The reason might be because ten years ago we all went home to our moms and pops and told them we had finally found a perfect browser for them that was much safer and leaner and better in every way and even though the switch from IE to Chrome was hard on them, they went along. Now they are masters of their browser and will not listen to us proclaiming that "well, I was wrong to put you on Chrome, but this time I really have found the bestest browser".
Also, there's a lack of benign browsers in the market. Even team FF tries to make your mom buy things she doesn't really want or need, with their Firefox Suggest feature.
Chrome is still the best, by far. No ads and random anti-patterns I don't want in the interface (looking at you Firefox), no MS shenanigans (10x worse than FF), it just gets out of the way and does its job. Bonus it runs DRM (I don't like it but necessary evil), casts to Chromecast, Google is still the best search engine, etc...
chrome does have anti-patterns, they're just far more insidious. like being logged into google meaning also being logged into the browser. they continuous refusal to block 3rd party cookies in any way, due to also being an advertisement company that massively benefits from them
IMO it's going to get pushed back even further. Their FLoC and other tracking-but-not tech is getting pushback, and they're not going to sacrifice revenue for privacy.
they pushed it back to allow for more time to figure out new ways to do targeted advertisement, because everyone hated their FLoC system. this is once again, google acting in its own interest as an advertisement company.
Google can't win? Their idea of removing third party cookies was on the condition everybody would accept FLoC, so Google still makes money while everybody else doesn't. Yes, it's an antitrust concern.
You spread misinformation. Any ad company can use FLoC.
Let me be very explicit for you: privacy advocates say 3rd party cookies are bad b/c they allow tracking yet the eu blocks google from removing them b/c they think it might hurt their own ad tracking companies.
> No ads and random anti-patterns I don't want in the interface
This is slightly ironic, since Chrome exists solely so that Google can more effectively sell ads on every page you visit and track everything you do. I guess sites themselves aren’t technically part of the browser UI though.
> Chrome exists solely so that Google can more effectively sell ads on every page you visit and track everything you do.
No Chrome exists because Google didn't have a desktop OS at the time and they needed a platform. They developed things like V8 to make the browser a better platform for things like Maps.
And FF is an example of a browser that exists solely to sell ads. Mozilla has no other revenue stream. That's why they shove ads into your start screen.
At least Google has some non-ad revenue. Diverse, useful products. And I can trust that my data will only be used to match ads to me via algorithm, they're not going to sell my actual data, unlike most other players out there. And there's no ads in the Google products I pay for. MS puts ads in paid products, Samsung puts ads in paid products, most OEMs actually. Google keeps the ads on their webpages, they don't creep into things you pay for.
I am sorry to wake you up, but the existence of Google revenue is based on what it knows about you. Of course they don’t sell your data, because they are big enough to use that data all by themselves, giving them competitive advantage.
You praise them that everything works when you pay for Google, but that is every evil companys dream; make user hostile anti-patterns for free users and get them happy paying customers. The whole Youtube in these days is one the worst websites in the web, because of the systematic addition of user-hostile features for free users. Do you really want to support service like that?
What it comes to FF, there are no really other options to get some revenue from the browser. At least they are now trying with the VPN.
> I am sorry to wake you up, but the existence of Google revenue is based on what it knows about you. Of course they don’t sell your data, because they are big enough to use that data all by themselves, giving them competitive advantage.
And? Thats far better than what most companies do. Credit card companies for example. There's a whole slew of 'traditional' companies that sell products and STILL sell your information.
I'd rather they have my data and allow me to use it for useful things (contextual search, maps, etc...) and use it to match me ads to make money versus companies like MS that would make me pay for their products, still shove ads in my face, then try to lock me into more products with a bunch of dark patterns, etc...
> The whole Youtube in these days is one the worst websites in the web, because of the systematic addition of user-hostile features for free users. Do you really want to support service like that?
Youtube enables creators in a way nothing before it did. It literally created a new type of publishing. As for ads on free Youtube, it's still far less than all the commercials that permeated cable TV since its inception.
Google is far less hostile to users and creators, free or paid, than cable companies and traditional media companies were for decades.
My trust in Chrome dropped a lot when they started implementing things like Native Client allowlisted to only work on google.com subdomains (giving Google properties a competitive advantage that nobody else had) and Dartium (an internal-politics-focused attempt to kill JS), proposing WebBundles as an attempt to push AMP into the browser, using UA sniffing to roll out Google+ features only to Chrome even when Firefox worked on them, conveniently breaking Google properties in non-Chrome browsers, etc. Hanlon's razor applies to some of this, but regardless of intentions it's all very convenient for them.
> using UA sniffing to roll out Google+ features only to Chrome even when Firefox worked on them, conveniently breaking Google properties in non-Chrome browsers, etc.
You reminded me of when they broke Microsoft Edge[0] by adding an empty (useless) div over the video element. IIRC that ruined its hardware acceleration, too.
uBlock Origin is great. It's installed on every machine I use, and for good reason. AdGuard is pretty cool, too, but they're more of a commercial effort.
Honestly, I don't think this rings true anymore. Google's search quality has significantly dropped. I was astonished when someone brought up Google: there were four(!) ads in the SERP, disguised as organic results.
The actual results, the organic ones, are very similar to DuckDuckGo[0] too. I've been using DDG for a long while now. Great search engine.
FF puts ads in the page you start on. There's no ads on Chrome when you open a new tab, the default page when it starts up, etc... No ads in the UI. And when you pay for things, no ads. No ads in my Gmail, on my Youtube (yes I pay for Premium), etc... Versus other companies that'll put ads in paid products (MS, Samsung, others).
Firefox's new tab page mechanism seems to recommend very suspicious insurance schemes too. Do they vet what they advertise? Actually, as an off-topic thing, how would you even advertise on FF?
Edge used to do this while having all the Chrome QoL features that make it better than Safari. Now they're eating away at that cause they're idiots. The Windows 11 era of Windows sucks
I really don't get it. I switched to Edge on Mac a while ago because it was more compatible than Safari but less bloaty than Chrome.
But I don't think they have anywhere near enough market share yet to start milking it. There is _nothing_ keeping me tied to Edge, and I haven't even really started recommending it to people yet.
Chrome is a terrifying window into the internet. To say it is the “best” is a bankrupt technical praise with no regards of privacy or the fact that Google knows more about you than you do. It has a monopoly on this.
Let’s not become more dystopian. Google is one of those evil companies that hardly get bad press on HN along with TikTok.
On paper this makes it even weirder, you would think the company that made its money from advertising would have done this - not the company that made its money letting people write VBA and macros
Also, there's a lack of benign browsers in the market. Even team FF tries to make your mom buy things she doesn't really want or need, with their Firefox Suggest feature.