02-27-2025 10:51 AM
After your disaster of ToU was released today you responded with an update on the blog which is blatantly false and misleading:
"UPDATE: We’ve seen a little confusion about the language regarding licenses, so we want to clear that up. We need a license to allow us to make some of the basic functionality of Firefox possible. Without it, we couldn’t use information typed into Firefox, for example. It does NOT give us ownership of your data or a right to use it for anything other than what is described in the Privacy Notice."
This text does not matter, the only text that matters is the text of the ToU and that pretty much gives you the right to do whatever with the data entered. That is completely insane. And even if it isn't to be used for anything other than described in the privacy notice: the language describing the uses is so vague and encompassing it provides no protection.
It is absolutely mind-boggling that anyone even considered writing this text, let alone publish it. I have been using Firefox for 10+ years at this point and am extremely disappoint in the anti-privacy direction the Mozilla foundation seems to be taking Firefox. But perhaps getting a CEO whose experience was blatant anti-consumer and anti-privacy AirBNB should have been a clear sign Mozilla no longer cares about it's mission statement at all. I no longer believe it does as all evidence points to the contrary.
02-28-2025 02:50 AM
I hope Mozilla reverts these changes. Otherwise, we should spread the word about this changes. Most clear indication of the changes mozilla does is this commit:
https://github.com/mozilla/bedrock/commit/d459addab846d8144b61939b7f4310eb80c5470e
02-28-2025 04:36 AM - edited 02-28-2025 04:39 AM
Does any of this apply to Thunderbird email? They say that they "adhere to the Mozilla Privacy Policy for how we receive, handle, and share information."
Are all my private emails now licensed to Mozilla? Is Mozilla now claiming a license to feed emails from my bank, brokerage, cardiologist, and family to an AI that wants to model advertising to me?
02-28-2025 10:54 AM
Agreed; this is bonkers. I've been using Firefox since version 1, but now might be time to give it up.
02-28-2025 11:04 AM - edited 02-28-2025 11:05 AM
Same. I have been using Firefox before it was called Firefox... I liked this browser and I could not accept other browsers policies: the way they handle my data and sell it for marketing or other purposes and so on. I'd be happy to PAY to keep using the browser as is, but the new Terms of Use are unacceptable.
Firefox has been losing market share for a decade now, it has so many hiccups, behind on implementing features and web standards that major browsers have. I think the only people who still stick with it are here because of the privacy they get and the trust, these type of users will learn about the updates, it won't go unnoticed. With this update I think Firefox will be a dead project in a year.
If anyone at Firefox reading this, please consider this: Either you say this was a mistake and go back and find another way to make money or you can say goodby to your user base.
EDIT:
I just made this account to tell this.
02-28-2025 04:40 PM
Please put this in a plugin first before deploying these features. If your plugin becomes popular, integrate it into your core software. Stop using your core userbase to capitalize on it.