Considering that the two projects funded by Cloudflare are headed by known bigots (Andreas Kling and DHH), it makes me distrust Cloudflare even further.
this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2025
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Really hoping this project goes well and has a strong start.
As the top comment on the Hacker News thread notes,
Cloudflare clearly wants to move us to a future where only approved browsers are allowed to access the web... an independent open source web browser is obviously against that ethos.
I'm suspicious on that basis alone.
When it incorporates something like TreeStyleTab, I'll look into it, horizontal tab bars are just silly - most have widescreen displays and content is usually in narrow columns.
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.
Wauw, that's crazy speculations. Google buys a service from Firefox, that doesn't give them the right to manage Firefox. Give me 1 example where Google did what you say? Otherwise, let's archive that fantasy rambling as paranoid speculation.
- It's a standard discussion point, not my argument in particular. It's the same one as for why it's a problem to have so much corporate money behind news media, political campaigns, and just about anything else.
But - It's all speculation, both the idea of priority manipulation happening and your idea it does not. The general population doesn't know anyone at these projects, so everything has to be discussed in vague generalities. You can say 'I trust X never to take a bribe, because I know X.' but you can't say 'I trust all members of the profession X is in, because they are in that profession.'
Saying you don't trust Google is just sensible. Saying you don't trust management at something like Mozilla because they are faceless management, (not that all the things said about choices made inside Mozilla are likely to encourage trust) though a bit generalizing, is also fairly understandable. As such, it's not at all unusual that people are going to hold some distrust for the combination of the two, especially when one of the big drivers of Firefox usage is specifically that it's supposed to be more respecting of privacy than chrome or edge. The user base is already primed to be distrustful of tech companies, and not through paranoia but experience.
I'm not saying manipulation of Mozilla by Google is guaranteed to happen but it's honestly less speculative to expect creepy activity from google, a company for which the business model is 'do sneaky shit on the internet,' than to assume absolutely everything going on is totally trustworthy.
So not a single example, but paranoid speculation, based on your general distrust. That's fine - you're allowed to feel that way.
It's a silly and stupid fallacy, to say that it's speculation that they are not being manipulated. But no, it's not speculation, it's the general principle to say that something needs proof. But I guess you are always in a state of flux. "Be weary of gods, because we can't prove they are there, but I believe they are - because someone else can't prove that they are not there..." That's so incredible silly.
But thanks for the talk. Now, please go find some other paranoid person to share your speculations with.
"Partly funded by"?
Google contributed roughly 83% of Mozilla's income from 2020-2023, and 89% of overall income since 2005.
That's what you call "partly". You know, unlike "solely"...? So what is your question here?
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.
If that changes, Google might lean on them harder.
If you remember, at one time Firefox used to hold 30% of total browser market share, and it was pro-privacy organization back then as it is now.
Even at that time Google was not managed to influence their decision making process.
What makes you think Google didn't influence their decision making process? (Assuming that's what you're saying)
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.
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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.
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I guess I won't be using it then. 🤷♂️
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.
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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?
It is being rewritten using swift
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.
challenge the status quo by partnering with the status quo...
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.
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ew what
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