I knew the "elephant in the room" section of the article was coming before I started reading... but then it wasn't even about the right thing! The other different, bigger, angrier, elephant in the room is about Brave being YACB (Yet Another Chromium Browser). A browser built on the Chromium project is riding on top of that elephant trying to tell it where to go.
I think Google created a "moat" in terms of hyperaccelerating browser development with disproportionate firepower that nobody else could keep up with. And one potential non-terrible use of AI might be diminishing that moat and with it Google's ability to steer the whole web into their ecosystem. So if you want to be an optimist maybe that's a silver lining that will grow with time.
It may be YACB, but that is precisely why it works for the author. Chromium browsers have the best compatibility because that is what is tested for. If it were any other way, then this post wouldn't exist.
Unfortunately, by switching to YACB, the user is effectively making Firefox less relevant.
So if you want it to be relevant, you actually do have to use it. Otherwise you can just as well give up and not care at all about the browser monopoly.
I was like you once. I still care - but Mozilla just insists on sabotaging themselves, and it's too far gone now. Honestly at this point I'm just waiting for Mozilla to implode, so something better can rise from its ashes.
I always try to parse this "Mozilla is doing bad" as I've been using Firefox for years and other than features I want (vertical tabs, firefox relay, and a few other minor things) I couldn't tell you the difference of Firefox now vs 5 years ago vs 10 years ago. And the "shooting yourself in the foot" things talked about are always something that pretty much all other browser companies do but 10 times worse.
I think the last major scandal was AI additions (cuz who is using AI these days? What an awful idea!) that you can now turn off with one click? Personally never saw the AI features presented to me once. Then the one before that I can remember was the Mr. Robot thing that was so long ago it's hard to remember what even happened. I think they installed a add-on that wasn't enabled and did absolutely nothing unless you went looking for it and specifically wanted it to do something? And then they removed it very soon after when nerds overreacted so hard that we're still talking about it 10+ years later?
Chrome: inability to block ads, new "cookie free" (nope they didn't get rid of cookies) ad tracking, monitoring people in incognito mode, the list would goes on for a long while. Brave: Crypto nonsense, all kinds of advertising for their crap everywhere unless you go through many hoops to turn it off. Firefox is one of the few pieces of software I can say hasn't enshitified itself to the point of using something else.
and gripe you have against Mozilla should be outweighed by looking at the other browsers but for some reason its not. People act like Mozilla is doing these awful things then switch to a browser doing far worse and say nothing.
I started using Phoenix at version 0.3 (compiling the port on my FreeBSD then-daily-driver) and still use Firefox (and Tor Browser) today. I'm not sure what problem(s) people have with it, but it works for me.
(I also use Safari on my Apple systems, to further diversify web browser usage.)
If you don’t care about browser diversity, and choose to use a Chrome-based browser, that’s part of the collective’s decision. There are literally billions of people just like you, which is why Chrome wins.
You’re trying to act put-upon, but you’re actually supporting the dominant monopoly side. Your apathy is winning, why do you still feel the need to comment? A bit of guilt or cognitive dissonance, perhaps?
If anyone is reading this and sees compatibility as their primary reason for staying with a Chromium browser: I have been using Firefox as my main browser for many years now, and I can count on one hand the number of times where I've been hit by compatibility issues.
The big one is anything to do with video calling — things often work but not as well, or you can voice call but not use video, or something like that. Most of the time the call works well enough, or I use a native app anyway, in which case this isn't a problem, but I suspect this is the thing people are most likely to run into in practice.
The other one is WebUSB, which is useful for certain tools that flash hardware (e.g. keyboards) from the browser. This is rarer, but I still have Chrome around so I can still use these tools. And mostly there's another option anyway, it's just that WebUSB makes things more convenient.
I have heard people complain about Cloudflare, but I've never noticed this. I suspect this is less to do with Chrome/Firefox, and more to do with privacy settings that Firefox makes more accessible. But again, I've never had an issue with Cloudflare myself, so I can't say much about this.
Other than that, I genuinely can't think of the last time I wanted to use a website but couldn't because of Firefox. And even in the above situations, it's rare that I actually run into issues, it's just something I'm aware of as a possible cause if something happens. Most of the time things work perfectly well.
Same but for Safari. I use it as my daily driver and rarely get issues related to unsupported APIs. Everything seems to work fine, the only issues I ever hit are related to the Apple VPN.
It would be the elephant in the room for both Brave and Vivaldi (though the author is not wrong that Vivaldi doesn't seem to to have captured the old Opera magic). The article is at least partially juxtaposing Brave against Firefox.
It's okay, soon everybody will switch to their own vibe-coded browsers, right?
(<a href="https://github.com/wilsonzlin/fastrender" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/wilsonzlin/fastrender this looks so dead...)
I regret to inform you that Mr. Kling and his browser have been pre-canceled on Mastodon due to his politics (support for DHH, Charlie Kirk, anti-DEI stances, etc.)
From what I can tell, Iceweasel is more or less a reskinned Firefox: there's some code changes to make it compatible with Debian's licensing guidelines, but it would be reasonable (in my opinion) to describe Iceweasel as 'Firefox for Debian'. And so are you also certain that the maintainers of Firefox comply with your requirements?
EDIT: Seems like they edited their comment instead of replying (kinda weird?), answering "yes" to my question. Perhaps I am a pessimist but I am doubtful that every single maintainer involved in Iceweasel complies with their requirements. And presumably this applies to more than just the browser: what OS are they using? What apps do they use? What phone do they have? What bank do they use? What car do they own? Etc. When you take such a hard stance against something over a refused pronoun PR (which btw was definitely chuddy of him), you nonetheless invite scrutiny against yourself, particularly when you say things like "You might be amoral, some of us give a fsck."
What I'm assuming is that 1attice is boycotting public statements, not actual impact. It's why JK Rowling is so hated but not Orson Scott Card: the latter is likely giving just as money money to objectionable causes but he's not being loud about it [anymore], whereas JK Rowling is being loud... very loud. And so buying Harry Potter merch becomes a litmus test for morality, but not buying Ender's Game merch. Alas.
Some people don't allow imperfection to stop them from achieving their goals to the best of their ability. Your takedown of Iceweasel completely misses the point.
> Your takedown of Iceweasel completely misses the point.
This is not a takedown of Iceweasel: it was merely the example that they provided. It could've been anything.
> Some people don't allow imperfection to stop them from achieving their goals to the best of their ability.
One could use this exact argument to explain one's continued use of, shills for, or even contributions to Ladybird, because what does the maintainer being a bit chuddy have to do with combating Chromium/Firefox's hegemony?
And let me be clear, the goal with these comments is not to convince 1attice to use Ladybird against their objections: the goal was to invite them to reflect on their boycott and question whether it was a proportionate response. But instead I got the usual moralistic response where I'm accused of being amoral for not [presumably] not engaging in the same boycott. Alas.
>One could use this exact argument to explain one's continued use of, shills for, or even contributions to Ladybird, because what does the maintainer being a bit chuddy have to do with combating Chromium/Firefox's hegemony?
Or, to your point, these arguments could count in favor of Firefox in opposition to Chromium.
Very true, though the suspicious mind seeking to evade Google's dominance will be naturally wary of then picking a browser that's kept afloat in-part by Google. I do correct my previous assertion though of a "Chromium/Firefox hegemony" since Firefox only seems to hold ~5% market share: <a href="https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/desktop/worldwide" rel="nofollow">https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/desktop/worl....
> because what does the maintainer being a bit chuddy have to do with combating Chromium/Firefox's hegemony?
Perhaps OP is more concerned with how humans interact with each other than Chromium/Firefox's hegemony. Perhaps combating the hegemony is only worthwhile to OP if the incumbent treats its users with equal respect.
OP described that they researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it. I assume this means looking for things like a CoC, and watching how maintainers respond to users.
When you point out that every person at Mozilla may not behave the same way, it misses OP's point. He's not interacting with the Mozilla community - he's interacting with Debian's Iceweasel community.
I don't know if you're amoral or not - that's not a judgment I'm prepared to make. I caution you not to confuse the word "amoral" (not caring about the morality - as it sounds you may not) with "immoral" (not being moral yourself.) I'm not sure it was an attack on your character.
That said, a thread that begins "Fair enough. What browser are you using?" and then devolves into an attack as to whether it's dependencies support OP's views does not appear to be made in good faith.
> Perhaps OP is more concerned with how humans interact with each other than Chromium/Firefox's hegemony.
Fair enough.
====
> Perhaps combating the hegemony is only worthwhile to OP if the incumbent treats its users with equal respect.
The issue arose from a pronoun PR, which I regard as disrespectful towards contributors. One can speculate whether that'll trickle down to the users, but I'd imagine most users being unaware of this drama going on behind the scenes. Then again it's a small project largely followed by people who care about the Chromium/Firefox thing so maybe not?
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> OP described that they researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it.
Did they? Where?
====
> He's not interacting with the Mozilla community - he's interacting with Debian's Iceweasel community.
> whether it's dependencies support OP's views
Okay, let's say that I do the same thing: I fork Ladybird and give it a new name (Ladybug) and a new icon. Maybe I swap out the IO library for whatever reason. Does that free Ladybug from upstream's drama? Can 1attice now safely use Ladybug knowing that it respects human rights because Ladybird is a mere dependency?
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> I'm not sure it was an attack on your character.
> then devolves into an attack
You're unsure whether their ad hominem was an attack on my character, but you are certain that me questioning their boycott was an attack? Huh?
> Okay, let's say that I do the same thing: I fork Ladybird and give it a new name (Ladybug) and a new icon. Maybe I swap out the IO library for whatever reason. Does that free Ladybug from upstream's drama? Can 1attice now safely use Ladybug knowing that it respects human rights because Ladybird is a mere dependency?
Once again, you seem to be missing the point. It's not a simply a matter of moral purity. OP is interested in projects where they and their friends feel welcome in the community: to submit bugs, to contribute, or just to use the tool. DHH's views on race (<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250925050154/https://world.hey.com/dhh/as-i-remember-london-e7d38e64" rel="nofollow">https://web.archive.org/web/20250925050154/https://world.hey...) - and pronouns - make that difficult for some people.
While I don't personally submit pull requests to change documentation which refers to users with male pronouns, I do always find it jarring and confusing when I come across gendered language in that context. I guess the best way to put it is that I find it "illogical" and so I double-take. In technical documentation, it seems sensible to reduce confusion through accurate terminology, politics aside. So, DHH's stance that using a non-gendered term for a userbase that consists of more than one gender is woke "politics", seems to me to be it's own form of virtue signaling - virtues which make me feel unwelcome contributing.
> You're unsure whether their ad hominem was an attack on my character, but you are certain that me questioning their boycott was an attack? Huh?
I don't think that saying someone "might be amoral" is an ad hominem, especially in the this context: in this thread you criticize "the usual moralistic response" in defense of "combating Chromium/Firefox's hegemony" - a technical goal. You may be thinking of the word immoral instead, which would certainly be an ad hominem attack.
> amoral: having or showing no concern about whether behavior is morally right or wrong
You went beyond "questioning their boycott" when you stated assumptions like this:
> > What I'm assuming is that 1attice is boycotting public statements, not actual impact.
When OP and others explained how they evaluate projects, you haven't demonstrated a willingness to genuinely understand them. It seems you are more interested in proving that they are illogical. But in fact it's OK to disagree and have different goals.
> I do always find it jarring and confusing when I come across gendered language in that context.
While I genuinely do not object to gender neutral language, I often find the opposite to be true: it's extremely obvious when gendered pronouns have been lazily replaced. For example, "If the Minister consults the Commission before they issue a direction, they must notify the Board before they take any further action." Who is "they" in this scenario? And is each "they" referring to the same entity? What this made-up example demonstrates is that, very often, switching to gender neutral language often requires you to rewrite and restructure the text, rather than merely find-and-replacing he/him/his with they/them/theirs. Though wrt to the specific Ladybird PR in question, it really was that simple.
Steel-manning the argument, I can understand a general aversion to updating language just for the sake of updating language: nothing is being added, clarified, or elaborated on. It's not like the section was rewritten to include a new feature and the rewrite used gender-neutral language. If anything, one could easily accuse the PR of being an attempt to pad a resume.
That being said, I do want to reiterate that Kling was being an absolute chud for rejecting the PR the way he did.
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> I don't think that saying someone "might be amoral" is an ad hominem
Ah, the "just asking questions" defence. Wonderful.
====
> You may be thinking of the word immoral instead, which would certainly be an ad hominem attack.
Fun fact, saying someone is without morals is also an ad hominem attack.
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> You went beyond "questioning their boycott" when you stated assumptions
No? Me stating an assumption based on demonstrated behaviour is part of questioning their boycott.
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> When OP and others explained how they evaluate projects
Okay, this is the second time you've referenced conversations that have not taken place within this thread, so let me remind you of the flow of the conversation with 1attice thus far:
> I'm excited for ladybird to reach alpha
> [flagged comment that said something approximating "I don't use browsers that don't respect human rights"]
> Fair enough. Which browser are you currently using?
> Iceweasel
> And you are certain that its maintainers comply with your requirements?
> Yes. [later edited to repeat the "yes" and state that I might be amoral]
> From what I can tell, Iceweasel is more or less a reskinned Firefox: there's some code changes to make it compatible with Debian's licensing guidelines, but it would be reasonable (in my opinion) to describe Iceweasel as 'Firefox for Debian'. And so are you also certain that the maintainers of Firefox comply with your requirements?
At no point during this exchange did they explain that they "researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it" or "explained how they evaluate projects" (both quoting you). In fact, prior to their comment editing, both of their answers to my questions were single-word responses. So once again I must insist that you actually show me these comments where they supposably said these things, because I cannot find these comments from 1attice anywhere in the comments or on their profile, so I'm starting to doubt their existence.
> Ah, the "just asking questions" defence. Wonderful.
The text you quoted does not lean on asking questions as a defense. For the third time, I'm pointing out that the word "amoral" is not a character judgment.
I'm also not sure where you're getting that interpretation from. In fact, in your last comment, you said you were only "questioning their boycott."
> Fun fact, saying someone is without morals is also an ad hominem attack.
I'm not sure how to be any more clear that that's "immoral" (without morals) and not "amoral" (uninterested in morals).
> At no point during this exchange did they explain that they "researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it" or "explained how they evaluate projects" (both quoting you).
"Yes" and "I have been in the scene for years, and I have researched and sourced carefully" was a clear reply to you asking if they had done their research. It may not be satisfactory to you, but the question was answered. (They actually previously explained more about their research but edited out.)
I don't think we're going to see eye to eye, but it was nice chatting with you.
The "just asking questions" defence is most exemplified by this South Park clip: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKsfJHZ9vXE" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKsfJHZ9vXE. But the concept is not confined to questions: it describes how attackers hedge their disparaging statements. "You might be amoral, some of us give a fsck" is so obviously an example of this that it feels asinine discussing it at all: it feels like trying to convince someone that "and" is a conjunction. I even fed the exchange into ChatGPT and asked what it thought "the 'just asking questions' defence" meant and it understood it without issue. I can even paste the output if you want. And let me be clear, I understand the distinction between amoral and immoral: it's still a personal attack. And I'm assuming the HN mods agree because their comment is still flagged.
Ladybird have a "no politics" stance by the looks of things, what that really means is kind of up to you. Here's an article about it further, I'm biased against it and so is this article so take that as you will:
In 2026, no politics usually means "we don't want you digging too deep into ours". Ask Ed Sheeran how well "no politics" works out.
You mean the guy whose concerts went on as planned, and the online slacktivists screaming literal baby murderer at him have already moved on to the next $thing?
Seems like Kling is a wee bit of a chud. The claim about human rights likely stems from the "trans rights are human rights" mantra and is likely is reference to this (<a href="https://github.com/SerenityOS/serenity/pull/6814" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/SerenityOS/serenity/pull/6814) where Kling accused a contributor of bringing "personal politics" to the project for changing one instance of "he" to "they" in a markdown file. Since then he has, for example, apparently gone on to complain about anti-white discrimination in the workplace (<a href="https://x.com/awesomekling/status/1874518295350837401" rel="nofollow">https://x.com/awesomekling/status/1874518295350837401).
For what it's worth, the perpetually-offended progressive has become an annoying stock character in our culture. At risk of falling for Poe's Law, the commentor on that PR who said "The denial of non-male users and/or developers is sufficient reason to not use SerenityOS" is a perfect example of this. Another more contemporary example would be the seething outrage over Last Ditch Bar's new mask-optional Saturdays.
Something weird happened with this comment. Someone throws a baseless accusation, I then go and research the issue. I link to the sources that I find, the comment gets 3 points.
The next day, it's already at -1. I've been observing this for quite some time.
I originally had an comment about how the creators did support human rights but then I did more reading. While Kling is trying to be neutral with respect to this particular project, his (personal) politics outside of the project would have placed him in the extreme far right a decade ago (by U.S. standards, so ever further right by European standards).
Can you give some examples of these "extreme far right" beliefs, by which I assume you must mean beliefs that are so extreme that something like only 1% of the most right wing parts of the population could believe them?
Chromium being open-source is a red herring here. The web is not an application, it is a protocol between clients and servers. Google has immense influence on both sides of that protocol, and regularly attempts to use that influence in an anticompetitive way. Chromium being open source just means you can fork the client, but that gives you essentially no influence over the web as a protocol; if Google wants to take the web in a direction that your fork doesn't agree with (e.g. adding new APIs that you don't want to support or getting rid of APIs that you do), then you're out of luck regardless of your ability to compile the code.
and? How does this all matter when you choose a web browser engine?
You can write your own, but you still have this problem.
So, this is not an argument against chromium at all.
I think they already answered this but their explanation simply bounced off you. When your market position and control over development is dominant you can steer the web in self-interested ways that hurt users and hurt the independence of the web as an ecosystem. That's a perfectly legitimate answer to your Q and it's basically stuff they already said the first time around.
You can't really replicate that unless you're a trillion dollar company that chooses software defaults on billions of devices and have the world's most visited website.
Main reason I keep using Brave is its "good enfough."
The CTO at my company recommended Brave in 2019; I figured why not and have found a compelling reason to change.
The "elephant in the room" paragraph actually is making me consider Vivaldi. Its still Chromium, so it will support all my plugins, and I use NextDNS so most of ads will be blocked anyway. And its not like its amazing, but I've just never heard anyone rave of a browser that was particularly efficent either.
WebKit-based is probably the next best alternative. I switched to Orion from Brave and have _mostly_ been pleased with it. (I do miss the Chrome DevTools but eventually I'll get used to these.)
glenstein · · focus · HN ↗
I think Google created a "moat" in terms of hyperaccelerating browser development with disproportionate firepower that nobody else could keep up with. And one potential non-terrible use of AI might be diminishing that moat and with it Google's ability to steer the whole web into their ecosystem. So if you want to be an optimist maybe that's a silver lining that will grow with time.
The_Rob · · focus · HN ↗
devilkin · · focus · HN ↗
So if you want it to be relevant, you actually do have to use it. Otherwise you can just as well give up and not care at all about the browser monopoly.
encom · · focus · HN ↗
A Phoenix, if you will...
ragequittah · · focus · HN ↗
I think the last major scandal was AI additions (cuz who is using AI these days? What an awful idea!) that you can now turn off with one click? Personally never saw the AI features presented to me once. Then the one before that I can remember was the Mr. Robot thing that was so long ago it's hard to remember what even happened. I think they installed a add-on that wasn't enabled and did absolutely nothing unless you went looking for it and specifically wanted it to do something? And then they removed it very soon after when nerds overreacted so hard that we're still talking about it 10+ years later?
Chrome: inability to block ads, new "cookie free" (nope they didn't get rid of cookies) ad tracking, monitoring people in incognito mode, the list would goes on for a long while. Brave: Crypto nonsense, all kinds of advertising for their crap everywhere unless you go through many hoops to turn it off. Firefox is one of the few pieces of software I can say hasn't enshitified itself to the point of using something else.
happymellon · · focus · HN ↗
To add to this, how do I turn off all the AI nagging crap in Chrome?
So it still seems like Firefox is the better option.
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throw0101a · · focus · HN ↗
I started using Phoenix at version 0.3 (compiling the port on my FreeBSD then-daily-driver) and still use Firefox (and Tor Browser) today. I'm not sure what problem(s) people have with it, but it works for me.
(I also use Safari on my Apple systems, to further diversify web browser usage.)
joquarky · · focus · HN ↗
I am apparently getting too old for whatever that threshold is these days.
antonvs · · focus · HN ↗
If you don’t care about browser diversity, and choose to use a Chrome-based browser, that’s part of the collective’s decision. There are literally billions of people just like you, which is why Chrome wins.
You’re trying to act put-upon, but you’re actually supporting the dominant monopoly side. Your apathy is winning, why do you still feel the need to comment? A bit of guilt or cognitive dissonance, perhaps?
joquarky · · focus · HN ↗
MrJohz · · focus · HN ↗
The big one is anything to do with video calling — things often work but not as well, or you can voice call but not use video, or something like that. Most of the time the call works well enough, or I use a native app anyway, in which case this isn't a problem, but I suspect this is the thing people are most likely to run into in practice.
The other one is WebUSB, which is useful for certain tools that flash hardware (e.g. keyboards) from the browser. This is rarer, but I still have Chrome around so I can still use these tools. And mostly there's another option anyway, it's just that WebUSB makes things more convenient.
I have heard people complain about Cloudflare, but I've never noticed this. I suspect this is less to do with Chrome/Firefox, and more to do with privacy settings that Firefox makes more accessible. But again, I've never had an issue with Cloudflare myself, so I can't say much about this.
Other than that, I genuinely can't think of the last time I wanted to use a website but couldn't because of Firefox. And even in the above situations, it's rare that I actually run into issues, it's just something I'm aware of as a possible cause if something happens. Most of the time things work perfectly well.
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joquarky · · focus · HN ↗
This is an anecdote without a denominator nor a representative sampling.
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mstaoru · · focus · HN ↗
(<a href="https://github.com/wilsonzlin/fastrender" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/wilsonzlin/fastrender this looks so dead...)
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Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
EDIT: Seems like they edited their comment instead of replying (kinda weird?), answering "yes" to my question. Perhaps I am a pessimist but I am doubtful that every single maintainer involved in Iceweasel complies with their requirements. And presumably this applies to more than just the browser: what OS are they using? What apps do they use? What phone do they have? What bank do they use? What car do they own? Etc. When you take such a hard stance against something over a refused pronoun PR (which btw was definitely chuddy of him), you nonetheless invite scrutiny against yourself, particularly when you say things like "You might be amoral, some of us give a fsck."
What I'm assuming is that 1attice is boycotting public statements, not actual impact. It's why JK Rowling is so hated but not Orson Scott Card: the latter is likely giving just as money money to objectionable causes but he's not being loud about it [anymore], whereas JK Rowling is being loud... very loud. And so buying Harry Potter merch becomes a litmus test for morality, but not buying Ender's Game merch. Alas.
radlad · · focus · HN ↗
Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
This is not a takedown of Iceweasel: it was merely the example that they provided. It could've been anything.
> Some people don't allow imperfection to stop them from achieving their goals to the best of their ability.
One could use this exact argument to explain one's continued use of, shills for, or even contributions to Ladybird, because what does the maintainer being a bit chuddy have to do with combating Chromium/Firefox's hegemony?
And let me be clear, the goal with these comments is not to convince 1attice to use Ladybird against their objections: the goal was to invite them to reflect on their boycott and question whether it was a proportionate response. But instead I got the usual moralistic response where I'm accused of being amoral for not [presumably] not engaging in the same boycott. Alas.
glenstein · · focus · HN ↗
Or, to your point, these arguments could count in favor of Firefox in opposition to Chromium.
Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
radlad · · focus · HN ↗
Perhaps OP is more concerned with how humans interact with each other than Chromium/Firefox's hegemony. Perhaps combating the hegemony is only worthwhile to OP if the incumbent treats its users with equal respect.
OP described that they researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it. I assume this means looking for things like a CoC, and watching how maintainers respond to users.
When you point out that every person at Mozilla may not behave the same way, it misses OP's point. He's not interacting with the Mozilla community - he's interacting with Debian's Iceweasel community.
I don't know if you're amoral or not - that's not a judgment I'm prepared to make. I caution you not to confuse the word "amoral" (not caring about the morality - as it sounds you may not) with "immoral" (not being moral yourself.) I'm not sure it was an attack on your character.
That said, a thread that begins "Fair enough. What browser are you using?" and then devolves into an attack as to whether it's dependencies support OP's views does not appear to be made in good faith.
Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
Fair enough.
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> Perhaps combating the hegemony is only worthwhile to OP if the incumbent treats its users with equal respect.
The issue arose from a pronoun PR, which I regard as disrespectful towards contributors. One can speculate whether that'll trickle down to the users, but I'd imagine most users being unaware of this drama going on behind the scenes. Then again it's a small project largely followed by people who care about the Chromium/Firefox thing so maybe not?
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> OP described that they researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it.
Did they? Where?
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> He's not interacting with the Mozilla community - he's interacting with Debian's Iceweasel community.
> whether it's dependencies support OP's views
Okay, let's say that I do the same thing: I fork Ladybird and give it a new name (Ladybug) and a new icon. Maybe I swap out the IO library for whatever reason. Does that free Ladybug from upstream's drama? Can 1attice now safely use Ladybug knowing that it respects human rights because Ladybird is a mere dependency?
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> I'm not sure it was an attack on your character.
> then devolves into an attack
You're unsure whether their ad hominem was an attack on my character, but you are certain that me questioning their boycott was an attack? Huh?
radlad · · focus · HN ↗
Once again, you seem to be missing the point. It's not a simply a matter of moral purity. OP is interested in projects where they and their friends feel welcome in the community: to submit bugs, to contribute, or just to use the tool. DHH's views on race (<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250925050154/https://world.hey.com/dhh/as-i-remember-london-e7d38e64" rel="nofollow">https://web.archive.org/web/20250925050154/https://world.hey...) - and pronouns - make that difficult for some people.
While I don't personally submit pull requests to change documentation which refers to users with male pronouns, I do always find it jarring and confusing when I come across gendered language in that context. I guess the best way to put it is that I find it "illogical" and so I double-take. In technical documentation, it seems sensible to reduce confusion through accurate terminology, politics aside. So, DHH's stance that using a non-gendered term for a userbase that consists of more than one gender is woke "politics", seems to me to be it's own form of virtue signaling - virtues which make me feel unwelcome contributing.
> You're unsure whether their ad hominem was an attack on my character, but you are certain that me questioning their boycott was an attack? Huh?
I don't think that saying someone "might be amoral" is an ad hominem, especially in the this context: in this thread you criticize "the usual moralistic response" in defense of "combating Chromium/Firefox's hegemony" - a technical goal. You may be thinking of the word immoral instead, which would certainly be an ad hominem attack.
> amoral: having or showing no concern about whether behavior is morally right or wrong
You went beyond "questioning their boycott" when you stated assumptions like this:
> > What I'm assuming is that 1attice is boycotting public statements, not actual impact.
When OP and others explained how they evaluate projects, you haven't demonstrated a willingness to genuinely understand them. It seems you are more interested in proving that they are illogical. But in fact it's OK to disagree and have different goals.
Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
While I genuinely do not object to gender neutral language, I often find the opposite to be true: it's extremely obvious when gendered pronouns have been lazily replaced. For example, "If the Minister consults the Commission before they issue a direction, they must notify the Board before they take any further action." Who is "they" in this scenario? And is each "they" referring to the same entity? What this made-up example demonstrates is that, very often, switching to gender neutral language often requires you to rewrite and restructure the text, rather than merely find-and-replacing he/him/his with they/them/theirs. Though wrt to the specific Ladybird PR in question, it really was that simple.
Steel-manning the argument, I can understand a general aversion to updating language just for the sake of updating language: nothing is being added, clarified, or elaborated on. It's not like the section was rewritten to include a new feature and the rewrite used gender-neutral language. If anything, one could easily accuse the PR of being an attempt to pad a resume.
That being said, I do want to reiterate that Kling was being an absolute chud for rejecting the PR the way he did.
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> I don't think that saying someone "might be amoral" is an ad hominem
Ah, the "just asking questions" defence. Wonderful.
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> You may be thinking of the word immoral instead, which would certainly be an ad hominem attack.
Fun fact, saying someone is without morals is also an ad hominem attack.
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> You went beyond "questioning their boycott" when you stated assumptions
No? Me stating an assumption based on demonstrated behaviour is part of questioning their boycott.
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> When OP and others explained how they evaluate projects
Okay, this is the second time you've referenced conversations that have not taken place within this thread, so let me remind you of the flow of the conversation with 1attice thus far:
> I'm excited for ladybird to reach alpha
> [flagged comment that said something approximating "I don't use browsers that don't respect human rights"]
> Fair enough. Which browser are you currently using?
> Iceweasel
> And you are certain that its maintainers comply with your requirements?
> Yes. [later edited to repeat the "yes" and state that I might be amoral]
> From what I can tell, Iceweasel is more or less a reskinned Firefox: there's some code changes to make it compatible with Debian's licensing guidelines, but it would be reasonable (in my opinion) to describe Iceweasel as 'Firefox for Debian'. And so are you also certain that the maintainers of Firefox comply with your requirements?
At no point during this exchange did they explain that they "researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it" or "explained how they evaluate projects" (both quoting you). In fact, prior to their comment editing, both of their answers to my questions were single-word responses. So once again I must insist that you actually show me these comments where they supposably said these things, because I cannot find these comments from 1attice anywhere in the comments or on their profile, so I'm starting to doubt their existence.
radlad · · focus · HN ↗
The text you quoted does not lean on asking questions as a defense. For the third time, I'm pointing out that the word "amoral" is not a character judgment.
I'm also not sure where you're getting that interpretation from. In fact, in your last comment, you said you were only "questioning their boycott."
> Fun fact, saying someone is without morals is also an ad hominem attack.
I'm not sure how to be any more clear that that's "immoral" (without morals) and not "amoral" (uninterested in morals).
> At no point during this exchange did they explain that they "researched the Iceweasel project before choosing it" or "explained how they evaluate projects" (both quoting you).
"Yes" and "I have been in the scene for years, and I have researched and sourced carefully" was a clear reply to you asking if they had done their research. It may not be satisfactory to you, but the question was answered. (They actually previously explained more about their research but edited out.)
I don't think we're going to see eye to eye, but it was nice chatting with you.
Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
brewdad · · focus · HN ↗
oblio · · focus · HN ↗
bodge5000 · · focus · HN ↗
<a href="https://kvibber.com/reviews/software/ladybird-inclusivity/" rel="nofollow">https://kvibber.com/reviews/software/ladybird-inclusivity/
Also I'm seeing comments suggesting that the lead behind it, Andreas Kling, is quite openly on the DHH side of things
brewdad · · focus · HN ↗
veeti · · focus · HN ↗
glenstein · · focus · HN ↗
Defletter · · focus · HN ↗
For what it's worth, the perpetually-offended progressive has become an annoying stock character in our culture. At risk of falling for Poe's Law, the commentor on that PR who said "The denial of non-male users and/or developers is sufficient reason to not use SerenityOS" is a perfect example of this. Another more contemporary example would be the seething outrage over Last Ditch Bar's new mask-optional Saturdays.
kbelder · · focus · HN ↗
Wow, hadn't heard of that dustup. People are crazy. I guess they always have been, but... wow.
[deleted] · · focus · HN ↗
[deleted]
efilife · · focus · HN ↗
Ok, I researched this. A PR that changed one word in a string - he to they was rejected 5 years ago (first and only PR of that person)
<a href="https://kvibber.com/reviews/software/ladybird-inclusivity/" rel="nofollow">https://kvibber.com/reviews/software/ladybird-inclusivity/
<a href="https://lunduke.locals.com/post/5823666/ladybird-web-browser-developer-attacked-by-unhinged-dishonest-activists" rel="nofollow">https://lunduke.locals.com/post/5823666/ladybird-web-browser...
<a href="https://media3.locals.com/images/posts/2024-07-03/102127/102127_l23acktsu7bxylp_custom.jpeg" rel="nofollow">https://media3.locals.com/images/posts/2024-07-03/102127/102...
Is this the human rights issue you were talking about or did I miss something?
efilife · · focus · HN ↗
The next day, it's already at -1. I've been observing this for quite some time.
gamblor956 · · focus · HN ↗
baggy_trough · · focus · HN ↗
philipallstar · · focus · HN ↗
You can give away all the insanely expensive base software to build a browser and you'll still get blamed for not encouraging enough competition.
eukara · · focus · HN ↗
kibwen · · focus · HN ↗
philipallstar · · focus · HN ↗
ahartmetz · · focus · HN ↗
philipallstar · · focus · HN ↗
throw0101a · · focus · HN ↗
How many organizations and individuals use, and depend on, those services for their livelihood?
bmacho · · focus · HN ↗
It can kill or force technologies.
feelamee · · focus · HN ↗
glenstein · · focus · HN ↗
You can't really replicate that unless you're a trillion dollar company that chooses software defaults on billions of devices and have the world's most visited website.
glenstein · · focus · HN ↗
AbstractH24 · · focus · HN ↗
The CTO at my company recommended Brave in 2019; I figured why not and have found a compelling reason to change.
The "elephant in the room" paragraph actually is making me consider Vivaldi. Its still Chromium, so it will support all my plugins, and I use NextDNS so most of ads will be blocked anyway. And its not like its amazing, but I've just never heard anyone rave of a browser that was particularly efficent either.
feelamee · · focus · HN ↗
billbrown · · focus · HN ↗
<a href="https://orionbrowser.com/" rel="nofollow">https://orionbrowser.com/