With the number of people concerned about privacy, it is a wonder why chrome is even popular.

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[–] 62 points 3 years ago (5 children)

The best time to switch to Firefox was 5 years ago. The second best is today.

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  • [–] 30 points 3 years ago (5 children)

    Oops, I switched 15 years ago,

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  • [–] 18 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    I switch when it was Phoenix, then switch again when it was Firebird, and finally switch when it become Firefox

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  • [–] 9 points 3 years ago

    I went straight from Mozilla Navigator to Firefox 1.0.

    Tabs were such a crazy new thing back then. You would show tabbed browsing to someone (rather than opening new windows) and they thought you were a wizard. IE5 didn’t have tabs, so nerds moved to Mozilla/Firefox. Then IE6 came out but still didn’t have tabs. By the time IE7 came out, I’d had tabbed browsing for 5+ years.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    Noob. I switched in 2006 - 17 years ago.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    I cannot be 100% certain but I'm confident I was using it not long after the 1.0 release. That'd put me at 2004. 19 years!

    Although I did briefly switch over to Chrome when it was new and fast. Then switched back when Firefox had a major optimization pass.

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  • [–] 6 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    I use Firefox since it's release. It was never bad. I don't get all the Chrome users.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 years ago

    I had the crappiest of PCs in 2006 or 2007 with 768MBs of RAM running Windows XP. Funnily enough the reason I switched to Chrome back then was the immense RAM usage of Firefox compared to Chrome back then. With the big rebranding an rerelease of Firefox in 2017? 2018? I came back and haven’t looked back since.

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    [–] 28 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    Most people aren’t concerned about privacy outside of places like here and Reddit.

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  • [–] 17 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    With Chrome killing ad blocking, they'll quickly care

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  • [–] 22 points 3 years ago (5 children)

    Except most people don't use adblock. I don't even know how they live

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  • [+] 8 points 3 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)
  • [–] 3 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    You are mostly right. Think about how many people use chrome on corporate office computers that they do not have permission to install anything on or modify. It's part of the reason Windows is so dominant. Businesses run windows and chrome a shit ton. I work for a Fortune 100 company. It's Windows and Chrome across the whole company.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago

    I work for a large company and its the same. They even force-install Chrome despite Edge already being there! Yes, some people will make the privacy argument that Microsoft takes your data, but so will Google, and it's not as if the business cared either way, because if they did they'd install an adblocker or Firefox, which they don't.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 years ago

    I suspect they spend most of their time in apps and not surfing the internet. Just a guess really since I saw the mobile traffic exceeded desktop. A lot of people don't spend hours on the "internet" surfing. Tic Tok sure. Hell I'm getting more and more like that. Even when I use chrome I still only go the the same sites for the most part. lol

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  • [–] 16 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    Firefox + Ublock Origin blows Google Chrome out of water.

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    [–] 15 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    Firefox is a weird buggy mess that constantly freezes.

    This is definitely not normal, Firefox never freezes for me. May be worth checking that out, especially your extensions.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 years ago

    Especially your security programs, like third-party antivirus or firewalls. They can install system-level plugins in your browsers, and sometimes those don't work well. Windows defender and the built in firewall are good enough and play nice with other programs.

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  • [–] 7 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    The whole Reddit debacle has really made me rethink all my services. I recently installed duck duck go and still getting used to it, so not quite sure if I'm ready to make another drastic change.

    I used to love Firefox in 2006 or so, but got Chrome when it was released and forgot about Firefox. I think I'll open a tab in my chrome browser for the Firefox page now...this is how I remind myself to delve deeper into stuff later. Thanks for the inspiration, everyone. Google has irked me ever since removing the Don't Be Evil mantra.

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    [–] 4 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    I have too use Edge at work. Is Edge also implementing this shit?

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    [–] 4 points 3 years ago

    IMO the thing is that people don't care about their privacy. Sure, some people around here do, but your average person owns an Alexa, has a FB/Instagram account and constantly posts their location, uses the same password on many sites, uses TikTok, doesn't block cookies, etc etc etc.

    Most people don't actually care. Some claim they do, but then can't even be bothered to stop using Instagram etc because of the "inconvenience"... So do they really care?

    Some companies (Apple, etc) push their products under a narrative around safety and security, and people will repeat that point as a way to justify a decision they already made, but if they actually cared, they would be doing other things too. But they don't.

    The number of us who do actually care about privacy and security is actually very small.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    Aged like fine milk

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  • [–] 3 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    what are some necessary addons besides ublock?

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    Dark reader - for dark mode everywhere

    Decentreyes - for avoiding CDNs that track you

    Sponsorblock - to skip sponsored parts on youtube

    Enhancer for youtube - for a nicer overall experience, specific quality setting by default, scroll wheel volume, and more

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    2 years later, the "Manifest" is doing it's job and still I know some people that would not leave their favorite Chrome.

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    [–] 2 points 3 years ago

    With the number of people concerned about privacy, it is a wonder how privacy is still a word in the dictionary

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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    How about Brave? Not a big fan of Chrome but a long term Brave user I am. Filters a lot of things out.

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    [–] 2 points 3 years ago

    It's ironic that there are over 60 blockable elements and such over Privacy Badger and Ublock origin on that page.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    i use 5 browsers 3 of them are based on firefox

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago

    I recently did the switch, pretty similar in terms of experience. Only thing I can point out about firefox is that chrome's page translator is faster and more efficient. I'm using the Google translate extension, if someone knows off a better one.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago*

    With the number of people concerned about privacy

    That number appears to be very small, all things considered. Out of everyone I know, literally one person cares about privacy. My mother. She will even go as far as to only use her first initial online instead of her name if she can get away with it. However, she uses Chrome all the time because she doesn't understand that your browser also tracks you.

    I think that's what it comes down to. A mixture of lack of public interest, and lack of public awareness about tracking/privacy in general. If people can't immediately see how having their data harvested will inconvenience/hurt them, they simply don't care.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago

    With the number of people concerned about privacy, it is a wonder why chrome is even popular.

    It's no wonder. It's because people aren't actually concerned about privacy.

    If you ask someone if they're "concerned about privacy" many people will of course say yes. If you follow up that question with "what are you willing to do about it", you'll find that the answer is a resounding "not a God damn thing". If they were they would spend 3 minutes on Google looking for an alternative browser that works even better than Chrome but without the privacy invasions.

    A browser is the low-hanging fruit on the "do-you-care-about-privacy meter". It's the one step with no sacrifices and the highest increase in privacy.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (2 children)

    Chrome does have a use, namely Selenium and automation.

    I'm guilty of having Chrome on my PC, as I need to nerf over my favourites to Firefox.

    Firefox is my browser of choice on my Google Pixel 7, but then again no doubt it makes little difference.

    I just choose to use a VPN, so any targeted adverts are blocked regardless of the profile built up from my browsing habits.

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