iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by bigfudge on Thursday January 01, 2026 @06:36PM (#46459449)

That was almost 20 years ago though. Things are really different now and it's hard to imagine Firefox saving anything these days. Sadly, the only entities powerful enough to control FANGs are FANGs (although fingers crossed the EU holds it's nerve and EU nations belatedly act on the realisation that being beholden to US tech giants is a massive strategic blunder, akin to relying so heavily on US military satellite data for Ukraine).

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by chongli on Thursday January 01, 2026 @07:04PM (#46459677)

I don't have much faith in Firefox saving us, given its organizational turnover and cultural issues.

I have much more faith in a new entrant, like Ladybird. I should be able to use Ladybird on iOS. Why not?

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by ethbr1 on Thursday January 01, 2026 @07:46PM (#46460043)

The problem with "new entrant" is that only revolutionary features convince users to switch en mass.

Tabs/stability (Firefox vs IE). V8 (Chrome vs Firefox).

Anything else is a battle of attrition, where the deepest pocketed competitor in terms of advertising spend wins. Or Google, because it flood all its own advertising channels.

And Chrome still barely only won.

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by pipeline_peak on Thursday January 01, 2026 @08:06PM (#46460201)

Ladybird has too much pride.

They are more concerned with making something from scratch than something that actually works.

Also they’re switching over to Swift which can only be worse for performance.

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by thingortwo on Friday January 02, 2026 @12:16AM (#46461661)

So what do you want another chromium based browser? The whole point of Ladybird is to kinda prove that a completely independent browser engine is feasible. Also, they are not doing everything from scratch for example it will use the same graphics library that chromium uses (Skia) and also now firefox. You should probably read the FAQ on their homepage:

https://ladybird.org/#:~:text=What%20does%20%22No%20code%20f...

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by pipeline_peak on Friday January 02, 2026 @01:20AM (#46461979)

> So what do you want another chromium based browser?

I want something free of Google code, which sounds like they aren’t doing if Skia is anyway involved.

Instead they’re wasting resources where it’s less needed. Like building a JS engine instead of starting off with something like SpiderMonkey, JSCore, or QuickJS.

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by Gabrys1 on Friday January 02, 2026 @05:11AM (#46463320)

Let them spend resources however they want. It's not like they are subsidized or anything

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by pipeline_peak on Friday January 02, 2026 @06:06AM (#46463636)

>It's not like they are subsidized or anything

View sponsors https://ladybird.org/

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by Gabrys1 on Saturday January 03, 2026 @02:27AM (#46473578)

Am I missing any govt org there?

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by pipeline_peak on Saturday January 03, 2026 @12:00PM (#46478902)

Subsidize doesn’t only mean government funded.

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Re:iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan by concinds on Thursday January 01, 2026 @06:41PM (#46459485)

Yes, new problems will require new solutions. I'm calling out the logic of paternalism and dependency, an impotent hope pinned on a "benevolent" corporation retaining absolute control forever.

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