Marketing Mozilla 263
garzpacho writes "Despite a 10% market share, Firefox isn't quite mainstream, especially with fairly flat growth after its initial explosion. With the approaching October release of Firefox 2, the team is looking for ways to gain greater mainstream acceptance — and adoption. This article and slideshow look at some of the company's unusual marketing efforts to date and speculate on the future. From the article: '[T]o widen its current user base, Mozilla will need more than elaborate marketing events. Because the new version of Internet Explorer is expected to be more competitive with Firefox, Firefox may need to evolve into more than just a browser. Seth Godin, author of several books on the Internet, including Small Is the New Big, says Mozilla needs to incorporate tools like tagging or... [linking] to eBay's Skype calling service that will help keep friends connected. The idea being, the browser becomes more valuable the more your friends use it, so you've got a reason to become a Firefox evangelist. Mozilla isn't giving many details on the soon-to-be-launched Firefox 2, but... there will be new features not found in current browsers.'"
How about the free software aspect? (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:How about the free software aspect? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Thats the thing with statistics. If you know what result you want, all you have to do is figure out where to collect your data.
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Re:How about the free software aspect? (Score:4, Insightful)
A surefire way (Score:2)
I'm sure many OEM's would jump at the chance to stick it to MS. The same bundling bullshit that has hurt them can be thrown in their face. Not even the Dells and HPs of the world, but the Emachines and small systems builders.
Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Insightful)
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Unfortunatly no one outside of IT gets this. They want to use one utility to do everything and I mean everything even if it doesn't do anything particularly well.
Take AOL... there biggest selling point is that by paying for the service you get the program suite which does a number of things and provides a number of services that could be had free or for little cost. Non technical people see this as presenting value.
IF you want to market to the computer illiterate public you need to tell them about al
Re:Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe, and here you're echoing a point in the OP:
Because the new version of Internet Explorer is expected to be more competitive with Firefox, Firefox may need to evolve into more than just a browser.
The trouble with this is that they effectively killed off the original Mozilla suite because it was getting too bloated, and hence Firefox was born. Now it seems they want to add new cruft into Firefox. I guess it all goes to show that the one thing we learn from history is that nobody ever learns anything from history.
Re:Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Insightful)
I disagree. They killed the original Mozilla suite because it was bloated with things you don't need while browsing. As a web browser, it did a basic job - "but wait, there's more! You also get this email client you may not need, which doubles as a newsreader; you get an IRC client, an HTML editor, and let's see what else we can cram in here!"
To compete with Internet Explorer, you want to pare it down to just a browser, and enhance the browsing experience. All those other things are completely different products. If I feel I need to replace my existing email client, let me decide separately. Same for the rest. I just want the best browsing experience I can have. Firefox is an attempt to deliver that, and nothing else.
So I say, if they can incorporate clever extensions as default options that enhance the everyday browsing experience, like tabs or better bookmarks or even bittorrent (a transparent download enhancement?), that makes perfect sense. However, extra tools that are effectively different tasks altogether unrelated to browsing, like IRC chat or internet telephony - those should probably stay as user-installable extensions.
I'll browse the web efficiently with Firefox, and if I decide I need to get on the FooBar internet bandwagon, maybe there's a neat extension that does that job for me right from firefox. But if it has little to do with browsing, it doesn't belong in the default download.
Re:Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I would argue that bittorrent has nothing to do with web browsing, and that it's exactly the type of application you were talking about in the Mozilla suite that shouldn't have been there. I mean, if you're adding bittorrent, why not an emule client? Why not a binary newsreader? Why not all the other ways people download things? And hey, while we're at it, people get files through email too! And then suddenly you're right back where we started with the bloated Mozilla suite.
The problem is everybody seems to say the same thing, "oh, Firefox should just be a web browser, except for this one extra feature that I think would fit in perfectly!" But that "one extra feature" is different for everybody, and if you include one, there's going to be a temptation to try to include them all. This is how feature bloat starts, and it's exactly what happened to Mozilla.
The Firefox team needs to stay focused like a laser beam on Firefox's core function. It's what differentiates Firefox from every other browser. I don't see what the point is in even trying to compete with IE, honestly, especially if it degrades the experience. I mean if the way to compete with IE is to make the browser as bad as IE and as bad as the Mozilla suite, then what are we actually gaining? It's as if a great indie rock band decides they want more fans, so they emulate Britney Spears. I mean, maybe that'll get them more fans, but it's sure not going to make the music any better.
People use Firefox because they don't want all these "features". If I want tons of features and I don't want to use IE, I can just use Opera. I use Firefox because it's a lightweight browser that does nothing but browse and does it well. I do agree that enhancements to the browsing experience can be added (e.g. tabbed browsing), but every single feature being considered needs to pass that litmus test first and foremost. When somebody proposes a feature, everybody needs to ask first "is this directly related to web browsing?" and second "will the majority of users want this?" If the answer to *either* of those questions is "no", then the feature should not be added.
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Firefox is the most unstable program in common use (Score:5, Insightful)
That's because spyware is marketed in a more effective fashion. Yes, the spyware marketing is a lie, and a destructive lie. However, spyware is marketed as simple. If you investigate Firefox, you will find many, many articles with the general subject: "How to spend a day doing highly technical things that may or may not make Firefox work correctly". For example, Google "Firefox memory" [google.com]. Or, Google "Firefox unstable" [google.com]. Or, "Firefox Crash" [google.com].
Sure, Firefox has extensions, but they often make Firefox unstable. The Firefox team thinks that it is entirely acceptable to market Firefox extensions, but when the extensions cause Firefox to be unstable, to excuse the instability by saying that it is caused by an extension.
From the Slashdot story: "With the approaching October release of Firefox 2, the team is looking for ways to gain greater mainstream acceptance - and adoption." This is nonsense, in my opinion. Firefox is, once again, the most unstable program in common use [slashdot.org]. If anyone on the Firefox team actually cared about Firefox acceptance, they would fix the bugs, which were first reported 3 years ago. Note that the main bug report linked is always marked invalid. That's not because anything has been done about the instability of Firefox; it's because people on the Firefox team don't want to, or don't know how to, fix the very, very serious bugs.
The 1.5.0.4 version of Firefox was quite stable, if the Flashblock extension was installed. The 1.5.0.6 version is unstable again. The CPU-hogging bug is back!
This comment posted from a copy of Firefox that is constantly using about 5% of the CPU, even when all pages have been loaded, and there is no active content. That's 2.8% on the way to 70% or more, which will soon make it necessary to close Firefox and reboot Windows XP.
The problem appears to be that Firefox does not allocate enough resources. If you open several Firefox windows and several tabs in each window, and leave them open for several days, or suspend or hibernate your computer a few times, you will find that Firefox has started to hog the CPU.
Apparently everyone on the Firefox team wants to add features or work on easy bugs. Apparently also, browser programmers are not necessarily heavy browser users. People who often do research on the internet are likely to cause Firefox to become unstable.
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By the time I say, "You just have to click Tools - Extensions/Add-ons..." I've lost them. Make an Extensions button at the top of every installation, and with one click it presents a list of teh top 10 extensions with a big MORE link to the rest.
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Would it work along side a system like the one Firefox has now or replace it?
Re:Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Interesting)
Why not offer a few different builds with pre-installed extensions so that Mom & Pop can just download a version with the features they want?
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While this isn't exactly a perfect analogy, I think that it's close enough to at least consider. For exa
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1. beef up the highlight/search feature to the level of dictionary search and have it come wikipedia search set up. Maybe have include every search installed in the search box up top.
2. fix the installation of shockwave and quicktime. They're annoying. Just make it work without having to do it manually.
3. include IEview or IEtab.
4. include an image zoomer such as zoom fox.
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One thing I recently thought of that would be a great thing to include in FF is some kind of "extension profile". Every time I install FF (not that often, but it happens) I find myself going to addons.mozilla.org and re-installing the same list of extensions. It would be really nice to be able to have an XML file or something with my list of extensions, and have FF
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Installation options (Score:3)
Once in a while prompt the user with a new, updated list.
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That's very short-sighted. What makes you think that anyone who tries FF is going to stick with it if it doesn't blow IE7 out of the water? Getting marketshare up is dependent both on user retention and getting new users.
Too complex for many users. Plus, too many choices can be very intimidating. Plug-and-play is what's needed here IMO (if you want to incr
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For example, the Enhanced installer can do what installers have done for years -
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Well, my OP in the thread is basically concerned with getting new users out of the Joe Schmoe segment of the population.
I'm not trying to be argumentative, but I'll address the three segments of the market that you list (apologies for paraphrasing):
1. Those who had IE swapped out by someone in the know: this segment is growing, albeit slowly. It's still very small compared to the market of those with
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Why, what's wrong with learning from someone who is successful? Sure beats the alternative. :)
The biggest problem I see (on further reflection) is that by providing all those plug-ins as default, Mozilla is basically vouching that they won't break anything. This makes patches much more difficult, as they have been known to break extensions in the past... Basically, it make me worry that Mozilla will be dealing with scope creep, and that too much time wil
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If they could just fix up their RSS support so that quotation marks, question marks, and ampersands showed up properly rather than in html code in my
Re:Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Funny)
Must not make joke...must not make joke...
-Eric
Re:Keep Mozilla Simple (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a structural flaw somewhere in the brain of many software product marketeer. When asked on how to enlarge market share or how to make more profit, the answer apparently always is: Enlarge functionality, more functions means more market share means more profit.
It's wrong. I always tend to flee away from products when they reach this phase and become bloated. That's why i ran into Firefox in the first place! Because it's light weight. I think a better market strategy would be: Firefox 2 is even more light weight, it runs smoother and faster than anything you've experienced so far. We dumped the features that nobody uses and made it even easier to use.
That would make my parents happy, I'll tell you.
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Yes they will lsoe you but they will get a lot of other users instead.
If Mozilla are going to get beyong 10%, market share they have to get the bells and whistels. The vast majority of people use the app with the most features - look at how successful MS Office is.
Most non-geek firefox users use it because it has tabs, now IE is getting tabs, Firefox needs something new to stay ahead - and it has to be built in.
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Two things (Score:5, Interesting)
I am running IE 7 RC1 now and it is slow. Dog slow. It makes molasses look like freaking Speedy Gonzales on meth. Firefox starts up quick and doesn't chew up as much CPU time when running.
2) Greasemonkey
If IE 7 has anything like Greasemonkey, I haven't found it.
On the other hand, Firefox still uses up memory like it's got some birthright to as much as it can horde. And it doesn't have as large a viewing area as IE 7.
No Greasemonkey, what about Trixie? (Score:2)
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Re:Two things (Score:4, Funny)
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Just get it pre-installed at dell/compaq/HP/etc (Score:5, Insightful)
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This is the single most effective way of getting market share.
Marketing efforts (Score:2, Offtopic)
Wasn't firefox designed as the simple mozilla? (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope history doesn't repeat itself, use the KISS principle.
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I tell people to use Firefox because it's a better browser, not because it has more bell and whistles.
Leave the extra bling to extensions, which is the whole point of extensions.
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There is a reason that every damn bit of software on Windows bundles private copies of all the libraries it uses that are not themselves part of Windows. No program is immune.
Dependencies are bad for non-geek users (Score:2)
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I hope history doesn't repeat itself, use the KISS principle.
From a programmer's side, I got the impression this is almost a cycle long-term. You start out with a tidy core, then add some layers and layers until it looks like a bloated onion. Then you form a new, tidy core and the cycle starts over.
On the application side, I got the impression that at least some software grows with the user base. Over tim
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That is not what I wanted. I want my email to work with my browser. I want an editor to make web pages.
I know there is seamonkey. Why is there not just a new mozilla version, why force the name change?
Who thinks up these names? Mozilla? SeaMonkey? Firefox is ok, but what does it have to do with the internet or browsing?
The KISS Principle (Score:2, Funny)
You mean Mozilla action figures, lunchboxes, pinball machines, condoms and caskets, right?
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If firefox bloats up with crap I don't want (bittorrent, delicious tagging, rss readers, etc) built in, I'll find a browser that doesn't have all the bloat. Keep all the extras in extensions where they belong.
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Maybe someone should go after the nerds-on-choppers crowd and do a blue motorcycle helmet with an orange fox wrapped around it. Sadly, I'm not talented enough with an airbrush to do it.
Um (Score:3, Insightful)
Is Seth unfamiliar with Flock [flock.com], I wonder? It's exactly what he's asking for. And I haven't exactly noticed it threatening to swamp Firefox in terms of popularity (though in fairness it hasn't reached 1.0 yet -- but I really doubt it will blow FF away even then, except maybe among some niche audiences).
Bloatware? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think if Mozilla convinced more IT Managers that it is the browser that their users ought to be using, IT Departments everywhere begin to set Firefox as the default browser on all of their computers and more people start realizing the benefits of
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I have a W2K system at home with only a 1/2 gig of ram and I have never, EVER, had any memory issues. And yes, I do leave my browser open for days on end.
Maybe people should look at things like Flash, Shockwave and extensions for memory leaks rather than complaining it is the browser which is the issue.
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Which is what I said above. It's not the browser, it's something else. Particularly that annoying security risk Flash. That alone will kill a system.
Though I do have to ask, why have java turned on at all? 99.9% of pages don't need java to work. I never have it turned on except in those 1 in a million pages which for some reason needs it. Java, like Flash, will also muck up your system.
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I have none of these memory issues. I do block flash but I notice it loads then hides the object. Java is fine if the applet is not bloated. Properly written AJAX webpages are fine. Poorly written AJAX webpages (yes, you eBay) suffer.
My homepage is 8 tabs. Slow to display but fine after that. AND I run other programs alongside it like StrongDC, Newsbin Pro... on another screen via a second GFX card, I might
Uhm (Score:3, Informative)
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It should NOT evolve into more that just a browser (Score:5, Insightful)
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a single cross-platform, cross-protocol GUI platform.
I find little joy in writing UI code. The concept of a single target that Just Works on all known OSs and lets me blow off Tcl/Tk, Gtk, Qt, wxWidgets, Swing, Windows.Forms, and every other kinda-the-same-only-different GUI kit is highly attractive.
Not to besmirch the fine efforts of people smarter than me, but I lack the attention span and patience required for the aforementioned smattering of technol
Re:It should NOT evolve into more that just a brow (Score:2)
I have a better idea (Score:3, Insightful)
That would make it worth using again. After a promising start, it got worse and worse with every release.
But instead, they are focusing on marketing techniques and gimmicks in order to spread the fox. It would be cool to have a good, not a well marketed, browser. Besides, do they really think they're in MS's league when it comes to marketing software?
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Question #2: how to make an uncrashable software?
Question #3: how to integrate it with main OSes?
Question #4: what is the relationship between community and most linux distros?
Wish #1, I hope they can make the memory footprint smaller. But I got 3G memory, and I don't really care.
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#2: Um... write better code. Code reviews. Smoketests. Purify. Seriously, that's what Computer Engineering's all about - writing robust and scalable code.
#3: Native look-and-feel. Support for the drag-and-drop methods of their respective OS'. Support for their native text rendering and printing facilities. Adoption of that OS' accessibility functionality.
#4: don't understand that question.
sloth jr
Don't tell apple... (Score:5, Funny)
Hmmm. (Score:3, Insightful)
Firefox appealed to me because of simplicity with the option of adding things that I wanted. IE7 is a clunky piece of trash...it looks like sh*t and I can't stand it. Keep it simple for the n00bs, the l337 h@x0rz can use extensions.
Who are they hiding the features from? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Who are they hiding the features from? (Score:5, Informative)
They're not hiding details from anybody, although they're also not widely publicising details to those who aren't interested in trying out pre-release software – the beta 1 release notes [mozilla.org] include a summary of new features, and there's more information for developers [mozilla.org] on how to use the features. (Beta 2 is expected [mozilla.org] for tomorrow and is primarily bug fixes; there won't be any significant changes to the feature set until Firefox 3, which seems to be the real major release.)
From the release notes:
Features like phishing protection were actually announced for IE7 over a year ago, but it seems that Firefox will be the first to ship with them. (Firefox also defaults to an implementation that better protects your privacy than IE [msdn.com], using an automatically-updated blacklist of sites instead of sending every URL you visit to a web service run by a company you may or may not trust.)
In the words of Anakin.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Firefox may need to evolve into more than just a browser.
Please don't do it!
I use Firefox because it's simple, it has a minimal resource footprint (unless you start getting addicted to extensions (*looks sternly at Forecastfox*)), and above all renders QUICKLY.
I don't know why IE can't replicate this, but still IE takes forever to render some pages long after Firefox is done loading. But that nimbleness is precisely what keeps me with Firefox. Start loading it with everything including the kitchen sink, and I personally will find the next, simpler browser.
Stripped down version of Firefox (Score:2)
Anyone else wishing someone would create a stripped down version of Firefox optimized for speed, without all the crud? They could call it something like Phoenix, or even Firebird, to distinguish it from Firefox.
Pre-bundled extensions (Score:2)
Or maybe not.
I'm a big fan of Mozilla (well, Firefox) and, unlike a lot of people here, I would dearly love to see a number of plugins actually come bundled into the default build because they truly are useful (for example, adblock) and some actually put directly into
Mozilla is opensource (Score:2)
Bet it's more than 10% these days (Score:2)
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How bout we just stick to web browsing??? (Score:3, Insightful)
KISS (Score:2, Interesting)
A "special" video? (Score:2, Funny)
Firefox and usemap (Score:3, Interesting)
Until then, I'll stick with Opera, thanks.
Obsession with Market Share Growth (Score:2)
At some point, I was somewhat surprised that Mozilla made a good amount of money from its search box, and it may make sense for them to seek greater market share for that re
FireFox needs a 'killer extension'! (Score:2)
Gaia Online pushes FireFox because of the Gaia toolbar.
DeviantArt pushes FireFox because of the navigational apps available.
Fanfiction.net pushes FireFox because it insists IE is just plain 'badware'.
Webcomics push FireFox because of the Morning Coffee extension.
Everyone has their reasons for FireFox, but no unifying purpose. What extension can FireFox use that EVERYONE wants?
And no, ForecastFox doesn't c
wait a second.... (Score:2)
Mozilla isn't giving many details on the soon-to-be-launched Firefox 2, but... there will be new features not found in current browsers.'" Click here to find out more!
I guess those crafty open-source bastards were hiding their secrets [mozilla.org] pretty well!
Best Marketting (Score:2)
Getting more users to use Firefox (Score:2)
One good way (Score:2)
Less is More (Score:2)
It has to work the same and so far, no (Score:2)
emacs (Score:2)
Awesome, by the time they reach Firefox 4, in barely a couple of years, it will have so many 'functions' that it will be like an OS inside the OS, à la emacs
OK, done trolling for today :-)
superbowl ad (Score:2)
Buy 1 second of ad time for the next Superbowl (less if you can get it). Cost is about $85k per second. Not cheap. But it will be so odd that it will be discussed for weeks before it airs in newspapers and on TV. Probably run dozens of times like the 1984 Apple ad. And slowed down so people will have time to figure out "what the hell was that?" And that will be worth the equivalent of mill
mozilla marketing? (Score:2)
Work and there will be flour! [mozilla.org]
That really communicates the superior nature of mozilla's product.
For the good of the code! [mozilla.org]
That re
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In other words, the mozilla project exists so as to prevent Microsoft from having such a monopoly on the web that the web becomes an extension of windows and becomes inaccessible to other OSes like Linux or MacOS, that would result in merely killing the web and rename it MSN.
When gecko was under 2% market share, Windows only site
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I'll just add that the choice by people to use alternative browsers is a gateway to them using other alternative software.
"Gee, this Firefox works much better than IE... I wonder what else is out there that I don't know about? That Clippy guy sure is annoying..."
What I think is great is that Firefox is a great way of introducing people to the Open Source community as a whole.
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C'mon. The problem was beaten to death all over the Internet. Just disable caching of recently viewed pages, remove most extension - and you'll be fine.
Parsed web page cache take quite space. You can't avoid that.
Extensions use lots of JavaScript. JavaScript utilizes Garbage Collection. Many extension writers do not even consider memory consumption. Every new variable, every dynamic array - all that eats memory up.
In other words, the most memory consuming features of Firefox - are the features we