Technology
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Not so easy. There is never a guarantee of ethical behavior, regardless of whether we are talking about FOSS or a company. Naturally it cannot be excluded that Vivaldi may one day move into unethical practices, but this, in view of the history of Jon von Tetzchner and his cooperative that is Vivaldi, is highly unlikely. Adding the activism right against these practices in which he is involved. There are quite a few small software companies that have been in the market for a long time, with proprietary products, more ethical than some others with FOSS products. A good example a two brothers, which with own money in their spare time (they are working as electricians in their own workshop), have created a page with online tools (office tools, graphics and a lot of others) free to use (they accept donations), without account needed, anonimous (the documents a saved locally in html format) PWA. It's freeware, the office suite is also downloadable. With the shortest and best TOS and PP I have ever seen. Apart of this, a fast and friendly user support. Firefox certainly isn't the worse and I use it as second browser for occasional use, apart from the French browser UR. But I trust more in browsers from european compañies than of those from US companies, because the privacy laws in the CE are a lot better than those form US, where they even don't exists or only poorly. Ethic depends only of the Dev or company of a product, not of the license it has. The ethic of a product youu can se in the conditions of the use and how they treat your data. (read those from Firefox, maybe you'll have a surprise)
You can't guarantee ethical behavior, but not having a conflict of interest is a prerequisite for it. Commercial software has an inherent conflict of interest that doesn't exist in FOSS environment. Companies either have to make profit or they perish, this is not the case for FOSS. Ethics depend on being able to ensure that the incentives of the developers align with the incentives of the users. This is not possible to do with close source software in the long run.
It is not entirely correct, also FOSS devs may have commercial interests, for example when the application, such as a browser or a VPN requires an infrastructure, such as servers.
The lack of commercial interest is only applicable to apps that do not require it, for example system tools or graphical applications. They can also be self-hosted, but this implies two possibilities, either having your own server or having to trust an external server, with which we are in the same, of commercial interests.
It is more about the question of how this application creates its income, which can be directly such as having to pay for it, using ads, or tracking user activities to sell it to third parties. The former is acceptable, the latter is not.
It is often unavoidable to use proprietary soft on our PC (some professional apps, official administrative apps, games, or in general in apps that do not have a decent FOSS alternative). For this reason, the most important thing to have a verifiable security of the software and this can also be given as in FOSS.
The OpenSource system is not automatically synonymous with security and privacy, the reason for its existence is not this and it is only related to the development and the possibilities of adaptation and sharing. But the interests behind can be the same as in proprietary soft. For this reason it can be dangerous to globalize with FOSS = security and privacy, with this we can get a very bad surprise, especially if the product is neglected, like many.
FrostWire is an OpenSource BitTorrent client and YT downloader...and is Malware
CheatEngine, also OpenSource and also Malware
MplayerX, FOSS and Malware, and so on, along others, which are flagged as ad and bundleware. Privacy? also a lot of apps and APIs from Google, Facebook, Amazon and other big tech companies are FOSS.
To return to the subject, it is not so important who distributes FOSS, be it the Chrome Store, MS Store (same as GitHub now), NASA software or others, but the origin of this software and the intentions of the corresponding devs and especially the community what's behind. It is always necessary to check it before use.
A browser is a client application that doesn't require any servers. However, we have plenty of examples of FOSS infrastructure being funded without the need for corporations. If anything, infrastructure costs are constantly and rapidly decreasing.
Lack of commercial interest is applicable in every domain in practice. This is what sets the goals of the developers, this decides what features are developed and why they are developed. In case of commercial software, features are developed to create profit for the business first and foremost, with everything else being secondary. When ethics come into conflict with profit, then profit must win.
Giving examples of malicious open source software is not really a counter point since both closed and open software can be hostile. However, the problem with commercial software is that it has additional conflict of interest that doesn't exist in open software. Furthermore, open software can always be forked, as often happens, when original developers take it in a direction people don't like.
Closed software can be useful the same way buying an appliance can be useful, but it's a fundamental mistake to invest in such software long term as a user. Sooner or later the company making it will either move in a direction you don't like because that's where the market is, or it'll go out of business. When that happens you're going to be left without useful software.
So, yes it is in fact incredibly important whether a project is FOSS and whether it's corporate owned. Decisions have to be made on case by case basis, but FOSS is a fundamental requirement.
FOSS is of course fundamental, this I have never doubted, by allowing collaborative creation in a new project, which allows development better than in a company with a few less efficient devs. The main reason for FOSS is precisely this, what many forget and confuse FOSS with security, privacy and a free internet, which is deeply wrong, these concepts are not synonymous with FOSS, they depend on too many other factors. Because of this the most among of FOSS is used and developed by this big companies, by this way they can use Devs freelance. That is what I mean that Free Soft has nothing to do with Free Internet.
Yes a browser is a client soft, but nevertheless it is perfectly capable of sending user data, as we see in many of them, especially if it is used with synchronization functions to have the data of several devices.
This does not necessarily have to do with whether they are FOSS or not, although the main ones that have these practices coincide with large companies, Chrome, EDGE, Safari, Opera since it belongs to a Chinese company, Brave selectively with its system of not blocking sponsors and Firefox is not completely spared either.
Today I have seen a good example of how much different browsers protect the user on a well-known website, in AutoCAD web app, which is freely accessible with Chrome, Edge and Firefox, while blocking Vivaldi, UR and Dissenter. Analyzing this page it turned out that it records the inputs of the keyboard, mouse and mouse movements, sending the data to third parties.
Again, I'm not saying that FOSS guarantees things like security and privacy, rather that it's a prerequisite. The best case scenario is software developed in the open without any commercial involvement. However, software developed by companies in the open is still strictly preferable to closed software. As I've already explained, my view is that it would be a worse situation if Chromium became the only engine in town, and that's the reason Firefox is a very important project. I don't think Google should be the sole company making a browser engine.
Google is unfortunately the dominant company on the net, but this will not change with using Firefox or another browser with Gecko, with a market presence of less than 2% and also dependent on Google. Even old, outdated IE has more users than Firefox today. For this reason, I do not believe that the path to a free internet is there. The only way to achieve freedom on the web is not to prefer one or the other browser or software license, but to end the surveillance practices used by these companies. It is useless to use instead of Chromium, another from a company that also uses these practices, I think.
Who develops a software is not so important then, without the surveillance of the user for commercial interests, then only matters who offers the best products or services. TOR and the Onion network were developed by the US defense and its secret services.
Google may be the dominant company on the net, but that doesn't mean alternatives should be abandoned. IE used to be the dominant browser just like Chrome is today, and it was displaced in a couple of decades. Thinking that Chromium is the end of browser technology is incredibly myopic.
The only way to achieve freedom on the web is to ensure that true FOSS solutions survive going forward. Firefox is currently the best hope for the future of browsers. Who develops the software is incredibly important, and that's a demonstrable fact. Google is driven by commercial interests, and it continues to introduce features like AMP that are hostile towards open web while removing APIs that make ad blockers work.
IE was just dropped by a better browser from the same company. Authentic FOSS is never going to be abandoned, even though the biggest producers are these big companies, simply for reasons of adaptability and development, useful for both private devs and big companies.
That Firefox exists or not, will not change much, they are equally managed and depending on Google, because it is Google that determines the standards and Web formats and also Firefox has to orient itself to these standards so as not to lose compatibility.
As you can see, it is not about browser technology and which of these we use. It is that these surveillance techniques are not incorporated. Trackers and fingerprintings are no longer a problem, these can be easily blocked, either by the browser itself or through extensions, so Google and others already use more advanced techniques, such as FLOC, Pixel ads, Idle API, Network Info, E-Tag tracking, Header sniffing...and so on, apart from these reCaptchas when you register in a web. This is the real problem in the web and what makes it the property of Google, not if you use one or the other browser.
IE was originally dethroned by Firefox and Chrome. This happened around a decade before MS came out with Edge. Again, your statement that Firefox is dependent on Google is simply not correct. The standards still have to go through 3WC, and Mozilla existing as an independent entity is pretty much the only reason this is still happening. Meanwhile, companies making browsers based on Chromium are entirely dependent on Google.
It's also absolutely false that trackers and fingerprinting are no longer a problem or can be blocked. It's pretty much impossible to block tracking at this point unless you use Tor. In fact, browser extensions meant to block tracking can themselves be used to track you because they can end up creating a unique fingerprint.
Things like AMP and plans for removing hooks used by ad blocker are far bigger concerns for me.
Unfortunately, even with TOR it is not possible to avoid tracking completely, it can only be alleviated, which all privacy oriented browsers do with only slight differences. Even more so using a VPN whose use is becoming increasingly essential, apart from a whole series of extensions (Trace and SiteBleacher are good choices, also for Firefox) Firefox is no exception to this either.
And yes, Mozilla is dependent on Google, apart from receiving its income through it and its services, apart from it is also obliged to use certain APIs, so as not to lose compatibility with many pages, since it is Google, as I said before, that determines a large part of the web format, either directly or indirectly. Chromium, if used as is, is naturally filled with all sorts of APIs that allow Google to track the user, but at least Vivaldi removes most of them or leaves it to the user's choice in the Privacy settings (which don't do any other Chromium).
That Chromium is a Google product does not mean that it depends on it, more than TOR does not depend on the US defense and the CIA, precisely because they are FOSS products, Google can only add things that allow tracking and it is a matter of the different Devs of the forks to eliminate them, what Vivaldi does (like FLOC, Idle API and others), for this reason it always takes a week or so, until Vivaldi has an update, after Chromium does. If I desactivate in it's privacy settings all the Google API's, it's even impossible to acces any Google services or pages que depends to Google, because of this, Vivaldi let do it in the settings to the like of the user, that is, Vivaldi is as private as the user want it.
We can not forget that Google, apart from its way of spying on the user, on the other hand offers the best services and applications, many of them without real alternative, in the educational environment for schools and universities, professional, scientific, things like StreetView, YouTube, where we can only use Front-ends or clients ... etc).
We can only hope that, by law we force him to return to his original motto 'Don't be evil', since it is only the problem of his user tracking, which advises to avoid it, no other.
Vivaldi is the only browser company, which is active against these user surveillance practices, nor is Mozilla on this list, nor is any other of the large American companies, for which the user is obviously only a commodity.
Being able to render pages is not an example of Mozilla being dependent on Google at all. Firefox internal implementation is not dependent on Chromium or the decisions that Google makes.
Meanwhile, Vivaldi can remove superficial changes, but if Google makes big structural changes in Chromium, then Vivaldi would have to fork the project and at that point they're in exact same boat as Mozilla. They'd need a ton of funding to maintain an alternative engine. This is the fundamental problem with relying on Chromium as your base. This works as long as Google doesn't move it in a direction hostile to users.
Companies basing their products on Chromium 100% depend on it. And we already know that the law can't really touch Google at this point. It's an international monstrosity that's not answerable to pretty much any government. The fact that many people are already dependent on Google shows the risk of using their technology.
And you once again mischaracterize which is a non-profit foundation as opposed to a commercial company trying to commodify users. Vivaldi presents a far greater risk for that being driven by profit.
It is clear that Google in many Chromium updates, also adds some dirty trick to be able to track the user, but so far the Vivaldi Team has also eliminated it again, before releasing the update for users. They are very good at this.
About web formats, I am not talking about the fact that browsers can render a page or not, this is done by Gecko, Blink and WebKit more or less equally well, I am talking about different page formats that require one or another Google API, for example Crypto Tokens (It is a Google API that in Vivaldi can be deactivated in the configuration), without these it is not possible, for example, to log in on many pages, because they do not accept you as a safe browser.
Google does not need to lend a lot of hand to Chromium, if it is Google that today determines the web standards, no other. The vast majority of websites are oriented to these standards and use plug-ins from Google and others, whether you like it or not.
Again, this approach works for surface level changes in Chromium. Should Google make deeper structural changes, then the amount of work to maintain a fork would drastically increase. And what APIs are you suggesting can be turned off in Vivaldi that can't be turned off in Firefox?
And you misunderstood my point regarding Chromium. I'm talking about things like ad blocker support that rely on Chromium design. Google is actively looking for ways to neuter such plugins right now. While, Chromium based browsers could be affected by this, Firefox is not dependent on internal workings of Chromium.
Vivaldi has its own ad and trackerblocker, with a list of expandable filters. It even uses filters that block these annoying Cookie pop-ups and Malware. As Chromium, of course, you can use extensions from the Chrome Store, but you can also install it from third-party sources, for example from GitHub or Sourceforge, among others, although most of the extensions are redundant, because Vivaldi includes them as its own functions. Do not confuse Vivaldi with other Chromium forks, which mainly limit themselves to just putting their own logo on a Chromium as is, nothing to do with it.
I just invite you to preview it and see for yourself that Vivaldi has nothing to do, not only with any other Chromium, or with any other browser on the market. More than a browser, it can almost be called an online productivity suite. It's a democratic collaboration between users and the Vivaldi team, in a community as there are few (already more than 2 million users active internationally in this community.)
There is no guarantee that what Vivaldi implemented will continue being compatible with hwo Chromium works internally. These are surface level changes. You're marketing Vivaldi, which is a commercial closed source product based on Google tech. I'm really not interested in it. I think we've said all there is to say about it at this point.
Vivaldi's 'Closed Source' is only for commercial use precisely and is only a small part of the UI. It is accessible to users and modifiable by them, in the forum they even teach how to do it. Of course, the user can do this at his own risk. This only prevents the big Chromiums, Chrome, Edge and Opera from using it for their own purposes, although if in the latest versions of these it is seen that they try to copy it, adding bad copies of these functionalities. Closed Source in the sense that you can't fork Vivaldi and publish it with another Brand (for the moment, there are internal discussions on this matter and perhaps in the future, when Vivaldi has achieved a certain strong percentage in the market, it can allow itself to go completely FOSS, for the moment it would be suicide)
As I said before, although Google can add certain things to Chromium, it cannot influence its development, since this would also mean having to revoke the status of FOSS to Chromium, which is nothing short of impossible and it will also have to face Microsoft and to Edge, which is not in Google's interest at all.
What Google does is this, to add APIs, which Vivaldi removes, or to eliminate the ability to sync with Google's servers, which has certainly broken the neck of a whole series of other Chromiums. But it turns out that Vivaldi has never used sync with Google servers, but always with its own servers with end to end encryption, Vivaldi itself has neither access to this data nor to the sync passwords. That is, if you lose your sync password, you cannot recover it, it is the price of privacy.
Where Google prefers to influence is in web standards, this is what it is mainly dedicated to, since, being the dominant company on the web, it knows that most of the pages are oriented to Google's standards in its creation, that is why Blink currently has the best performance and compatibility with newer formats.
Meanwhile going with Firefox, also depends on Google (Yes) or using some firefox forks, which are most outdated, not very stable, also depending de Mozilla and with this de Google ore otherwise with Systeme One, even worse . It's irrelevant which you use, the browserworld is or dominate or sponsored by Google, the loser always is the user in those browsers which make money with tracking (read the TOS and PP of Firefox/Mozilla and you will see that they are not better. Well, they are not the worse certainly). That is the Problem, FOSS or not, it has nothing to do with this., the problem is the lack of privacy and the surveillance which kills the free internet.
Google absolutely can and is influencing the development of Chromium. While the source is public, the development is very clearly tightly controlled by Google who decide on what features end up in Chromium, what patches they accept, and so on. It's of course possible to fork Chromium, but at that point the amount of work would be similar to what Mozilla has to put into developing Firefox.
You keep repeating that Google hasn't significantly modified the workings of the engine so far in a way that prevents Vivaldi from easily working around. However, it's a logical fallacy to extrapolate from the fact that this hasn't happened that it will not happen in a future.
Vivaldi directly depends on the code that Google is producing while Firefox does not. This makes Firefox strictly preferable to Vivaldi.
At this point we're just going in circles, repeating the same thing over and over. So, I don't see the point of continuing the conversation.
Have a good day.
Ok, and who tells you that he is not going to do it with Mozilla? This would be even easier for Google, he just have to stop supporting it and provide the necessary APIs that Firefox also uses. In this way he will directly dominate the entire browser market and he do not need to confront Microsoft, which also uses Chromium. Firefox forks don't really count for anything and will disappear from the market, adding to the list of discontinued, like the other 70 before them.
No, the market does not work like that, it is a very common practice of large monopolies to create and support different companies that are supposedly competitors, thus creating a supposed variety that does not exist in reality. Thus controlling the entire market. Disabling Chromium for others will only result in a self-shot.
One Example of something similar: It also happens in other product areas. Due to the unethical ethics of the Nestlé company, many sought to boycott the products of this multinational company. But it turns out that this is not so simple, since apart from the famous Nescafé, it also owns other coffee brands, for example Bonca, not even counting the private labels that also come out of its production. He also owns several brands of animal feed, cocoa, different brands of chocolate, sweets and even various brands of bottled water and other aliments. The list is kilometer long and covers almost half of any supermarket.
That is, the intend to boicot Google using Firefox or other Mozilla fork, is like boicot a Nescafé, buying Bonca or one of it private labels. That change nothing, because it isn't the cause of the problem.
Combating this problem is not about staying stuck in one product or another, but about combating the bad practices used by all major browsers, Firefox included. It does not serve to combat a product, using another that does the same, but to boycott everyone who uses these practices, using those who do not. From being active in initiatives to require legislators to ban these practices, this is the way to go.
Full letter in PDF https://www.forbrukerradet.no/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/20210622-final-report-time-to-ban-surveillance-based-advertising.pdf
THIS is the way to go, all other in looking at the finger which pointed to the way without the Big Brother watching you in internet.
We fundamentally disagree here, and I've explained my position already.