Mozilla has created its own problems. It has no one to blame but itself for its now-inevitable failure.

It will be a great loss. Its add-on/extension model allowed for the first and probably the last time a browser to be something more than just a content consumption engine but rather a real productivity tool.

And it’s also the first time that I’ve ever had a browser that could do exactly what I wanted it to do.

But that’s all going away with the rest of the interesting parts of the internet as it all becomes  sanitized.

This article is good, but ignored in it is how Mozilla has inexorably removed customization options from its users, and made the browser into a toy.

Australis was the tocsin of death for Firefox.

While Firefox usage was already declining, the advent of Australis was when the power users and tech evangelists started abandoning the browser in earnest. This abandonment means that any tech product will eventually die as they are the people who tell regular, non-technical people (about 99% of the population) what to use.

I used to recommend Firefox to anyone who’d listen. I even had a Firefox T-shirt at one time. Now I tell people just to use whatever browser came with their machine, and to avoid Firefox as it’s become unpredictable and user-hostile.

Regular users are highly confused by Australis, especially if they’ve already used Firefox. But the hamburger menu helps no one, contra even Chrome.

Mozilla had a real chance to distinguish Firefox as a non-Chrome browser. They blew it and won’t get another chance.

It’s unfortunate but it’s what’s happened.