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Firefox Browser Use Drops As Mozilla's Worst Microsoft Edge Fears Come True
Back in April, we reported that the Edge browser is quickly gaining market share now that Microsoft has transitioned from the EdgeHTML engine to the more widely used Chromium engine (which also underpins Google's Chrome browser). At the time, Edge slipped into the second-place slot for desktop web browsers, with a 7.59 percent share of the market. This dropped Mozilla's Firefox – which has long been the second-place browser behind Chrome – into third place.
Now, at the start of August, we're getting some fresh numbers in for the desktop browser market, and things aren't looking good for Mozilla. Microsoft increased its share of the browser market from 8.07 percent in June to 8.46 percent in July. Likewise, Firefox fell from 7.58 percent to 7.27 percent according to NetMarketShare.
[...] As for Mozilla, the company wasn't too happy when Microsoft first announced that it was going to use Chromium for Edge way back in December 2018. Mozilla's Chris Beard at the time accused Microsoft of "giving up" by abandoning EdgeHTML in favor of Chromium. "Microsoft's decision gives Google more ability to single-handedly decide what possibilities are available to each one of us," said Beard at the time. "We compete with Google because the health of the internet and online life depend on competition and choice."
[...] Microsoft developer Kenneth Auchenberg fought back the following January, writing, "Thought: It's time for Mozilla to get down from their philosophical ivory tower. The web is dominated by Chromium, if they really *cared* about the web they would be contributing instead of building a parallel universe that's used by less than 5 percent."
Is the browser monoculture inevitable or will Firefox hang in there?
Previously:
Mozilla Teases Chromium-Based Firefox, Then Pulls Back
Firefox Tops Microsoft Browser Market Share for First Time
Netmarketshare Claims Mozilla Firefox Usage Drops Below Ten Percent
Microsoft Intercepting Firefox, Chrome Installation on Windows 10 Insider Build
Microsoft Reportedly Building a Chromium-Based Web Browser to Replace Edge, and "Windows Lite" OS
Mozilla CEO Warns Microsoft's Switch to Chromium Will Give More Control of the Web to Google
Microsoft Employee Sparks Outrage by Suggesting Firefox Switch Browser Engine to Chromium
Mozilla Was "Outfoxed" by Google
Microsoft Edge Shares Privacy-Busting Telemetry, Research Alleges
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Tuesday August 04 2020, @06:07PM (5 children)
95% market share hardly makes for a suicide pack excuse in my book.
Regardless, the argument stands: It's all free, open source code implementing open standards so unless you have specific technical goals that can't be met with Chromium, what's the point of expanding resources on Firefox?
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by Freeman on Tuesday August 04 2020, @06:33PM (1 child)
The problem is you have Google at the helm. The only difference between Google Chrome and Chromium is semantics.
While it was interesting to see Microsoft's near complete dominance go to almost nothing, seeing another single browser take it's place, wasn't very heartening.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Tuesday August 04 2020, @08:55PM
Again, they can just fork it. They're not some moms & pops bakery. They're Mozilla. They already maintain a huge browser code base that takes hours just to compile. They can maintain their patch sets. They can fork. They can re-license.
A few years ago when their extensions API was different and more full featured it would have been a different case... But now that they're just monkeying Google's APIs, what's the point?
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 04 2020, @07:31PM (1 child)
in case it's not your phone auto correct and just fyi: it's "pact", not "pack"
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Tuesday August 04 2020, @08:50PM
Nah the original paragraph was something along "95% market share hardly makes for a suicide pact. Putting aside kettles and pots, the argument stands:..." but some clumsy mouse editing and desktop* spell checking resulted in the above. Oddly enough, testing it out now shows my phones' spell check includes an idiomatic usage vocab and would have auto-corrected "suicide pack" into "suicide pact".
* Firefox ironically enough.
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(Score: 2) by Teckla on Wednesday August 05 2020, @04:53PM
In purely pragmatic terms, Mozilla should probably switch to the Chromium engine.
However, a web browser engine monoculture is probably not a good thing.