Mozilla Firefox Blocks Add-Ons to Circumvent Russia Censorship : linux

[–] savvywolf@pawb.social 50 points 5 months ago (1 children)

It's either get the addons removed, or get the whole addon store itself blocked. You can just install the extension from an xpi file.

Mozilla really isn't in a position to fight the Russian government over this and win.

[+] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip -28 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Yes they kind of are. I'm not sure how many Firefox users there are in Russia but some how I think there enough that it would be yet another bad look for the authoritarian government.

[–] savvywolf@pawb.social 23 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I checked, and according to Statcounter it's at 3.3%. So if Mozilla did go hardball, it'd affect an insignificant amount of people.

Realistically though, I don't follow world politics much but I assume that "blocking firefox" probably wouldn't be the worst optics they've had in the past few years.

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 5 points 5 months ago

And they can easily say it’s Mozilla’s fault

[–] khorovodoved@lemm.ee 8 points 5 months ago

If Mozilla gets blocked, people would just install some other browser (probably, something from Russia). I do not see how this helps anyone but the government itself. And departure of hundreds (if not thousands) of western companies did nothing to the Russian government, some problems with a browser with almost non-existent userbase would have the same effect. It should be quite clear by now that such tactic simply does not work.

[–] Telorand@reddthat.com 35 points 5 months ago (1 children)

“Following recent regulatory changes in Russia, we received persistent requests from Roskomnadzor demanding that five add-ons be removed from the Mozilla add-on store,” a Mozilla spokesperson told The Intercept in response to a request for comment. “After careful consideration, we’ve temporarily restricted their availability within Russia."

It sucks, but it's a battle they weren't ever going to win. The dictator gets to have final say in how things go in their country.

[–] HumanPerson@sh.itjust.works 30 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Not that this isn't interesting, but how is it linux related?

[–] holgersson@lemm.ee 15 points 5 months ago

I mean, FF is the default browser and this also might rub some people the wrong way - having the developer of the only relevant free and open, non-google browser bow to a dictatorship

[–] PromptVII@lemmy.wtf 6 points 5 months ago (1 children)

LibreWolf <3

[–] khorovodoved@lemm.ee 7 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Does it have a separate add-on store?

[–] PromptVII@lemmy.wtf 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Nope. It just uses regular firefox add ons.

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 12 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

Weird to recommend it here then

[–] pastermil@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 months ago

Makes me wonder if a 3rd party server for this is ever a thing.

[–] GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml -4 points 5 months ago (3 children)

Ok it's getting properly sus now. Mozilla goes into politics way too much

[–] Telorand@reddthat.com 21 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Read the article. They didn't "get into" anything. They got told to take five add-ons down ~~or face the wrath of a regime with a close relationship with defenestration~~, which they did only for Russians.

[–] ProgrammingSocks@pawb.social 10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Every major company does this, it just doesn't make headlines. Plus I'm sure they know you can still install it outside of the store.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 6 points 5 months ago

It is a hard issue to solve. However, I think Mozilla should ignore Russia.

[+] cheezits@lemmy.ca -8 points 5 months ago (1 children)

laughs in Canadian

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 5 points 5 months ago

What is so funny?

[+] kenkenken@sh.itjust.works -10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

It's not the first time. Mozilla was helping to fascism in Russia for years by using Yandex as a default search engine in Russia. Because Yandex was paying them. It's all for money, obviously. And now they don't want to lose the market. But the fans of FF will explain how this is "ethical" and helps to save the web.

[–] JackGreenEarth@lemm.ee 15 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

It's not ethical.

Chrome, and Google, however, are worse. Firefox derived browsers are the lesser of two evils, at least they prevent Google having a total monopoly.

[–] kenkenken@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 months ago

Chrome is a commercial product and don't pretend to be something more, while Firefox gets free marketing from the whole GNU/Linux community, exploiting people's sense of morals.

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