Mozilla Turns Firefox Towards Spyware: Firefox Labs Now Requires Data Collection
www.quippd.com
TL;DR: Mozilla is now enforcing data collection as a pre-requisite to access new features in Firefox Labs. This is backed by the Terms of Use that Mozilla introduced a few months ago.

TL;DR: Mozilla is now enforcing data collection as a pre-requisite to access new features in Firefox Labs. This is backed by the Terms of Use that Mozilla introduced a few months ago.

  • yoasif@fedia.ioOP
    0·
    12 days ago

    Plenty of OSS licenses have rules baked into them about how you can use the code, or lay out obligations for redistribution.

    “Is it really open source if I have to edit the source code I was given to remove a feature I don’t like?”

    I’m really not being aggressive about this position and I tried to express the ambiguity here. I think what irks me most are these things:

    1. Forking Firefox means it isn’t Firefox - yes, this means that the original was OSS, but you really need to be an expert to get at all the OSS code running on your machine. I mean that it is literally not Firefox, since your fork doesn’t have permission to use the trademarked name.
    2. If we think of the enabling functionality in Firefox as a virtual lock, breaking that lock is illegal under the DMCA. That seems very weird for code that is ostensibly open source.
    3. The addition of the Terms to Firefox seems like an additional restriction (a la Grsecurity, as I mentioned in the post) to the existing license in Firefox. Indeed, Mozilla says that the existing license isn’t “transparent” enough for Firefox users.

    Yes, the purpose of a system is what it does, but the author isn’t presenting any evidence of what it’s doing vis a vis their claim of making technical users quit FF.

    The purpose of the system being what it does is Firefox being spyware - you can’t escape it if you want to use Labs features.

    Love the feedback, and I while I think Firefox is open source, I do see the addition of software locks as backing away from OSS.

    • t3rmit3@beehaw.org
      0·
      12 days ago

      Forking Firefox means it isn’t Firefox - yes, this means that the original was OSS, but you really need to be an expert to get at all the OSS code running on your machine. I mean that it is literally not Firefox, since your fork doesn’t have permission to use the trademarked name.

      This is only relevant if you are planning to redistribute it after you make changes. You can make any and all changes you want to FF on your machine to remove telemetry, and you do not have to remove the branding.

      If we think of the enabling functionality in Firefox as a virtual lock, breaking that lock is illegal under the DMCA. That seems very weird for code that is ostensibly open source.

      Extending this argument would mean that it’s potentially illegal under DMCA to remove any protection mechanism that it would be ‘hacking’ to bypass during usage (e.g. SSL, authentication, etc) from any OSS project. Thats not the case, because an OSS license gives you explicit permission to modify the application.

      • yoasif@fedia.ioOP
        0·
        12 days ago

        Extending this argument would mean that it’s potentially illegal under DMCA to remove any protection mechanism that it would be ‘hacking’ to bypass during usage (e.g. SSL, authentication, etc) from any OSS project. Thats not the case, because an OSS license gives you explicit permission to modify the application.

        I’m talking specifically about the compiled Firefox on my disk - if I break the virtual lock, I have broken the law. Sure, a forked version of Firefox that I compiled on my own would grant me access to the features without breaking the lock - but the copy of Firefox that Mozilla distributes to me only allows me access to the features under a new terms grant – not under the existing open source license.

        Again – yes, Firefox is literally open source. But as I said in my post, this feels to be against the spirit of open source. Obviously we disagree on that front.

    • PhoenixAlpha@lemmy.ca
      0·
      12 days ago

      It’s really not ambiguous. Anyone can fork Firefox, make any changes they want, and release it with different branding. This is the goal of open source.

      The term you’re looking for is free software. By making this change Firefox is no longer respecting the freedom of their users. That’s the “F” in FOSS. It’s possible for Firefox to remain open source without being free software.

      • yoasif@fedia.ioOP
        0·
        12 days ago

        You are right - I was struggling with the fact that Mozilla was adding additional restrictions via its Terms, alongside the MPL that changed the rights of their users. You are absolutely correct that the code remains free while the user doesn’t.