News Mozilla considers tracking Firefox browsing habits

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2008/05/20/mozilla-considers-tracking-firefox-browsing-habits/1

Mozilla CEO John Lilly has revealed that the Firefox developer is considering tracking users' browsing habits on a voluntary basis.

 

No.

 

Yeah count me out, if they could keep the data anonymous then maybe because it would actually be quite interesting, but I don't see that happening.

 

i got a lot more faith in mozilla than i do in aol, but still a no. don't know why, just don't like the idea.

 

'a project that is said to collect data on users’ browsing habits if they chose to opt into the scheme'

IF THEY CHOOSE TO OPT INTO THE SCHEME.

I'll hold my breath until we know how this pans out, and whether or not he's being truthful.. Or if they'll just be another company abusing the market share of their new software by collecting user statistics whether they want it or not.

They have this market share due to the browser being perceived as safer and more trustworthy than IE. IE already stole all the user-friendly features, so it's all they have left. If they squander that by bundling what amounts to malware in my eyes with the browser.. That share will plummet. I sure hope they don't go down this road.

 

If you opt-in then its a feature to enhance your experience, or dont opt-in, then its a oops if they get caught doing it anyway...

 

I hope we will NOT be giving this info by default, otherwise lots of people will just click "opt in" because there is the word "recommended" next to it.

 

It is foss, you could always patch it and compile it your self not to include this. I agree with the sentiment though, count me out.

 

DO NOT WANT!

 

If it's opt-in, then by all means. Not that I would opt-in.

 

I can see certain people being very childish over this and shout me not want. But as long as it's op-in I don't see why they shouldn't include it in there program. I must say i wouldn't opt in myself though. As they've said it would run anonymously.

 

From what is being said on the Mozillazine.org forums, it looks like this may be "opt-in" via an add-on. So you've got to add the functionality in before any data is sent to Mozilla.

IMO it is a bad idea anyway, and I'll not be using FF or Thunderbird if this goes ahead, opt-in or not. The major problem that Mozilla have here is that this is being seen as Spyware, and that is generally seen as a very bad thing, no matter who has written it.

Andy

 

put on your tin hats people!! it is optional!

as for me, i will chose to help out.

 

So they just figured out what demo-testing means? But they don't want to pay for it.

 

The first person to actually show practical support for OSS.

99.999% of OSS users are just free-loaders.

 

Well that's a hazard of creating OSS, cpemma. I've certainly made no contributions back to the Wordpress codebase despite using it, nor PHPBB back when I was running a forum. Certainly not Firefox, though I'm not a desktop developer. There was a web snippet for geo-location that I did make the author aware of a bug and respective fix, though from what I've seen it wasn't implemented (except in my own code, but that's not my problem).

 

I don't think thats fair, there is a lot of value in just running software and submitting bug reports when they arise. Not every one can be a developer, besides that Mozilla is making a small fortune from the ad revenue from google just for having the search bar in the top.

Given the volume of software which is pirated or used as freeware most computer users are free-loaders

 

Ye its optional, so no-one will care....count me out.

 

I'd opt in... I actually like to let developers know that I spend the average 0.2 seconds on fugly flash sites...

 

Do I take it that you like having a libel action taken against you cpemma?

I use OSS, and I support it wherever I can, yes, even paying (via my employer) for OSS instead of using the free version on the net. So labelling OSS users as free-loaders is not a good idea.

Oh, and this post is slightly tongue in cheek

Andy