It continually amazes me how people use a Google product on their desktop, as if they don't send enough data to an ad company. Actually, I'm not sure why I type this, any rational arguments are definitely not winning them over.
edit: why is every dissenting comment here being down voted en masse with no arguments posted against them???
Mozilla Corporation takes money from Google for search placement. That doesn’t turn it into a subsidiary. Google doesn’t own it, doesn’t run its roadmap, and doesn’t ship its code. Mozilla negotiates search deals the same way Apple does for Safari. Revenue deal ≠ corporate control.
On telemetry: you’re overstating it. Firefox ships with telemetry on, but it documents what it collects, lets users turn it off, and exposes most of it in about:config. Google Chrome ties into a much broader account system, sync stack, and ad network. Chrome doesn’t operate in isolation; it plugs straight into Google’s data ecosystem. Firefox doesn’t own an ad network to feed.
“Almost comparable” needs evidence. Comparable how? Volume? Type? Identifiability? Retention? Without specifics, the claim collapses into vibes.
The bigger difference sits lower in the stack: engine independence. Firefox runs on Gecko. Chrome runs on Blink. If you care about web monoculture, that matters more than marginal telemetry deltas. When one engine dominates, web standards start drifting toward what that engine implements. We watched that happen in the IE6 era.
As for uBlock Origin: yes, it’s a major reason people choose Firefox. But browser architecture shapes how long powerful content blockers survive. Chrome’s extension model changes (Manifest V3) restrict what blockers can do. Firefox kept the older, more capable API. That choice signals priorities.
If your argument reduces to “both collect some data, so it doesn’t matter,” you flatten meaningful differences. The question isn’t purity. The question asks who controls the engine, who sets extension policy, and who benefits from surveillance at scale.
If you think those differences don’t matter, make that case directly. But don’t blur structural distinctions into “basically the same.” They’re not.
I'm quite envious of this line of thinking. I truly yearn for the times I was so naive and idealistic.
Pessimistic arguments that boil down to "everything sucks therefore I'm right, and any argument to the contrary is just naive and juvenile, and therefore lesser"
I can't speak for anyone else, I'm just honestly done with these people. Get off the internet, don't have kids, and die alone feeling smug - but save the rest of us from with your worthless drivel.
Read your statement again and tell me who the pessimist is, and who is most in need of a break from the internet.
What's up with the straw men?
Poor quality comments lead to poor quality replies. I won't deny mine is as well.
> Read your statement again and tell me who the pessimist is, and who is most in need of a break from the internet.
And that was to them replying to your first backhanded remark.
Though of course there’s no telling how far we will eventually go in a trumpworld.
Could you please point to what I said that implies I'm pretending a "full blown dictatorship?" I apologize if that's the case. Certainly wasn't my intent.
Google search revenue represents about 75% of Mozilla's total revenue.
Google search revenue represents about 4% of Apple's total revenue.
If you think those differences don’t matter, make that case directly. But don’t blur financial distinctions into “basically the same.” They’re not.
> mozilla is basically a google subsidiary
"Everyone" knows that Mozilla has a heavy financial reliance on Google. So are you bringing this up to suggest that Mozilla also consistently acts to benefit Google and its ad network? If so, where's the proof? If not, what's the point you're making?
> firefox telemetry is almost comparable to chrome
Comparable to Chrome what? Telemetry? Something else? What is Firefox using that data for? In the service of or against users? What's the point you're trying to make? If you're making assertions, where's the proof?
You're making a lot of imprecise comments, most of interpretations of which carry a large burden of proof, and then complaining that people are just down-voting and moving on.
> It continually amazes me how people use a Google product on their desktop, as if they don't send enough data to an ad company.
I'd love to have alternatives, but which ones are there? Firefox is not an alternative; audio does not work for me as I am pulseaudio free here. On chrome-based browsers audio works fine, out of the box, so it is not my system that is at fault; it is mozilla that is at fault. I also reported this, the lazy firefox dev said all Linux users use pulseuaudio these days. Well ...
I could recompile it but compiling firefox is a pain in the ...:
https://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/xsoft/firefox...
I am not going to use a build system that is +20 years old and only exists because Mozilla is too lazy to switch to cmake or meson/ninja as primary build tool.
> Actually, I'm not sure why I type this, any rational arguments are definitely not winning them over.
Well I gave one rational argument: can't play audio on my linux box if I use firefox (by default that is). I can give many more reasons too. You seem to make the point that Google is worse, so we should also use a bad product (firefox). I think we really need better browsers in general. Firefox simply isn't one and that is Mozilla's fault. There is a reason why it went into decline. Mozilla gave up the fight - the ad-money made it weak.
Obviously I don't have any data backing me up here, but I'm going to guess that that isn't the main reason why so many people choose Chrome over Firefox.
Would second this. Mach uses Python, and the dependencies they use are a pain whenever no pre-built wheels are available. Especially so when you see that an "optional" Mach dependency for build system telemetry is what busting the configuration (not build) stage...
For those that don't know what trusted types are: Simply put, it splits the string type in to unsanitised_string_from_user and safe_escaped_string where unsafe strings can not be used in function parameters that only take a safe string That's heavily simplifying of course, but it's the basic idea.
It's not perfect, but it works, and unlike Chrome you can have full ad blocking with uBlock Origin.
The feature I would really want here is a switch that blocks AI summaries, overviews, etc. on any websites you browse.
Eg here's a list
https://github.com/laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist#...
Even better, why was the AI feature ever added in the first place?
All those arguments about agents and hallucinations kind of distracted people from noticing we've accodentally built a universal translator.
Firefox for Android has been killing it for me with the latest ux updates, I didn't expect major improvements there and was pleasantly surprised.
So, the most effective path here for y’all to be heard is not flipping the switch off yourself (do so anyways!) — anyone who cares at this stage has probably opted out of being counted already, after all — but instead to ensure that news of this switch spreads to absolutely as many non-tech people as possible. Don’t argue that they should run some script that shuts off their metrics and phone home and updates. Just convince them to shut off the AI and explain that this is why their browser got slow about a year ago! They’ll flip off the switch gleefully, their phone-home will count them, and y’all will have the strongest possible impact on the telematics graphs at Mozilla.
I already ran the disable process manually on the computers I have friends and family IT duties towards, so I’ll go back and do the AI switch to be sure it’s counted next week. Yes, this is a crap way to be heard. But making a mark on feature opt-out graphs is probably the only hope we have left to get their executive leadership to stop drowning the browser for its own good.
Gee. If only there was a way to collect users opinions on things. Welp.. guess we have to live with subtly spying on everything they do with our software.
Most people who are vocal aren't representative of users.
Many vocal people aren't even users.
Don't get me wrong, I turn off telemetry, but you're acting like it's easy to get that information. You act like people don't scream when Firefox prompts people with surveys. You act like there isn't bias in survey takers.
If you just pretend everything is easy we'll just end up reinventing the same evils we're trying to fight today. Unfortunately most evils are created from good intentions. I hear there's an entire road paved that way
But current Firefox users could probably temporarily turn on telemetry, activate the kill switch, and turn telemetry back off. Just make sure you wait long enough to ensure the information is sent
This feature seems to be a nod to people with this worldview.
EDIT: See e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47133786 liking AI features to defecating on your food. It's not a technical objection, it's a principled one.
Ideally they wouldn't make the product bad, with a badness opt-out, in the first place, but everyone in Silicon Valley's got to feed the AI monkey. So I guess this is the best we can expect.
(Also I didn't realize how bad this push got until I visited California recently, and saw every other billboard - that's physical ad over a road - pushing some unqualified form of AI magic on me).
However, I think data control is critical and any kind of implicit cloud service such as transmission to remote AI servers should be toggle-able clearly, just like search autocomplete can be done.
> For those who wish to maintain some AI functionalities, a selective blocking option is available, enabling users to retain useful features like on-device translations while avoiding cloud-based services.
All:
(1) Generated comments aren't allowed on HN - this rule predates LLMs but obviously applies even more now: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20%22generated%20comments%22&sort=byDate&type=comment
(2) If you see accounts that look like they're mostly posting genAI comments, please let us know at hn@ycombinator.com. That's how I found my way to these cases.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46747998, by dang, 1 month ago:
Please don't post generated or AI-filtered posts to HN. We want to hear you in your own voice, and it's fine if your English isn't perfect.
---
P.S. The actual comment is (surprise!) completely wrong. Visit Settings -> AI Controls and you will see a granular set of feature switches under the master kill switch. Each has a clear title and description and is independent.
Read every comment made since the account started posting again.
Tell me what you think.
> It's good that they've added an option to disable them for those who don’t want to use or see them.
I'm sorry, but we'll never get corporations to do what we want if we don't throw them the smallest bone when we get our way. You need positive reinforcement too, not just negative. If it's all negative they just stop caring and you get companies lot Google who just don't give a shit anymore.
And yes, there are some AI features I like and I want in the browser. I get a lot of utility out of translation as well as semantic search of my history. I don't want agents in my browser but get, Firefox is giving us choices.
Look, no one needs to like Firefox, but let's also be honest, it's the best we got right now. Google, Apple, and Microsoft are shoving agents down our throats and putting us in walled gardens that are getting harder and harder to break from. I don't care what flavor of chromium you use, Google is still using it to control the way the web works. Everyone loves to say how chromium is has greater coverage of standards but never takes a second to question who sets those standards.
I'm sorry guys, that's the state of things now. You can't fight Google by switching to chromium. It's still their vehicle to eat the internet. Our choices right now are Safari, Firefox, and maybe ladybird. It's slim pickings and nothing is close to perfect. At this point it doesn't even matter if Mozilla is evil, because at least they're the enemy of our enemy. Google is keeping them on life support to avoid monopoly claims but how long will they need that?
So what, we're just going to hand the keys of the kingdom to the guys selling artisian turd sandwiches because what, there isn't enough mayo on your ham sandwich? Because you don't like ham?
We got a win. Celebrate. Take the break from being cynical. There's bigger battles to fight and there'll be more tomorrow. Take the night off and don't be a sore winner
Thanks for staying positive. I like Firefox, I think it's a very nice holdout against adware.
I remember when every other software prompted you to install Bonzi Buddy or some other intrusive search bar. This AI push is even worse.
Are those the features this kill switch removes or was there a deeper issue here?
yibers•1h ago
shevy-java•1h ago
Before, we did not need to disable AI stuff. Now Mozilla forced us (that is those of us who don't like or use AI) into an extra step. Guess the only thing worse is being given no choice at all though.