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Is FireFox running out of money?

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Mr Happy

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Over the last few years Mozilla FireFox got most of it's money (85% according to their financial reports) from Google for making it the default search engine for a number of years. The contract was originally due to end in 2006 but it was extended until November 2008 and then again until November 2011.

Now here's the problem. The last time the contract was renewed Google Chrome browser didn't really exist but now Google Chrome is bigger than FireFox in users according to statcounter.

The contract just ran out and their has being zero news about the contract being renewed. I can't find any information anywhere that suggests it was renewed which is unusual as press releases for deals such as this are common.

We can safely presume it was renewed as it's still good for both companies and Google doesn't really want Bing becoming the default browser. However one has to assume that if it was renewed it must be for a lot less money due to it not being announced added to the fall of FireFox and the new dominance and growth of Google Chromes market share. Why would Google pump millions into FireFox when it's a competitor?

If FireFox are currently having trouble losing users to Google Chrome and being forced to release updates more frequently to keep up the fight then competing with a severely reduced budget will be a much bigger challenge and could potentially bring the downfall of FireFox even faster.



UPDATE 20th December 2011
Today Mozilla announced that they did a new three year deal with Google but they haven't disclosed the details. It was to be expected that a new deal would be done as it's still beneficial for both companies but I'd be interested to see for how much it was as FireFox isn't as big as it used to be so it would be hard for them to demand such a high price. Suppose we can find out in their end of year financial statement what that comes out.
 
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this sucks for firefox :( i love both of them and i hope the competition between them goes on for the betterment and not for destruction of each other :/
 
Interesting topic Mr Happy. And i agree with all points made. It also seems FF is slowly giving up trying to fix major issues like the memory leaks. Myself being a FF fan gets this quite often, (like 3/5 daily.) I only have like 6 tabs open and i'm using 300mb memory or more. I would use chrome but there's alot of things i don't like about it.

Example's being the tabs being forced to stay at the top i like them below my address bar not at the top where it takes longer to find what i want. I'm also not to keen on the plugin's it just doesn't appeal to me. Another thing i find is alot of sites i try in chrome break even WJunction doesn't work right for me.

So it will be really interesting to see what happens chrome may be the biggest but until they fix these issues i wont take the move.
 
Not to worried about the memory leaks issues or features as they can be improved if you have time and money. What I'm worried about is if these memory leaks or non features are due to income or funding issues and if not will they be in the future. Even with a few extra donations or a new contract from another search engine like Bing your not going to replace a huge 85% of your income. If Google do pull out or reduce the money Bing won't be forced into a bidding war. Yahoo are powered by Bing so they won't bid and others like Ask.com or Badu aren't big enough. Microsoft already have their own browser anyway with is IE so the price for a new contract would be extremely low.
 
I agree, but on the other hand... developments itself wont end when a final version of something is released... would it?
 
No because mozilla is not stupid.. If they lose google there is still bing which is taking over yahoo already... So they may lose "sum" which to them wont be much of a loss since google is a more used search engine..
 
FireFox is very handy for developers, they have lots of nice debugging plugins, and lots more "under the hood" settings compared to Chrome.
I, as a user, am willing to donate to the Mozilla Foundation.
 
The first time I used chrome, I didn't like it very much. After the major FF update that made it essentially look like chrome, I swapped to Chrome. I haven't looked back since. I ran into more 'freezing' and huge memory usage, compared to chrome. I'm running a clean PC with an SSD, no excuse for this excessive usage. :)
Soon it'll be an era where FF is over and Chrome/IE take over. Microsoft will always incorporate IE, Chrome will continue to be free to download. Most of my school computers have swapped to Chrome.
 
It's just a fuckin' web browser. Christ. Give it a rest.
I thought mozilla created their 'products' out of the 'goodness-of-their-hearts', not for-profit.

The whole "oh but you know, developers cost munies" is bullshit. It's a hyped up way of saying "they wanna make something to give away for free but its not to be nice - they're actually just greedy as fuck".

If they're making a free program FOR-PROFIT then fuck mozilla.
 
chrishdman87 said:
It's just a fuckin' web browser. Christ. Give it a rest.
I thought mozilla created their 'products' out of the 'goodness-of-their-hearts', not for-profit.

The whole "oh but you know, developers cost munies" is bullshit. It's a hyped up way of saying "they wanna make something to give away for free but its not to be nice - they're actually just greedy as fuck".

If they're making a free program FOR-PROFIT then fuck mozilla.
Click to expand...

Everyone has to eat. Employers have families.

And they could easily find a sponsor if they wanted.
 
I personally never liked Chrome for many reason including their design & function.
Firefox has many good add on & it also allow programmer to create some add on plugins..this also brings good money to the programmer.
Seems like Google want to get into every people Business..They got into tube site, social network,e-mail service,payment processor etc etc..Why can't they just be happy with 2-3 Service For me, they are hungry pig's.
After success launch of 4-5 product..Google may be started to think they can kick everyone out & rule on the web.
If they keep going competing everyone..sooner or later they will face shut down.

Lots of Memory usages is only negative part of Firefox..If they can fix it..they gonna over take Chrome again.
 
I doubt that Firefox is going to disappear, but they may have problems in terms of the points you have mentioned. I personally only use Chrome, so it's not a problem for me no matter what happens with Firefox.

But I've never particularly understood why Google favors Firefox rather than their own browser.
 
I got used to Firefox so much that it will be very hard for me to move on to Chrome.
I like Chrome it's fast and doesn't use as much memory as Firefox or other browsers, i know but still Firefox for me comes natural because i use it for a very long time and i know what i want from him and that is why it's a perfect browser for me.
I wouldn't want losing Firefox or Chrome they make it more easy for me to relax and enjoy the time i spend free time that i have on the internet and yes i still remember Internet Explorer and the crashes when i was visiting something interesting, remembering the hair i pulled from how angry it made me.
I hope Firefox hangs in there even though it will be very tough from now on since Chrome took over his place but it's better Chrome than Safari or Internet Explorer right ?
And @Mr Happy weren't you the one who always praised Google Chrome, why are you sad about Firefox losing, i really wonder about the reason you posting this and acting confused all of a sudden ?
 
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