8 points

The second they start sticking AI bloat in Firefox, I’m out.

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35 points

Are you informed about what they’re using AI for? One example is in-browser translations, which allows it to work offline and be privacy-respecting (no calls to Google, etc).

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8 points

If they want to build extensions that do those things, I fully support them.

I don’t need or want my engineering team building my browser doing things other than building my browser. I want them working on the browser. I need AI I didn’t ask for in my browser like I need an additional hole in my head.

I want my browser to be a browser and if Firefox isn’t focused on just building a great browser, I’m leaving.

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17 points

Leave and go where ?

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7 points

@Deebster@programming.dev @TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world @firefox@fedia.io Why is translation marketed as AI?
You are hurting Firefox’s image by trying to label raw logic as AI which a buzzword accompanied by a lot more baggage you don’t want to have.

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@jfmezei@mstdn.ca @Deebster@programming.dev @TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world @firefox@fedia.io Maybe because Mozilla and their partners actually did use machine learning to build the model that powers the local translation feature?

https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/local-translation-add-on-project-bergamot/

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2 points

Its absolutely not my job to protect Firefox from its self.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/02/13/mozilla-downsizes-as-it-refocuses-on-firefox-and-ai-read-the-memo/

They are the ones who made the announcement and I could give two wiffs of stinky piss about their image. I only care if they make a good product that serves my needs. The microsecond their product ceases to to be a ‘good’ product from my personal viewpoint, I’m dropping them and calling them out on it. They’ve got the best browser in the game rn (imo). Its their game to lose but it looks like they are starting to make some dumb ass choices.

Corporate cheer leading is for sycophants.

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11 points

why, when it can actually be helpful? Using chatgpt for searches is already much faster than denying 10 cookie banners. Some more privacy focused AI would be great, if firefox does that.

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20 points

Using chatgpt for searches

I cannot stress this enough: LLMs are not, have never been, and quite likely never will be search engines. You may as well ask your a auto-complete questions.

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3 points

But LLM can and do use search engines and create summary of the search with references to actual pages, where they found this information. ChatGPT saves tons of time by doing search for you. Want to double check? Go and click the reference. But so far it was very reliable in my experience.

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1 point

They are better than search engines. I can ask anything and get a good answer in a second, without having to search the web.

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4 points

@joewilliams007@kbin.melroy.org @SvensKia@kbin.social @TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world @firefox@fedia.io I disable searching in the browser. When I wish to search, I go to a specific search engine web page.
When users have to work to DISABLE stuff in a browser, it reduces the trust people have in the browser. Consider why people have been switching back to Firefox, and now you are making the same mistakes that drove people away fro their former browsers.

KEEP IT SIMPLE AND TRUSTWORTHY.

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4 points

Are you saying you’ve disabled searching from the address bar and instead load up whatever.com and then type your search into there? I don’t understand what you think you’re gaining by enforcing this extra step.

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2 points

You miss the point. This takes away from them actually building and maintaining a browser. If they want to do this as a plug in or something, that’s fine. I do not want it and am not interested in anything AI related being built into the browser. Its that toxic, VC mindset around everything having to be everything and following the hype of the moment. Its dumb and the announcement was a redflag warning.

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4 points

Why should it be relegated to a plug-in? It is a feature everyone would find useful because no-one speaks every language. Also, since Chrome has this feature, new users would expect to have it work without having to research which plug-in to use.

You might not want to use it, but some people don’t use Firefox bookmarks and you don’t hear them demanding that bookmarks be moved to a plug-in. It’s been a very long time since a browser was solely an HTML renderer, and while people were also against CSS and scripting at first, we’ve moved on.

“AI” has been used for many things for many years. The fact that the news is full of machine learning and generative AI doesn’t mean that it’s sensible to condemn anything using it.

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2 points

Nope, I’m with Tropical here
Long time Firefox user, but if they start shoving AI stuff into it, I’m out
Servo is looking kinda fine there, might as well make my own browser

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1 point

I mean Servo was what Firefox was working on, and imagine still the roadmap to reintegrate into Firefox in the future.

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2 points

I have some genuine hope for this plus the semantic web. Have quick general answers be answered by the LLM, and use it to also generate vector (or a knowledge graph from wikidata) results of the other content on the internet so that if want to dig deeper it can ingest a specific sources data (or route to an models with that info already embedded) or just return it to you for your personal reading.

Pretty exciting tbh, and hopefully all open source, open data, on local or distributed systems!

At least all the pieces are moving to make that possible.

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