Mozilla doesn't have the willpower or vision to do anything with anything.
Don't be so harsh on them. (\s) They show lots of willpower and some sort of vision when talking about AI in Firefox.
Don't forget telemetry! The makers of the "privacy-focused browser" were super strong-willed about that, too.
Re:Help Keep Thunderbird Alive
by hackingonempty on Thursday April 09, 2026 @11:11AM
(#47704799)
It is important that they know exactly how many users are permanently switching to Chrome.
omg best thing I've read all day. Thanks for the good long out-loud laugh <3
I like those two comments giving context on what has happened 10 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46118243 (parent and child comment).
Good! I hope they do "kill it off" so that someone who isn't totally incompetent can fork it and take it over.
That's basically how you could describe what happened. Those competent people are using Mozilla's infrastructure and trademarks, but otherwise running on donations.
Then how come everything they've done in the last 10 years has been garbage?
calling it garbage seems kinda harsh, but I think they are moving more to using a javascript rendering method instead of xul. I remember reading about it a while back. I don't really like it either and one of the first updates from back then broke a lot of UI that had been working ok. I am not really sure what the problems are with working with xul though, but I think firefox moved off it a long time ago too. I feel like thunderbird's user base is more the type to want to use thunderbird because it runs like a local first desktop style app as an alternative to using a web interface to their email. At least that's what I like about it.
> they are moving more to using a javascript rendering method instead of xul
> I am not really sure what the problems are with working with xul though
> I think firefox moved off it a long time ago too
And that's the moment when firefox became garbage - just another chrome-alike, except slower and more resource-hungry. It had been getting worse for a decade prior to that, but dropping xul and breaking a ton of my extensions and customisability was the (large) straw that broke the camel's back. Sound familiar yet?
> I feel like thunderbird's user base is more the type to want to use thunderbird because it runs like a local first desktop style app as an alternative to using a web interface to their email. At least that's what I like about it.
(forgive my tone, nothing against you, I just get emotional when morons take an excellent piece of software I've been using for decades and turn it into broken, unusable trash)
I'm not a Thunderbird user myself, and obviously everyone's experiences are different, but I've seen lots of people happy with Thunderbird's development. And just the fact that they've ensured that k9mail is still maintained seems like an objective win, even if it's now called Thunderbird. Exchange support is also something I've been hearing people wish for in non-Outlook email clients in general for ages.
> just the fact that they've ensured that k9mail is still maintained seems like an objective win, even if it's now called Thunderbird.
k9mail's developer called it a day, so this is still strictly the better outcome. If you want an unmaintained version, why not just install the old version?
They might have the money, but they don't really seem to want anything to do with the project.