Mozilla drops Yahoo!

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Daikun
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Mozilla drops Yahoo!

Unread post by Daikun » 2017-11-15, 20:57

A few years ago, Mozilla partnered with Yahoo! after their contract with Google expired.

Well, now Mozilla has dropped out of the deal.

mrmivo

Re: Mozilla drops Yahoo!

Unread post by mrmivo » 2017-11-16, 06:17

I feel it's a really short-sighted decision on Mozilla's part. Chrome has taken over most of Firefox's marketshare, and continues to diminish it, so it seems strategically unwise to expose their remaining users to Google's search engine and the Chrome advertisements/popups that appear on the search results.

Reading their reasoning ...
"We exercised our contractual right to terminate our agreement with Yahoo! based on a number of factors including doing what’s best for our brand, our effort to provide quality web search, and the broader content experience for our users."
... pretty much gives me the impression that it's solely about securing the money while they are still relevant enough to make it attractive for Google to pay. This year, Google paid 3 billion USD to Apple so that Apple would continue using Google as the default search engine in Safari, so this must have been rather lucrative for Mozilla. It fosters more homogeneity instead of diversity. Google does not provide so much "quality web search" as it provides filtered, tailored to the user, advertisement-influenced results, and most users are blissfully unaware of the fact that they get tweaked results that someone else thinks they should see and believes are best for them. It's anything but "best for the brand", nor arguably for the user (from my perspective, but I admit this is pretty subjective), though it is good for Google. It's a very sound decision on Google's part to pay for this.

It's a shame that Mozilla continues to propel itself into insignificance. I still prefer Firefox to Chrome because so far it isn't as opaque as Chrome, but I wonder how long that will last, seeing that they are willing to herd their users right into the maw of their biggest competitor if the price is right. Well, if "competitor" is the right word anymore; the argument can be made that from a certain perspective Mozilla essentially sold out to Google.

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