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Let me pay for Firefox

(discourse.mozilla.org)
803 points csmantle | 1 comments | 13 Jul 25 08:38 UTC | HN request time: 0.204s | source
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beloch ◴[13 Jul 25 10:14 UTC] No.44549076[source]▶
It's become a meme, but consider WinRAR. Odds are, it's installed on your machine and you haven't paid for it. It just works. It brings up a polite nag box but it doesn't sell your data. It doesn't invade your privacy. It just works and makes enough money to keep getting updated.

It sounds hokey but, perhaps, Firefox should be trialware. Don't cut off the people who can't pay. Make a browser that just works and see how many people will pay for it even if they can use it without paying.

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1. keyringlight ◴[13 Jul 25 10:42 UTC] No.44549258[source]▶
I'd wonder if there's enough willing to pay within individual consumers or professionals that would support a browser development team, and my impression is that file compression and browsers are pretty much a software commodity where they can be easily swapped with other options. I doubt there would be a lot of uptake on licensing within companies, and any bundling a licensed copy with an OEM build PC would probably involve mozilla paying them instead of the other way around.

It seems like the browser only exists with a very important secondary motivation, for microsoft and IE it was tying the web and windows together with activex, and for chrome it was to give their ads/services a good presentation. The other alternative I wonder about is the Document Foundation with LibreOffice, where their offering is distinct from MS Office, and there's still space for other players to exist healthily.