Ask HN: Would you fund Mozilla to become independent of Google?

A user like me would be willing to idea of some monthly donation when Mozilla restructures its expenses.

If memory serves right, the biggest slice of expenses were in C-level compensations & shortlived pet projects. The organization has to focus on growing a cadre of good engineers and product teams for their core offerings (just like the ones who rewrote large chunks of Netscape code into a fledgling Firefox ~22y ago).

One can't be expected to donate just to eventually subsidize a penthouse purchase for the CEO or their swanky McLaren.

I’ve tolerated them being in the gray zone for years with their neglect of Firefox. After their latest stunt they’re out for me. I would not donate to an org that openly neglects a social responsibility of this magnitude.

You can look at their most recent annual report[1].

Their total expenses were ~$40M, and their CEO made over $6M in compensation. So out of a $100 donation, $16 goes directly into the CEO's pocket.

The total compensation for their top 10 employees is close to $10M. They all are President of this and VP of that and Director of thus--my strong guess is none of them write Firefox code. So $24 of your $100 go into their pockets.

1: https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2024/b200-mozilla-fo...

This link is a tax form for the Foundation, which doesn’t do any development on Firefox at all. So, 0% of all donations would go towards Firefox, even after your proposal.