even if you add popular privacy configs. It's basically become a chrome clone running on a different engine.
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If you believe that last sentence to be true, I would encourage you to read from more sources in "the industry". Possibly even experience and knowledge from folks in this very thread.
 
scojer said:
https://www.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/kl82pt/is_firefox_really_the_privacy_browser/

Seems ff also phones home. Only difference is brave at least gives you a small fraction of their cut.
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Its important to consider not just that such "phoning home" can be disabled, but for what reason its there in the first place, what it contains, and who the recipient of that information is going to be. A non-profit foundation using telemetry to improve usage has different vested interests than a for-profit one that is focused upon their own advertising network (or crypto etc) as forms of revenue generation. Even the exact same data going between Google, Mozilla,. and Brave (among others) could be used in different ways and to different potential outcomes. Oh and as a frequent contributor to privacy focused communities like that, its important to realize that there are a considerable sub-population who ignore things like threat modeling, usability, take a hard fast approach to one side when there's a hypothetical conflict between privacy, security, user autonomy/sovereignty etc... and otherwise hyperfocus, ignore context , fail to update their appraisals as things evolve (ie the DoH feature when it was in opt-in test mode years back was heavily cloudflare linked but it isn't current today, for example.) Just something to keep in mind when you see a subgroup of people who claim something is at best unsafe or at worst a CIA/NSA honeypot unless its designed to go up against a Tier 1 state level actor targeting you. These aren't the only people on those communities and there can be a lot of good info, but sometimes you get to very authoritative sounding rabbitholes that are predicated on...limited credibility at best (a couple of neocities sites used to be popular but erroneous ones a few years back., good to see they've fallen off.)

Overall I continue to use Firefox for a number of reasons from open source/libre focus, privacy and security , customization, operated by a foundation and its monetization is transparent and not contingent on tracking/data mining/advertising/other shady stuff, to the fact that it remains the last serious bulwark against Google having a monopoly with the browser engine given Chrome/ium (and to a lesser degree, blink) . Having one company with de facto control on how web standards, content, and browser features are to work is certainly a concern and things like ManifestV3 are just the latest example (yes, I know certain browsers have solutions to get around it and advanced users can make exceptions and give permissionsetc.. but the vast majority of users or browsers will stick to the standards). There are already sites that don't work as well without Chrome/ium (not to mention services predicated on Chrome Web Apps) and sometimes even those that do intentionally treat the users of other browsers like Firefox differently (ie captcha. The difference between a Firefox user having to solve several harder puzzles vs a Chrome/ium user having to solve fewer easier ones or perhaps almost none at all if logged into a Google account etc).

There's a lot of other stuff worth discussing for how we got here, but suffice it to say for an open web I see Firefox as the best course going forward. You can harden and configure it as you like, use the addons that are of use to you, or if you must pick a pre-configured fork (though sometimes these can be kitchen-sink style attempts that can expose contrary problems or vulnerabilities) If you need a Chromium based browser for one reason or another something like Ungoogled Chromium or reluctantly a heavily configured Brave can work, but I wouldn't favor them in the grand scheme considering all the various factors that benefit supporting Firefox.
 
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