Comment by godelski
14 hours ago
I hope people remember this when advocating for chromium. Just because it is open source doesn't mean they don't control it. We need to start the long process of hard forking now or turn to alternatives like Firefox as a new foundation.
> Google simply regrets android being open source.
Android wouldn't be what it is if it wasn't open source. With all the work from outside Google. The same is true chrome.
But they won't learn that on their own. They are breaking the deals. So we move. We force their hand
> But they won't learn that on their own
I think they're fully aware of this. They just don't care, because the goal of "get market share super high" has been reached, so now they have no need for it to continue being open.
I don't disagree about what that means we should do; I just don't think we should assume they're being naive here. It's like writing a program to play chess; you should select your move assuming the opponent is smart and will make the optimal counterplay rather than assuming weakness, and then if they end up being less smart than that, you're still in a good place.
Tbh I don't think fighting open source is Google's best play. I think it is in their own best interest to keep it fully open. It is free labor by those who are most passionate. It gives strong signals at what people want, this direction you develop. It strengthens security as more people try to test it. It means people work on forks rather than alternatives. All this is true even with a monopolistic market share.
So yes, I do think they are being naïve. The stance is myopic. It is only a good move in the short term, and barely even that. It is under the false belief that we operate in a zero sum game.
Most successful open source projects have devs being paid by big corporations, including Linux itself, which only really took off in the 2000's when companies like IBM started caring.
Also in the last century most software was commercial, and thanks to business friendly licenses we are back to demos, PD, Shareware and co, only with new names for a younger generation.
Google will do just fine.
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Google learned that it's exactly not in in their best interest when they lost their court case against Epic a few years ago which is why they are shifting focus away from open source and moving towards Apple's walled garden approach. If they had locked down their platform similarly as Apple did, Epic would probably have lost it's case for similar reasons.
Granted, we know Android would not be where it is today without open source contributions.
I think this is true, but I also believe the original people who built it are not the people in charge now.
Like most projects, anyone that thinks Linux or Steam will stay as they are when the generation that started it all is gone, is in for a surprise.
We haven't had antitrust enforcement for 25 years. It's high time we did.
Google needs to be broken up.
Its still crazy to me that a judge effectively said "yes you're a monopoly, but it's too hard to break you up so we won't bother"... I'm being glib, but only slightly.
MS was never broken up.
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Hard forking doesn't solve the problem of closed source.
If the goal of a hard fork is "the community will invest equal resources that Google does today" then you wildly underestimate how many engineers work on Chrome.
Not denying than many engineers work on Chrome just wondering how many of them work on Chrome features that are anti pattern, reducing privacy, improving information collection or tracking or against users interest in broad.
You can just look at the commit stream and see for yourself. Despite community pearl-clutching, 99% of the work is just good old fashioned software engineering.
Can anyone actually share 1 - 3 examples where a hard fork of a living os project has actually succeeded ?
If AMZN couldnt make their fire whatever it was called fork of Android really grow, what chance has the community got ?
The big ones that come to mind that were not already mentioned are MySQL => MariaDB, XFree86 => X.org.
OwnCloud -> Nextcloud, OpenOffice -> LibreOffice, Elasicsearch -> OpenSearch, privacyIDEA -> eduMFA
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>wildly underestimate how many engineers work on Chrome.
It is completely insane how many people work on Chrome. It seems like it is time to deprecate web browsers and do something different. Like you get a frame-buffer to draw on with something like a wasm vm. Web pages get replaced by programs (which they essentially are anyway). Get rid of 99.9% of the cruft that has accumulated over the decades in browsers. If you want to have some of that cruft, that is a library you have to send.
Or go the other way and make web pages not programs at all, like they originally were. Unfortunately, just communicating information isn't cool, doesn't monetize, and certainly doesn't get clicks.
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> Like you get a frame-buffer to draw on with something like a wasm vm. Web pages get replaced by programs (which they essentially are anyway).
The biggest thing standing in the way of this is actually Apple, since they don't allow competing browser engines or equivalent so you can't make something like this for iOS whatsoever.
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But the open source project wouldn’t need to invest as much as Google does. There are all kinds of features and things they are working on that the general public really does not care about.
> But the open source project wouldn’t need to invest as much as Google does.
Not at first. Yet over time the work increases as one must differ more and more from Chrome. I believe that's why so many forks are giving up on Manifest V2.
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The bigger problem is wasting developer effort contributing to Google's platform. The real secret behind Android being "open" (sorta) is that while almost nobody runs AOSP, Google has tricked a bunch of fools into working on Android forks instead of building a real competitor.
Playing at their table is a losing game, the house always wins.
Windows only isn't still 90% market share because of Wine, then Proton.
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The developer effort is not wasted because it's open source. Anyone can fork it at any time. None of it can be thrown away from humanity, wasting it.
The reason why no one runs AOSP is because the phone market rewards differentiation. Each phone manufacture wants to build their own experience and building on top of AOSP is how they do so.
Is it really a losing game? Building a new OS from scratch is not worth it. Why throw away an entire app catalog for your device? Consumers want access to existing app catalogs when buying a phone. If anything is a losing game it's building a new mobile operating system over forking Android as a base.
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but perhaps we dont need several gigabytes compressed code to have a browser. perhaps what google have been doing is an utter abomination?
This is cool until Google doesn't load in your free browser.
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> Android wouldn't be what it is if it wasn't open source.
Yes, and now that they've achieved market saturation, it's time to pull up the ladder.
Thanks for all the free work, suckers!
Don't worry, we will fork and just repeat the pattern with new names! See you next time!
GNU generation is over 50 nowadays, and newer don't really get open source as we used to.
I mean, FOSDEM full of Apple laptops on the corridors, the message was really lost.
I would say its even more proactive than support other projects. It is becoming clearer that every single technically competent member of the friends or family is now required to educate and proactively change devices.
Remember this upcoming Christmas that the ye oldie tradition of fixing PCs clearing awful exploiting phone apps (and cancelling subscriptions) should also include the "fix my browser" again, instead of Internet Explorer being replaced by Chrome, our collective duties is to replace Chrome with Firefox, plus its useful extensions to block ads and improve the web experience removing trackers etc.
Your call to arms today is to ensure all your tech colleagues join the movement, and then we can see Google's management views on "market growth"; they forget they made Chrome, we sold it - its our fault we forgot the "infinite growth of shareholder value"...
What's the licensing on AOSP? Everything I look for points to Google-owned things. Is it a GPL/similar that Google is actually legally required to share its changes?
> or turn to alternatives like Firefox as a new foundation.
With the way Firefox is heading, that might not be the best idea. Nowadays Mozilla seem more focused on riding the AI-hype wave than actually making an excellent browser people want to actually use.
Is Firefox or Mozilla perfect? Heck no. But we're not comparing Mozilla against pre-IBM Red Hat or Ben & Jerry's or whatever your concept of the ideal corporate citizen is. We're comparing Mozilla against Google. That's a very low bar that Mozilla clears with ease, especially if you're criteria includes shoving AI down your throat.
I'm not sure Mozilla clears it. Zen or Librewolf or PaleMoon clears it.
Firefox is no longer part of most browser compatibility matrices, what ease?
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Either way we're still stuck with it.
Mozilla definitely wastes a bunch of money building features I don’t want. But underneath it all, Firefox is still an excellent web browser. You just occasionally have to disable “pocket” or “gadgets” or something.
It is sad to see Firefox riding various hype trains over the years, but I can't really blame them. Miss the wrong train, and you fall behind and may not be able to catch up. Miss the train to nowhere, and you are only wasting resources.
As for the excellent browser that people want, that raises the question of what people want. There are likely as many answers as people.
I don't understand this - what is wrong with Firefox these days? It does everything I need, and very few things I don't want.
Very puzzled why there isn't more love for Firefox, even on HN.
Yeah. It’s a tough balance to achieve but that’s the situation we’re in right now so Mozilla really ought to step up (and I totally wish they would).
My biggest pain point at the moment (entirely subjective mind you) is not even the AI nonsense, but how disjointed and alien the Firefox UX and general feel is to Apple platforms (what I use, at the moment). I don’t want Firefox to mirror Safari 1:1 but I do want the Firefox UI and UX to feel polished, well thought out and thoroughly in line with system HIG specs—given that I spend a lot of time in a browser, it shouldn’t feel like a stranger in a strange land amidst my other desktop applications.
Aggressive UI improvements would go a long way to restore some faith in the incandescent fox‘ mission—at least for me.
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Mozilla gets 100M a year from Google ??? No fucking way they are biting the hand that feeds.
Closer to 500M, actually.
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It's not really a "both sides" thing given the scale difference between what Google is up to and that.
No one is forcing Mozilla’s hand (afaik) and no one is actually thinking “if Firefox had a chatbot that might convince me to move over”. Youre right that it is not a “both sides” thing, its a “Mozilla thing”. Through and through.
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Where is the form, forum or spot in general where one can tell Mozilla?
The next board meeting, after buying at least 51% of the shares.
> or turn to alternatives like Firefox
Implying I ever left Firefox in the first place.
Google is starting to turn into early 2000s / late 90s Oracle.
How?
The “we” in your post is interesting to me. Who do you mean? Individuals?
> advocating for chromium.
Advocating for chromium to do what?
> So we move. We force their hand
What do you have in mind?
> We need to start the long process of hard forking now or turn to alternatives like Firefox as a new foundation.
[dead]
oh yes sure. just like we can shift the population into installing Debian into their machines so we also deter M$ and Apple abuse /s
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I'm reading your comment on Firefox. You can probably read mine and write a reply on it too!
That's crazy! I'm commenting from Firefox! What a crazy world! How is this even possible?!
Donate to Ladybird https://ladybird.org/
Handing even a slight control over the web to an all-out white replacement theorist is somehow even worse than the status quo. Ladybird is run by the kind of person I'd never want to financially contribute to.
- https://nitter.example/awesomekling/status/19693500085383702... (archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250920103645/https://twitter.c...)
- https://nitter.example/awesomekling/status/18745182953508374... (archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250101180923/https://twitter.c...)
- https://nitter.example/awesomekling/status/19712877382689095... (archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250925185636/https://twitter.c...)
- https://nitter.example/awesomekling/status/19671787088520972... (archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250914104847/https://twitter.c...)
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They have their own problems. They may be "open source", but they don't accept contributions. I'm skeptical it will ever become more than a hobby project.
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It's on BSD license, Google or someone else can again Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.
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Well, it is time to realise that GPL and similar variants, are better in the long term. I like MIT too, but GPL worked so much better for the linux kernel. Google and others abuse the ecosystem of open source contributors here.
You mean the Linux kernel that the GrapheneOS project has to request every update for and then has to wait up to weeks to get a Google Drive link?
The GPL is worth nothing if nobody is enforcing it aggressively.
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LOL "start" using Firefox. I've been using Firefox for half a decade. There's zero I miss about Chrome.
Rather than being smug, I’ll say awesome! The best time to start using Firefox is yesterday. The second best time is now.
IOW:
Don’t threaten to stop using Google Chrome if they do one more evil thing. Start now.
Some of us have been using it for two decades more or less.
LOL half a decade.
I've been using it for more than 20 years.
I don't know why either of use loled though
LOL, I've been using it since Netscape Navigator 3.0 Gold, via Mozilla M3 (SeaMonkey tech preview), Phoenix, Firebird, and then finally Firefox :D
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I've been using it since the time it was called Netscape Navigator. Just sayin'
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There are already several different forks of Chromium and they are able to make their own decisions on points where they want to differentiate from upstream or other browsers in the market.
> Just because it is open source doesn't mean they don't control it
Just point out how that hurts security or privacy and we’re with you!
Ahem. Ladybird.
Who's we?
It's sad we lost ChromeOS. They got Linux, they got open source, they didn't make so so so many unforced errors.
Now that the chromebooks are also Android, it feels like the slide is only going to grow ever more fearsome.