Comment by kick
6 years ago
Firefox should definitely be used, but donating to Mozilla is a mistake. They waste a lot of it, their executive compensation rates are way too high (especially given that MoCo just laid off employees), and Mozilla still hasn't kept up with promises they gave years ago (that Pocket is still proprietary being a notable and depressing example).
Donate to smaller developers of software you use, it'll go a lot further, and they'll probably put it to better use!
Donations go to Mozilla "the non-profit organization" rather than Mozilla "the corporation".
Mozilla (the corporation) has the typical/bad corporate structures and ridiculous executive compensations. Mozilla (the corporation) had the layoffs. Mozilla (the corporation) bought Pocket with money that comes from deals with search engines.
That being said, though...
> Donate to smaller developers of software you use, it'll go a lot further, and they'll probably put it to better use!
... is still a great point.
(Updated this because "Mozilla, Org" and "Mozilla, Inc" were inaccurate)
I think the Mozilla Foundation is starting to look a lot like a sinecure employer for friends of friends in the non-profit biz.
Here are a few seemingly similar titles listed on their leadership page[0]:
[0]https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/about/leadership/
The Mozilla Foundation controls and owns the Mozilla Corporation, and the executive structure looks more or less the same. Baker's compensation has been inversely tied with performance, and she runs both.
Owns, yes. That is radically different from "funds", though.
Not going to dispute anything about executive structure or Baker's compensation and (mis)management, but a lot of people here are acting like donations either go directly to the corporation or funnel to it through the actual recipient of the donations, but there isn't really any evidence being presented.
> Baker's compensation has been inversely tied with performance
You've mentioned this twice in the thread now. "Inversely tied" is quite a strong and unusual claim for compensation. Care to prove it?
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That still doesn't answer why should I donate to Mozilla the non-profit? What do they do with my donations? According to another post they don't use them to fund Firefox or presumably any project run by the corporation side.
As I see it if I wanted my donations to go to political or other activism there's more direct and better organizations to donate to with less middle management involved.
> According to another post
Respectfully, HN comments aren't a great primary source. Here are some places to start your research:
https://donate.mozilla.org/en-US/faq/
https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/about/public-records/
https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2018/mozilla-fdn-201...
https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/
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> their executive compensation rates are way too high
Just because they're a non-profit doesn't mean execs should be paid far below market rates.
Mozilla engineers typically accept a salary that is below market rates.
Recently they have been increasing salaries to be more competitive.
I agree, I never understood that argument. We have a fairly large and wonderful kids hospital that looks for donations and some of my friends said they wouldn't donate because their CEO makes 500k and he should donate his money instead.
I had to explain you want to recruit great talent, and that 500k is less than he could make some place else.
Right. What people actually want is some form of income equality, which would bring executive level salaries in line with their actual worth. You're not going to achieve that by starving non-profits of executive talent in the meantime.
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The Mozilla Corporation laid off like 70 employees the other day, and Baker's compensation has been inversely tied to the performance of Mozilla.
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You're assuming the $500k guy is great talent.
Our local YMCA pays the Executive Director $400k/year. The child care workers make $11.50/hr + free membership. (ie. minimum wage) The Y is great, but I'm not donating anything to them.
Do you care how Apple pays its executives when you shell out 3-4k on their laptops or 1-2k on their phones? The OP just said that Firefox is a great piece of software available for free, and they deserve to be compensated (in form of donation). Now, I'm totally on board with you that they waste money, that's not even debatable.
Also, Mozilla made donations to political entities in the past
Which ones? Eich donated like $1000 to a political group that (I would hope) most of us disagree with, but Eich != Mozilla, and he was removed because of the backlash
I'm a Firefox user but I'm doubtful about donating to the Mozilla Foundation.
They at least endorse some really far-out organizations on the Mozilla Foundation homepage[0], such as Riseup Networks.
[0] https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/?utm_source=www.mozilla.or...
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RiseUp, from their about-us page: https://riseup.net/pl/about-us Riseup’s Purpose.
The Riseup Collective is an autonomous body based in Seattle with collective members world wide. Our purpose is to aid in the creation of a free society, a world with freedom from want and freedom of expression, a world without oppression or hierarchy, where power is shared equally. We do this by providing communication and computer resources to allies engaged in struggles against capitalism and other forms of oppression
>> We do this by providing communication and computer resources to allies engaged in struggles against capitalism and other forms of oppression
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As long as they keep Firefox available they can waste my money as much as they want. Why should they owe me anything? I am taking their browser.
Better yet, donate to Brave who doesn't share the same conflict of interest as Mozilla does with Google, as Google is Mozilla's #1 source of income. Best of all you get a browser just as fast, if not faster than Chrome because it's Chrome without all the junk.
But I don't want to participate in dodgy cryptocurrency scams.
While Brave not taking the "Search deal with Google" route is commendable, you shouldn't donate to it, either.
Venture-funded for-profit startups don't need donations, and again, donations will be more heavily felt by the people maintaining the software you use every day that isn't created by behemoths.
> Firefox should definitely be used, but donating to Mozilla is a mistake.
These seem at odds with each other. If you want Firefox to be used, how do you suggest its development be paid for?
They're already getting more than enough to fund development with the Google deal, which they've shown no willingness to let up on, despite it seriously compromising user privacy. Donating to Mozilla at this point is just encouraging organizational bloat.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree (which is fine!). I'd rather continue donating to them to show there are funding sources outside of advertising, which is a business model I despise.
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Donations are not used for Firefox development -- they go to the Foundation, not the Corporation.