I guess I won’t be using it then. 🤷♂️
Without a Windows release it will remain a niche browser even if by chance it becomes the most used on macOS, GNU+Linux and other Unix-like OSes.
As far as I know, there still aren’t any non-WebKit engines for iOS, even though the possibility is theoretically there as of 17.4… (It may need to be EU-only? I’m not clear on that part.)
windows browsers are all niche when you introduce anything to the mobile market. An android / iOS ladybird browser would crush it
Giving how apple adjacent the project is I have never had much faith in it being able to truly become an alternative to firefox.
Apple adjacent?
You go to the website and the images promoting the browser are using apple. The project is being developed only for macOS and linux. They decided to change the programming language to swift.
To many signs that the devs are appleheads and I get the feeling that the main target is apple, linux second and windows completely out of the box (states by devs themselves). Myself personally, not a fan on apple, I don’t have that kind of money to buy hardware and I don’t see any advantages on doing so.
You are not much challenging the status quo by partnering up with the NSA.
i give them the benefit of the doubt, as stated on their website:
All sponsorships are in the form of unrestricted donations. Board seats and other forms of influence are not for sale.
AIPAC doesnt partner up with politicians. They just give them. “uNrEsTrIcTeD dOnAtIoNs”.
This is very encouraging:
Ladybird uses a new browser engine called LibWeb that is being created from scratch by the development team.
Browsers that rely on Chromium / Blink rely on Google. Firefox relies on Google for its funding, so any browser based on Gecko relies on Google. If they can make a browser engine that has rough feature parity with Chromium but doesn’'t rely on Google that’s very healthy for the web.
You do know the difference of “built by” and “partly funded by”, right?
What exactly is your problem by Mozilla/Firefox being partly funded by Google?
The standard point is most around how big that ‘partly’ is, and how attached a project can become to that part. If a project has, for easy math, a $10M bankroll and $5M comes from, say, Goog or MS, the project can face a moment where the corporation comes and says, ‘we don’t like that you’ve implemented this feature that interferes with our control of users. We’re pulling our funding unless you remove it.’ (more realistically, ‘we see you have allocated some dev time to this feature request we don’t like. Cancel it before the public can demand it.’) If that happens, you have to have a project lead with some real rectitude to say, ‘okay,’ and just cut their budget in half. The more diversely sourced a FOSS project’s funding is, the harder it is to control, and vice versa.
“Partly funded by”?
Google contributed roughly 83% of Mozilla’s income from 2020-2023, and 89% of overall income since 2005.
Firefox relies on Google for its funding, so any browser based on Gecko relies on Google
Google introduced Extension manifest v3 to effectively to kill/handicap AdBlock extensions.
Mozilla, though getting funding from Google to make google its default search engine, officially decided to keep supporting Manifest v2.
Adblockers are direct challenge to Alphabet’s ad revenue which is still their biggest cash cow.
That speaks a valume about how much control google has on Mozilla decision making process.
Mozilla, though getting funding from Google to make google its default search engine, officially decided to keep supporting Manifest v2.
For now. Google probably isn’t too concerned since they have a more than 70% market share, and nearly 90% if you count all Chromium-based browsers. Firefox has managed to do what Google wants, which is “exist” and “not meaningfully compete with Chrome”. If that changes, Google might lean on them harder.
That speaks a valume about how much control google has on Mozilla decision making process.
It doesn’t say anything about that at all. Just because you’re paying for something doesn’t mean they have to do it your way. It is at most something to keep an eye on.
Google pays them for two reasons. To be the default search engine giving them substantial marketing and ad space, and to keep them floating and independent to lessen their probable status as a monopoly.
In fact, in the recent antitrust ruling, Google is precluded from even making exclusive deals with them.
You are agreeing with the person you replied to lol
I just wanna say that we have Webkit. After Google moved over to Blink Webkit has not stopped development… and it even has multiple big names behind it (like Apple, but also Valve partnered with WebkitGtk maintainers, and many devices like Amazon’s Kindle are heavily invested on it) so it’s not gonna go away anytime soon. Specially with Safari being the second most used browser on the web, right after chrome and several times more users than Firefox.
On Linux we have some browsers making use of Webkit (like Epiphany, Gnome’s default browser) that are thus independent from Google or even Mozilla. I’m not sure if there’s any browser like that for Windows though.
There’s also Netsurf, they also have their own rendering libraries, but development for it is super slow, I’ve been following them for a couple decades and they still haven’t got a stable javascript engine, so it only works for the most basic of websites. The plus side is that it’s very light on resources, though.
I love WebKit exploits because they suddenly open up several gaming consoles to homebrew, almost all of them have browsers based on WebKit too.
There’s also Palemoon with its goanna engine, which forked off Firefox when Mozilla retired XUL and has diverged since
Ironically, we already had that - Microsoft’s first version of Edge was using their own engine. On release, it had the highest W3C compatibility score.
Google started shitting on it (including things like serving clear HTML version of Gmail because “the browser is outdated” if it detected the Edge user agent) and massive self-delusion campaigns of “Edge is just Internet Explorer” eventually killed the thing and forced MS to switch to Chromium.
I have Ladybird installed and I check it out every now and then, but I honestly doubt that a bunch of random developers will succeed where Microsoft failed. Unless Cloudflare somehow chips in and forces Google’s hand into compatibility, but I don’t know if even they are big enough to do that.
Personally, I think if the engine was closed source, then we didn’t in fact “had that”. Maybe Microsoft had it, not us.
What makes things like chromium, firefox and webkit actual ecosystems is that they at least have an open source basis. Edge isn’t an ecosystem, it’s a black box. We don’t even know whether it’s true or not that it was its own thing or just they sneakily used bits and pieces of chromium from the start anyway.
User Agent checks is the easiest thing to overcome. Had edge’s engine been open source we would have had spins of it resolving the issue within hours. There are many examples of “random developers” succeeding where big companies tied by business strategies (I bet they had business reasons to keep a distinctive user agent) didn’t, to the point that the web runs on servers using FOSS software.
Personally, I think if the engine was closed source, then we didn’t in fact “had that”. Maybe Microsoft had it, not us.
Well, yeah, in that aspect, you’re correct. I meant that as a “we had a non Google-reliant engine”.
Yes, I understand that. But in my view, Microsoft is the one that might have had “a non Google-reliant engine” (if it’s true that they didn’t rely on Google code).
They just let us use it under their conditions, for the limited time they decided to make it available to us… but it was never “ours”. We were just contractually allowed to use it, but we didn’t really “have” it.
Semantics. I agree with you in principle, but the matter of fact is that we ended up with effectively zero choice over the browser engine.
Yes, the matter of fact is that the reason why that choice was taken away is because everyone except MS was forbidden from “having” that engine. It might have still been alive today in some form had it not been an exclusive MS-owned thing.
I imagine the reason that Cloudflare is doing this now is that Google just got off with no punishment from their antitrust loss.
Anybody who competes with Google now has to worry that they’ll do to them what they did to Microsoft. And, with Trump’s DOJ, the government will probably just ignore it if Sundar Pichai shows up with a shiny bauble for Trump. So, I’d imagine that Microsoft, Cloudflare, Amazon (AWS, Twitch), and Meta, among others, might all decide to fund an alternative browser.
doubt that a bunch of random developers will succeed where Microsoft
Ladybird doesn’t have to be profitable and the org cannot be bought.
Not what I meant.
Microsoft - in theory - had the finances to push their browser to peoples homes. Be it by baking it in to Windows, by ad campaigns, etc., etc. And they still lost to Google’s control over the Web.
Ladybird, by comparison, is an obscure no-name product, being made by a controversial figure, with (relatively to MS) zero ability to market itself to the wider audience. All Google has to do is make their products completely inoperable under Ladybird and, other than some extremely committed power-users who want to “de-google” their lives, nobody will use it.
You are right, but as you noticed, we don’t argue the same thing.
eventually killed the thing and forced MS to switch to Chromium.
Ladybird is not threatened to be killed by whatever anybody but the developers do.
Ladybird is not threatened to be killed by whatever anybody but the developers do.
It absolutely is. If Google forces incompatibility on it (like it did with Edge) ordinary users won’t switch. Because the majority of ordinary users are still deep in the ecosystem.
All it takes is for Google to block high quality streaming on YouTube and the browser will never go outside of 2-3% market share.
I think not being a default browser means that, for now, it’s not for ordinary users anyway.
But we’re discussing the potential future of the browser, not its current state. Right now it can barely render a modern page without crashing (but not always).
That’s not bad.
What’s not bad? Ladybird sitting at floor-leves of market share?
If we want to threaten the status quo in any way, it absolutely is. Firefox has 2.26% and - in terms of defining standards or forcing changes upon Chromium - it’s 100% irrelevant.
challenge the status quo by partnering with the status quo…
How much you want to bet Cloudflare went to them and was like ‘hey either work for (sorry, “with”) us or we declare you a “suspicious” traffic source and block you.’
Why is Cloudflare suddenly the enemy on Lemmy?
Well, not a straight answer but, there you go.
(yes, late, also my first post so hi)
I think that’s the first time I’ve seen a url in hiragana. And welcome to lemmy. I hope you enjoy it here, it’s normally very chill.
Just big company = bad
Nothing new on lemmy
Just ignore that they heavily contribute to opensource, have extremely generous free tiers, open incident reports and regularly share deep dives into their architecture and problems
just ignore that cloudflare was founded to collect data for the department of homeland security
It’s such a weird mix of people with very strong opinions on topics they’re extremely ignorant about here, on Lemmy. I was first shocked to see it on the Technology community.
I thought that, since Lemmy (and fediverse in general) is relatively difficult to get into, it’d attract more tech-savvy people, but now. Here, in this thread, we have a dude saying that “Cloudflare always sucked”. Any Windows-related discussion always devolves into crying about data being siphoned (and nobody has bothered to read the telemetry documentation, of course)…
Just getting a weird cognitive dissonance whenever I’m browsing here.
Suddenly? They’ve always sucked
How did the literal best DDOS protection on the planet and the provider of a very safe and secure DNS suck?
By being a monopoly and having a unique chokehold on the internet. Even if we don’t get into their ties with various governments that they inevitably have to have, the fact that they alone can cripple the internet is concerning
By being a monopoly
How so? There are dozens of website hosts and DDOS protection services around.
having a unique chokehold on the internet
Have they ever utilised it in any extent?
Even if we don’t get into their ties with various governments that they inevitably have to have
That sounds suspiciously close to “I have zero proof but I think they’re doing X”. Can you elaborate on those government ties?
the fact that they alone can cripple the internet is concerning
Imagine a hosting company that’s 100% open-source, 100% vegan, 100% green, 100% pro-consumer. Their service is so good that the vast majority of the Internet starts using them.
Do you start hating them at the point where they reach, lets say, 50% market share, just because they managed to grow that large?
I guess what I’m asking is: do you have any concrete cause for the Cloudflare hate, or is it just a “they’re big therefore they must be bad, because big == bad”?
Liberalism really does a cook a lot of peoples brains dont it?
It always was?
Why?
IIRC a lot of hate comes from their refusal to blacklist kiwifarms after they bullied several people to suicide.
But… they did blacklist Kiwifarms? In 2022.
Good for them. I like to keep the free and open browser that works, free and running… So I donate a little to Firefox and Thunderbird, every so often.
The title is an oxymoron lol
Your an ox and a moron
I’ve seen a lot of Ladybird news recently. Let me know when I can actually try using it.
You can try using it.
It will crash most of the time, but it’s technically already usable.
pack it up folks, we’ve been compromised
Cloudflare and “challenging the status quo” in the same phrase ?
Well, the browser status quo. I guess they want their own Chrome.
Its sponsorship only of an open source browser, with no telemetry, advertising, crypto, etc, etc built in.
Sponsors get listed as sponsors, thats it.
For now
So when they do just fork it?
I likely won’t touch it anyway, but it is fully open source, so it can be forked easily. With the transition to Swift I suspect there would be plenty of devs who could take things forward if they wanted to.
If you look at history, Google did the opposite with Chrome, they forked an open source browser and turned it into the world’s most used.
I guess we’ll see.Thats google though, with the added ability to put it direct into an extremely common OS (Android). With ladybird, you’ve got an apparent neocon and 3 years currently planned for a GA release (2028). Its future is already pretty uncertain regardless of sponsorship.
So when they do just fork it?
say the same for chrome, and think again if you mean it seriously.
Iridium, cromite, edge, brave, thorium, vivaldi, pale moon…
And this is a drastically simpler browser that would be in swift 6.
and what can they do against the manifest v3 migration? they cannot afford to keep maintaining the code for mv2 addons. it is an important topic for efficient content blocking.
its funny you bring up edge as an alternative. brave too has opt-out telemetry and other shenanigans.
ladybird browser coming up with status quo integration so they challenge status quo.
it’s like these browser devs have no idea what people actually want in a browser.
Like, definitely not a full screen window. Have they changed that yet?
There’s nothing about integrating anything (I assume you mean Cloudflare turnstile?). It’s Cloudflare giving money to projects they like. Apparently Ladybird also has a 100k per donor limit, so that’s the max Cloudflare can give (annually?)
that’s like taking money from google just so they aren’t considered monopolies in the browser segment.
doesn’t “challenge” no status quo.
Remind me, which browser is Cloudlfare making?
did i ever make that claim or imply it anywhere?
You compared the Cloudflare situation to “taking money from Google” and added that due to Ladybird taking money from Cloudflare, they’re “not challenging the status quo”.
Ladybird being a browser has absolutely no bearing on webhosting and the only status quo it can challenge is in the browser market. Which implies that you think Cloudflare has something to do with the browser market.
i compared it to firefox, saying sucking up to oligarchies for money gets you tied up with them and prevents you from challenging them.
no use in challenging “the browser market” when you are getting funded by the very same actors keeping it the way it is.
Again: what does Cloudflare have to do with the browser market…?
Apolitical people are really funny.
to be fair “apolitical” usually leans right-wing
Cloudflare has announced its sponsorship of the Ladybird browser, an independent (still-in-development) open-source initiative
Is it still independent?
Yes, and their donations are limited to 100k a year per corporation/organization, so there cant be a company who comes, donates 20million and then tries to gain control of them through money
Yes, and their donations are limited to 100k a year per corporation/organization
Interesting that they did that.
Frankly, that’s really cool and I think all NPOs capable of doing that should follow suit… though I suppose that paves the way towards ghost or shell companies sneaking in that way… Hmm…
Yes, it is still independent. Cloudflare is just one of the three Platinum sponsors. Other two are Shopify and FUTO. Proton is also a sponsor, but in Gold tier, iirc.
Shopify being a sponsor makes it highly suspect instantly.
Andreas (lead engineer) has told the story of how he got that money - they just happen to know each other and $100k is peanuts for the Shopify founders.
But you’re right to suspect anything of the sort!
No browser with third party investors can be really independent, they always will obey more the interests of the investors as on those from the users. Anyway the guys from Ladybird have balls of steel to develope an browser engine from scratch in an market saturated of browsers of any kind and a brutal competition, this would had more sense 15 years ago, but not now. Good luck, maybe in 2029-2030 there is an good browser multi-platform with all the needed infrastructure, servers and extensions, but I’ll see to believe.
How can you say it’s saturated when chrome has an effective monopoly. If you look at browser engines, there’s basically only 3 for desktop, with one of them targeting only Macs.
As said, there are currently three engines + two forks of these (Gonanna and Qt), except some basic render engines from text only browsers (Links, Lynx and some others), but over hundred different browsers which use these engines, + almost 70 abandoned ones, because outdated engines and others which also tried to develope an own engine. This is what I mean with saturated. It’s nice to try to release a browser with a new independent engine, but if there are not enough users which also use it, it’s a death born child. For some products the market is limited. Make it eg. sense to release a new OS? There also existing only 4, Unix, Unixbased like Windows or Mac and Linux with tons of distros. It’s not only the browser engine, in over 20 years there are also growed complete infrastructure arround these engines, dedicated plug ins, extensions, etc, which don’t exist for a new indie engine, precisely because other browsers, which also tried to release a new engine, before Ladybird, are currently all death. Sad, but you need also a minimum of infrastructure for an browser and which offer also somewhat more as only a new engine. It need security and privacy measures, inbuild or with extensions/plug-ins which need an extra developement and other things more.
No browser with third party investors can be really independent, they always will obey more the interests of the investors as on those from the users.
That’s why they limited donations to $100k per organization. No one is allowed to make themselves indispensable to the project.
I think It’s on their charter that no matter how much corporate money they’ll get they’ll never accept any outside influence just the same. The donators are amply warned to not expect anything other than development as usual or faster.
People always imagine this as “I will pay you $100 to kick the puppy” and of course they would never.
But what actually happens is that you have a long-term donor. You rely on their help (they’re paying for you to be able to hire a nice college intern who’s really smart and has been fun to have on the project). They never tell you what to do so you see them as more of a friend than anything else. It’s perfectly normal to get some lunch with friends and talk. You’re stuck on some problems and they have some good connections that help you out. That might even be worth more than $100k, but it’s not money at all so it’s OK that they’re helping you like this. They also talk you up, which is like free advertising except you didn’t ask for it so that also doesn’t count. Anyway, at some of the lunches they’re telling you about what’s going on with them and there’s some problems they’re dealing with that you could help with. They don’t ask for help, of course, because they know you’re independent. But being independent means it’s OK for you to do what you want. Even help a friend out who didn’t ask for help so they’re not influencing you…
This guy politiks
they stated on their website this project will remain independet and that donators don´t have a say in how this is being developed
Straight outta Onion
