Started running a homeserver recently, trying to get non-techy friends to join, can confirm this is difficult (the main one right now being people using old software on their phones, one friend was running iOS 14 for crying out loud)

Once set up I find it OK as a user

This story marks the loss of another revenue stream for Mozilla. Their business is increasingly reliant on Google’s search deal for money, and if that money stops, they’ll have to face that same reckoning. For example, they won’t be able to afford paying their CEO millions of dollars a year any more.

I think they should start repositioning themselves now as an activist organisation that is fighting corporate interests trying to control the internet. If they can do that, I think a lot of people would pay to use Firefox

Enough internet users are familiar with the adage “if a product is free, you are the product”, through personal experience

I’d be OK with paying for Firefox if it meant that it was stripped of all association with advertisers. And presumably, if Mozilla were freed from that association, they’d be able to make a stronger case for how they’re protecting a free internet

Mozilla should fire their non-technical staff, strongly make the case for how they’re fighting for a free and open internet, and use a subscription model for Firefox to pay the bills