So, trying to unpack the OP's multiple questions a little:
1. Preventing Firefox going out of business
-> as noted by others, Mozilla is actually doing decently well financially, and continues to dedicate a large part of its resources to Firefox
-> however given some of its revenue sources, maintaining a certain share of users is important to maintain that state of affairs
2. Driving more adoption of Firefox
-> Most users have pretty simple browsing needs, and a non-negligible share still don't know what a browser is (we all know a few I wager) while still using one daily,
-> Competing browsers have semi-exclusive or exclusive distribution channels for their products which help drive their adoption (Google.com, some Android flavours, ChromeOS / Mac and iOS / Windows, Bing, Outlook & Office)
-> Thus as with any product, driving adoption could be done by:
--A. offering a killer feature many (actual) people care enough about to download the browser for - for most people, this would need to be significant speed or friction reduction (Adblock, etc) which Firefox already does well but perhaps not significantly well enough
--B. get users early, i.e. partner with websites, apps and influencers that reach younger users to promote/recommend Firefox and its features, notably on the privacy and personalisation side (themes, meta filter, Adblock, password and history sync, etc) - think some viral Tiktoks on the benefits or simple product placement
--C. get a series of not-just-tech ambassadors to promote the browser along with the work of the Foundation, which may be done cheaply as they do have commendable initiatives
--D. Partner with like-minded organisations to recommend each other's solutions where possible, e.g. Automattic or such
-- etc etc
Firefox has been my daily driver on all devices for 20+ years. I personally feel it's never been as good as it is now: it's fast, the memory woes are gone, the sync works like a charm, password suggestion and management is seamless, the Android version is great (love the bottom navbar option).
Probably not perfect - what is - but I just wanted to share a more upbeat comment here, and perhaps one more geared towards the majority of users, who will be less technical and choose their browser's (or better said default to their browser's) for vary different reasons.
I've been enjoying my Nothing Phone (1)a great deal. Very few pre-installed app - I believe just a reskinned version of the weather app; full Android experience and the updates have been very impressive so far.
Also, incredibly cost-effective.
Curious to see if you considered Shadow Tech[1] as well, given the similar price point ($30/month) and possibly wider use case (whole cloud pc instead of just the browser)?
The first thing to determine, as with any challenge, is goal definition and scope. What do we mean by "fixing the Earth", and for what stakeholders.
A few potential goal definitions which can be wildly contradictory:
- maximise the probability for Earth to remain habitable until cosmic conditions (the Sun's decline) dictate otherwise, for humans,
- ibid, but for for as many species as possible,
- identify and implement the most optimal way to coexist as a species toaximised learning and knowledge advancement,
- etc.
It feels like long-term, multi-national, consequential fundamental research could be undertaken on an interesting scale with such a budget. This in turn could highlight scenarii of different ways forward to inform and influence policy-making. It may be one of the best ways to spend it.
Presse-Citron is definitely more aligned with the tech establishment, but it remains useful for general tech news - and the comments are still rather sharp.
CanardPC is a GREAT addition, excellent build! About so much more than games too.
In French you have a few interesting options, notably:
- LeBonCoin.fr (“the good corner”, a Craigslist type site that’s used for everything from second-hand selling to job hunting to meet up organising),
- LesNumeriques.fr is a decent tech review media with in-depth tests and a VERY critical community providing good balance
- Gazelle which has now become backmarket.fr (also exists across other countries like Spain and the U.K.) and offers vetted second-hand tech gear - great for bargains and avoiding buying new for ecological reasons,
- LeMonde.fr/Les-Décodeurs is the fact checking arm of the French paper Le Monde and has some really interesting visualisations and articles
- Presse-Citron.fr was one of the first tech blogs in France and continues to be a reference
- priice.fr is a price comparison site I’ve heard good things about but haven’t used myself yet
- danstonchat.com is the French version of Bash.org for IRC fun
- Legorafi.fr is a satirical paper with lots of hilarious fake news - often quite timely - akin to The Onion (it’s a play on words on the famous French paper Le Figaro)
- Gandi.net is a registrar and hosting site which I’ve been using forever - they’re awesome
> An under-rated feature of US cities is the diversity of occupations that can command relatively high incomes.
I find this super interesting, especially when linking salary back to how much society values that job type. For instance it seems that many European countries value societally their teachers and professors, yet it is a rather underpaid profession, all things considered. Similarly, a maitre d’ would be quite well regarded in France or Italie, yet would not command a high-salary.
Thus it feels like your point on there being more diverse sectors being cogent with a comfortable lifestyle in the U.S. rings true.
Veering away from the main point, but I wonder if, as pointed in other comments, that is somewhat balanced by less people being, comparatively, in the poor and very poor category. That is to say, less of a difference between top lifestyles and bottom lifestyles overall. I would need to properly research that though, as salary alone won’t give us that variance.
That’s a really good point. My understanding however was that you still need to pay some parts of the treatments, even with top healthcare?
I’m no specialist on the US system, so could be wrong, but I heard from a friend who paid $4K cash for a broken ankle (arguably out of a total bill of $25K+, and not sure what type of healthcare they had), whereas your bill in the U.K., France or Spain for the same injury would be exactly zero (as an example, from countries I know better). The same would be true, I believe, for child birth for instance (again, I could be wrong as relying on second-hand accounts in both cases).
Agreed on the type of specialist you would get in the U.K., although in my experience it’s always been very feasible to see top specialists when warranted, even on public healthcare. You would typically get faster access for non-essential care on a private basis though.
Overall, it seems from Yours and other comments that the salary multiple in U.S. tech specifically may still be significant and would probably make these moot.
Great question and something I’ve been struggling with as well. A few things I like to do to make “down time” more productive:
- listen to podcasts and take notes, which I then turn into mini mind maps (it helps me remember concepts and linking ideas together)
- I do brand and marketing work, so I often use phone time to doodle early logo concepts, draft storyboards, start composing shots for photo shoots... etc. I find the constraints of the small screen quite interesting as it obliges me to veer towards simpler designs (I use Google Keep which allows for zooming in and out easily, and seamlessly integrates with the laptop version)
- whiteboarding (again in Google Keep or Miro) is also something I love to do on a phone, usually for processes and/or identity systems where I’d collate references for a projects into a single document for future use
- photo editing / story editing using VSCO and Over is a great way to use phone time productively. I often prepare visuals for blog posts or social stories that way,
- financial planning (probably less creative than the rest, but also a good way to spend phone time and many workflows are actually faster on mobile): I use a virtual bank (Monzo, in the U.K.) so I use phone time to label/categorise spend, visualise budgets, pay anything that needs paying and create simpler invoices with a Google Sheet template and pdf exports to Dropbox
Many more options, but these are my major uses. Looking forward to reading the other answers!
I always feel like salary comparisons are a little biased by a slightly US-centric definition of a comfortable lifestyle (e.g. including a car, parking, bigger house requirements, etc) as well as underestimating some built-in benefits of other countries like free healthcare.
Are there good sources out there that would afford a holistic cost comparison of a typical London lifestyle (Tube, 1-bedroom in Zone 1-2, weekend abroad in Europe, etc.) vs SF, LA or NY for instance?
Otherwise agree that long-term the work from home trend could be slightly more concerning, but this won't materialise as soon as most think. There is still a lot of value in being physically close to networks of influence and decision-makers, which in the UK would very much still remain in London.
ProtonMail [1] Plus user for the past 4 years now with my own domain. They've since added the VPN, which I find excellent and use all the time.
They have most recently added ProtonCalendar and ProtonDrive [2], which were the features I was missing the most. Thus, I moved everything over and pay for the bundle of all products which comes at just under EUR 8.00 a month (Mail, VPN, Calendar and Drive).
As mentioned by others, the webmail and UI of all 4 products is minimalist, but it is snappy and pleasing (to my taste, at least). The mobile apps on both iPhone and Android work very well, just missing threaded messages on the Android one.
Finally, of course, end-to-end encryption, hosted in Switzerland and abiding by stringent national privacy laws [3] and out of the US, 5 eyes network as well as EU realms.
1. Preventing Firefox going out of business -> as noted by others, Mozilla is actually doing decently well financially, and continues to dedicate a large part of its resources to Firefox -> however given some of its revenue sources, maintaining a certain share of users is important to maintain that state of affairs
2. Driving more adoption of Firefox -> Most users have pretty simple browsing needs, and a non-negligible share still don't know what a browser is (we all know a few I wager) while still using one daily, -> Competing browsers have semi-exclusive or exclusive distribution channels for their products which help drive their adoption (Google.com, some Android flavours, ChromeOS / Mac and iOS / Windows, Bing, Outlook & Office) -> Thus as with any product, driving adoption could be done by: --A. offering a killer feature many (actual) people care enough about to download the browser for - for most people, this would need to be significant speed or friction reduction (Adblock, etc) which Firefox already does well but perhaps not significantly well enough --B. get users early, i.e. partner with websites, apps and influencers that reach younger users to promote/recommend Firefox and its features, notably on the privacy and personalisation side (themes, meta filter, Adblock, password and history sync, etc) - think some viral Tiktoks on the benefits or simple product placement --C. get a series of not-just-tech ambassadors to promote the browser along with the work of the Foundation, which may be done cheaply as they do have commendable initiatives --D. Partner with like-minded organisations to recommend each other's solutions where possible, e.g. Automattic or such -- etc etc
Firefox has been my daily driver on all devices for 20+ years. I personally feel it's never been as good as it is now: it's fast, the memory woes are gone, the sync works like a charm, password suggestion and management is seamless, the Android version is great (love the bottom navbar option).
Probably not perfect - what is - but I just wanted to share a more upbeat comment here, and perhaps one more geared towards the majority of users, who will be less technical and choose their browser's (or better said default to their browser's) for vary different reasons.