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patmorgan23yesterday at 5:04 PM3 repliesview on HN

A leading web browser can not be built and maintained by volunteers.


Replies

glensteinyesterday at 5:22 PM

Right. Firefox stands alone as the most successful self financed full stack browser that's ever been made without being subsidized by outside revenue streams. I like to use the example of Opera. If "make a better browser" won market share and business creativity won stable revenue, we'd all be using Opera right now because (sorry Mozilla), no browser company was ever better than Opera in my opinion.

In 2026 the rules to making a good browser are (1) already be a trillion dollar company, (2) use Chromium, (3) have some form of distribution lock-in over billions of devices. Otherwise you're cooked. Mozilla swims against the stream better than anyone.

manfredzyesterday at 7:48 PM

I don’t know, but there are other ways of funding besides -completely- volunteer run.

Take look at Ladybird

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladybird_(web_browser)?wprov=s...

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PaulHouleyesterday at 5:31 PM

The EU says it cares about privacy. although it's actions have normalized enshittification; the EU could fully fund Firefox or a Firefox fork or another browser in a second and stop all the trackers right in their tracks.

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