OP, so your post is not removed, please reply to this comment with your best guess of what this meme means! Everyone else, this is PETER explains the joke. Have fun and reply as your favorite fictional character for top level responses!
Firefox is turning into an agentic browser. Now there’s a technical explanation for what that means but in essence it’s going to use 80% of my Ram instead of the 50% it usually does.
What are you even going to do with all that RAM anyways? You don't need it to watch American football. Besides you would just waste the money on an overpriced farmers coat and an antique Honda? /s
As someone who lived through it, that ain't no lie. My first modem was a 300 baud acoustic coupler, which means the receiver lifted off the phone base and fitted over the modem on rubber cups that held the earpiece and the mouthpiece. Going on CompuServe, and later local bulletin board systems, was literally a mind expanding experience.
My friend and I used to Telnet into the library internet service to then connect to the MUD we played because the connection allowed for full 56K connection onward to the game while his dialup ISP throttled it to 14.4K.
Every day, mum would wake me 90 minutes before I'd gone to bed, I'd have to eat a cold bowl of gravel, walk 30 miles both ways to work 19 hours at mill, and when I got home, dad would thrash us about the head with 1 baud 'til we were DEAD.
Didnt you hear? America's Dear Leader says we need to rename that sport to something else that isnt Football, so that way no one can confuse the sport with the one presided by the Peace Committee.
I used to have a modded Sims 3 that put in a 2012 Ford Focus (the car I had at the time) into my game. The item description was "You wouldn't download a car would you?"
And now it looks like video cards will blow up again soon. What with the insane water usage, and truly astronomical power usage that has increased the price of electricity, I am so glad to support the asinine growth of AI datacenters - a product without any path to profitability! So when the bubble bursts, they will look for government socialism to keep themselves from going into bankruptcy and losing the massive amount of money they knowingly poured into an unsupportable business model.
Imagine not having purchased RAM in years and thinking 'oh I should buy some during black friday' I was like no fucking way RAM is this expensive compared to back in the day but I was very wrong. I'd kill for 64 ddr5 right now
Browsers in general have been giant memory hogs for quite some time. For a while Chromium was worse about it, but it's possible Firefox has caught up by now.
Let's not forget how we migrated in the past to avoid memory leaks and hogs. First we all went with I.E. because we didn't know any better. Then Firefox came and said it'll be better and it was, so we used it... then it got bloated and Chrome came along and said it'll be better and it was, so we used it... then it got bloated and Firefox said that they learned from their mistakes and that it worked better, and it did so we used it... then it got all bloated and Chrome said that they learned from their mistakes and that it worked better, and it did so we used it... then Chrome said they didn't want ad-blockers so we all went back to Firefox and used it... then Firefox said it wants to be an AI browser
I’ve been using Gmail for 20 years. I feel dumb now for choosing that as my main email, but I don’t even know how to transition after using it so long. It’s going to be a massive PIA.
Is the few minutes you need to be on the site actually a problem though? I don't personally use it, I'm just curious why when it's only open for a few minutes it's a problem.
Some people leave the Gmail tab open so that when emails come in, they're notified with the little (_) in the tab space. Moving to an email client is a potential solution.
Ahh. I mean yeah in that case you're better off switching to a program anyway. I didn't realize people did that instead of getting notifications on their phone or using a dedicated program.
I mean, they're doing the math. Joe Consumer is reducing their purchasing of GPUs and RAM, but Grok is still buying it. So it'll be the new normal until Grok stops buying it, then NVIDIA will go "oh fuck sales are down" and drop the price (but never as low as it was) so Joe Consumer can buy it again.
People are stretched way too thin, and most folks aren't looking at dropping $800 on RAM. They'd rather just make do with what they have.
Saw some peeps in another thread suggesting to move to Waterfox or Librewolf (think thats the name). Particularly after the Waterfox guy replied directly to the new Firefox CEO's bullcrap
ohh this is probably about when they changed their privacy policy. they removed the "we don't sell your data" statement, or something along those lines iirc
it was big drama, but in reality it was just the legal guys being legal guys
That story is mostly misinformation from Gawker. The original blog post was about Google rephrasing their code of conduct so "Don't be Evil" was at the beginning and now it's at the end.
Gawker's whole schtick was ragebait and provocation and people are still circulating fake news they put out.
It is absolutely the case, and not always intentionally.
The problem is that once the wording change is in place, even if the intentions are good, a bad intentioned person is eventually going to come along and realize "Oh, nothing is stopping me from doing this now, because the wording changed."
And once challenged on it, people will realize the wording change allows this.
Then when challenged with another bit of wording, that wording gets changed to "be in line with the recent policy changes proposed in the previous change."
Which then changes the "wording change" to a "policy change" right under your nose, and no one bothers to question it.
Let's say I promise you "I will never eat a baby!" and then my lawyer informs me that veal is actually a cow baby, I need to change my policy to "I will never eat a human baby!"
but then I don't know what the future holds, what if some insane president says that sperm is already a baby, I would not be able to swallow anymore, and so my policy is "I currently have no plans to eat a human baby!" - but now it sounds like I really want to eat a baby.
yup, but they didn't actually remove it. they moved its placement. but if you only focus only on where it was, it looks like it was removed. hence the drama. cue the pitchforks.
There's now an option turned on by default that allows the browser to collect anonymous data though. Which, from my recollection, they did because Firefox is struggling to keep afloat. So they need some kind of way to sell "some" general anonymous data on their users to have at least some revenue.
To add a little context from my field of expertise, they did this because the definition of a sale of data, particularly in California, is pretty vague. From a legal risk mitigation perspective it makes sense to not explicitly say you aren’t selling data rather than leave that statement up opening yourself up to false claims risk.
And, to be fair to California, the definition is that way so someone like Google can't say they aren't selling your data when they pass info they scraped from a Google search to AdSense, where no money changed hands because Google owns it.
The issue is that it means if you make a Firefox account with all your bookmarks and whatnot saved, then login on a different device so they move over to it, that transfer of your info is counted as being sold for the exact same reason.
In February they changed their Terms of Use to be way less privacy-focused (which they have historically been one of the best browsers for). Seems like that decision precipitated the news from the last 48 hours.
This post is from February, likely referencing a change in Firefox's ToS that seemingly gave them ownership of your data. It's not about their AI stuff.
Steve here. Everyone loves Firefox due to it's decent security measures and Ublock Origin to watch YouTube without ads. Now they've decided to go full on AI. People don't like that.
Yup, as I am in the UK, I object to our laws the previous government brought in which means anything they deem "mature" be it porn or NEWS SITES is blocked on Reddit and other websites unless I prove my "age", hence using a VPN, which ironically is what ALL the politicians here do using NORN VPN that they charge to their expenses, that we the people bloody pay for. Using PROTON myself, as the standard version is free and have no issues, slowdowns or otherwise with it.
Previous? No, they were introduced by this government which also campaigned to have them strengthened.
The last government also proposed laws, and the competition isn’t sanity, it’s “who can sound the toughest while pretending it’s all about caring for children”. It’s sadly a bi-partisan problem.
The conservatives implemented it and set the law to come in at the X date it came in on. Labour of course could have changed it but they like the cons do the "its all about the children" knee jerk reaction when it does nothing to help the children in the first place.
Bare in mind most of them in government have zero clue how anything works on the internet, how tech works as proved by the fact the most Googled question on the day it came out was "Free VPNs" and the most downloaded VPN on the day was Proton as it came up as the most recommended for free, simple to use and less intrusive.
I only got it simply because it blocked about 90% of news articles or subs on Reddit which had nothing to do with the porn they claimed it was all for, and damned if I am giving my ID to a 3rd party that has zero link to the government, no oversight and will happily sell my info to scammers.
Thank you Steve! That went completely over my head. Could have guessed it since even my graphics card driver wants to install AI now... And not for upscaling that is!
Firefox has made multiple mistakes of late, this one was about selling your data. So then OP saw some shit about FF this week and ran to find something to link about them here for karma. The problem with FF this week is the AI browser.
Opera GX is a Chromium browser (which kind of means you're just running Chrome but with a different skin), and Google has been throwing their weight around for a while trying to force ads through adblockers, or force you to disable the adblocker in order to work.
Your mileage may vary, some users aren't having problems at all, but others report not being able to watch YouTube at all.
This is just one thread on it, but you can find quite a bit of discussion around this topic.
Yeah I mean Opera GX is as unethical as the rest of them, I definitely won't try and defend them there, this is purely a technical question. I'm in Canada using GX and uBlock and only "get an ad" once in a very blue moon when Youtube and uBlock are getting into a particularly nasty knife-fight, at which point I refresh and carry on without the ad.
Thank you! I will check out Librewolf, I hadn't even thought of phone browser until you mentioned it there, I am indeed using Firefox Beta with UBlock on my android and same with my son's tablet and PC so I'm going to have a fair bit of software changing this week by the sounds of things!
Thank you for putting me on the right track where to begin.
I used Librewolf for months but due to its extreme privacy policies many things just don't work. I have had trouble previewing PDFs, filling in forms, making payments, etc. In the end I just had to switch because it was too much hassle.
Yeah, it is incredibly frustrating that so many websites view 3rd party cookie blocking as ad blocking and will simply refuse to serve content if they can't track you via the ad networks.
I've heard good things about Brave. I might honestly give it a shot once the mobile version of Firefox introduces the AI. Mainly cause the Firefox forks are APK and I don't want to constantly be checking for updates.
From what I've seen, it's nothing big-- there's just an AI chatbot you can put on as a sidebar to your browser. The idea is you could type "Hey, can you summarize this page for me?" and it would be able to answer.
I imagine turning it off is literally just hitting an X on the sidebar. We'll know more whenever they eventually finish it.
Do you know if Librewolf still lets you match diacritics when using Ctrl-F? Because as silly as it sounds, that's my favorite distinctive feature of Firefox
I used to main brave browser, but it would consistently mess up tons of page elements on reddit and youtube to the point where it was unbearable. Especially on youtube, I'd be typing a full sentence and then stop and just watch as the letters appeared 1 by 1. Sometimes I'd scroll through a short just for the background to go full blown white flashbang. I miss brave :( just couldn't handle the consisten bugs
Absolutely nothing. I jumped from Firefox to Waterfox and will jump again when it doesn't suit my needs. There no point in worry too much about what if when I can focus on the now.
To be fair, I haven't tried other privacy browser like Brave or Librewolf so those could be better. But for now, I will stick with Waterfox until it give me a reason not to.
Waterfox is good, Librewolf is also good. Waterfox just released this update, and along with it, a very nice statement about using a metal pipe to enclose their figurative dick.
LibreWolf is the most secure and private option out of the box but also costs a certain level of convenience such as websites remembering your setting or certain websites working at all. (Some of this can be fixed in the settings but it's extra work)
Waterfox is one I have less experience with, but it seems to focus on bring user friendly and privacy focused. So it's going to be the closest to the default firefox experience.
Palemoon has a heavy focus on customization and is designed based on a much older version of firefox in terms of its design.
Floorp has a silly name and its main benefit is its modernized and convenient design and customizability.
Zen browser is the one I personally use right now. It's still in beta and has good privacy and a unique minimalistic presentation too keep your screen from getting cluttered without losing out on any functionality. Its got good customizability and is feature rich with a lot of convenient features I've never seen anywhere else. Plus it just looks nice.
Personally I recommend Zen browser to just about anyone, I've tried lots of different browsers and haven't found any I like as much as this one.
I think there’s a bit of knee-jerking to the response for sure, but I think it’s very reasonable to be concerned and suspicious about internet browsers - ie the source of the vast majority of modern information wanting to ‘focus on’ the misinformation machine.
Well, I read an article about it and apparently they want to keep the AI part entirely optional and up to the user and still keeping data privacy as one of their main goals, sounds very reasonable to me tbh
I agree that automatic summaries like Google ai overview are mostly unhelpful, but I think there's genuine benefit in LLM-based web-search agents like Deep Research. These tools leverage the models' ability to read extremely fast, and as such, can be used for filtering through hundreds upon hundreds of webpages based on any custom, context-sensitive criteria, or fishing out obscure/specialized information. You get your annotated list of sources and then engage with the sources themselves. So, it's not a "misinformation machine" in this capacity, it's just a super custom search filter where you can formulate any constraints and search strategies you want in natural language.
Whether I need this directly in a browser and not as a separate tool is another question. But if it's opt-in, I have no grief.
That’s a reasonable argument! I have to say I sincerely doubt it will be implemented in that capacity rather than typical overview/summary and ‘assistant’-type options but I’m open to being pleasantly surprised
When I joined Mozilla, it was clear that trust was going to become the defining issue in technology and the browser would be where this battle would play out. AI was already reshaping how people search, shop, and make decisions in ways that were hard to see and even harder to understand. I saw how easily people could lose their footing in experiences that feel personal but operate in ways that are anything but clear. And I knew this would become a defining issue, especially in the browser, where so many decisions about privacy, data, and transparency now originate.
Also...
As Mozilla moves forward, we will focus on becoming the trusted software company. This is not a slogan. It is a direction that guides how we build and how we grow. It means three things.
First: Every product we build must give people agency in how it works. Privacy, data use, and AI must be clear and understandable. Controls must be simple. AI should always be a choice — something people can easily turn off. People should know why a feature works the way it does and what value they get from it.
Second: our business model must align with trust. We will grow through transparent monetization that people recognize and value.
Third: Firefox will grow from a browser into a broader ecosystem of trusted software. Firefox will remain our anchor. It will evolve into a modern AI browser and support a portfolio of new and trusted software additions.
My interpretation: Mozilla has been behind the big players like Google for years. They know they can't afford to just sit back, or Firefox's marketshare will continue to be eroded. Mozilla is trying to sell their company and products as having AI features that are easier to use, clearer to understand, and easily turned off.
Whether they can actually realize having all the "good" of AI (to the extent anyone believes that AI can be good... but Mozilla clearly believe that there is value that they not only should but must offer) without the bad (hallucinations, deep integration that can't be disabled) is a judgment you have to make for yourself.
constantly being slammed with fake information from AI, shitty content from AI, terrible customer service from AI, awful moderation from AI yeah you bet your ass I'm gonna have a knee-jerk reaction whenever AI is mentioned.
They also changed CEO and doubled his salary to 7million dollars, at a time when the mozilla company is losing money. So now they need to put ads and AI into the browser to try to get back the money he's leeching out. It was supposed to be a non profit but now they're just another shitty company doing the same shitty stuff
Judging by the comments here, I'd say knee jerk reaction. Reading through the top 20 comments it's all "GOING FULL AI", as if that means anything.
As per usual if there was anything substantial wrong, people would just explain what was wrong. If all you see are catch phrases, then it's likely the pitchfork reddit losers.
At least I hope that's the case. But even if it isn't Firefox is open source and someone would do a fork if there was something substantially fucked going on.
Chris here. Everyone says it's because they are turning into an AI browser, but this post is from February, when they changed their Terms of Service to be way less privacy-focused. Firefox has historically been much better about user privacy than competitors like Chrome and Edge. In February they got a hammer and pulled out their dick, and yesterday they announced they are going to swing that hammer.
It's an incredibly ironic move, as a big reason why AI is a viable commercial product is that online based AIs like ChatGTP and all the others are provided for free because they save every single bit of information you give them. They are probably the least privacy-oriented pieces of consumer software count there right now.
Many of the AI tools that Firefox ships with currently use local AI models, but they are all turned on by default and the terms of use say that they can switch to non-local models at any time.
Vivaldi seems to be the only browser that is consistently on the right side of history.
Back during the Crypto boom they vehemently stood against crypto as every other browser added integration, and now they are vocally against AI when every other browser adds AI features.
Peter here: instead of searching for lactating pregnant Latinas it wil now create images of lactating pregnant Latinas for me. It does not have the same feel. I want to see real images of real lactating pregnant Latinas. All browser makers are dumb and I hate them now!
The new CEO is pushing for AI integration and floated the idea of blocking adblockers, one of the things that a lot of people choose Firefox since Chrome is trying to kill adblockers too (they delisted uBlock Origin, the most popular adblocker).
He’s also bullish that things like built-in VPN and a privacy service called Monitor can get more people to pay for their browser. He says he could begin to block ad blockers in Firefox and estimates that’d bring in another $150 million, but he doesn’t want to do that. It feels off-mission.
everyone's talking about the recent firefox ai drama missing the fact that the post is from nearly 10 months ago. i dont know the full context, but I'm guessing this is about firefox going for the less privacy route. a while ago, they removed a statement to not sell user data on their ToS, which people immediately noticed.
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