Re:Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on comm...
by DangerousPie on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @10:56AM
(#24132640)
So you think Mozilla would be better if it wasn't run like a tech company? How should it be run instead? Why should they not be using metrics to measure the impact of what they do? It's not obvious to me that running it less like a tech company and more like a non-profit (whatever that means) would work better.
Re:Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on comm...
by m4rtink on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @11:27AM
(#24133004)
Well, that would explain why they are seemingly ignoring the Firefox power user and fan community, that got them where they are in the first place by free marketing and advocacy.
Looks like we dont fit their badly selected metric. :P
Re:Mozilla lays off 250 employees while it refocuses on comm...
by zaat on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @09:42AM
(#24131989)
Surely the option to have tabs organized vertically on the side of the windows instead of stuck crowded to uselessness on top can be considered as a technical merit.
Sure, there is no shareholders so there is this freedom, but people working there were basically hired after working in other tech companies, and they just work as they did in other tech companies. The fact that Mozilla Corporation is owned by a non-profit seems to be completely lost. Basically people are paid to improve metrics, whether it's the number of users, the ARPU, the "engagement" on whatever features they decided was important...
Add to that the fact that Firefox lagged technically behind Chrome for many years (it only recently cought up with Quantum) and UX wise also Firefox was stuck on the "IE6 but with tabs" look and feel and waited many years before accepting that the UX introduced by Chrome when it was released was superior.
As a result, now that casual users are on Chrome and the Firefox user base is mostly made of users who choose Firefox not because of its technical merits but because it's Open Source, supported by a non-profit, etc. There is a disconnect between that user base and the Mozilla Corporation who just thinks like any other SV company.