After version 57, what will be Firefox’s USP?
Being the best browser. Look at WebVR, the CSS Grids dev tools, the tab handling improvements in v55, the plain better UX in general.
I don’t get how Chrome is better, especially if Firefox is as fast as (or faster) than Chrome. Amusingly enough given the name, Chrome’s browser chrome has never been that great. Look at the way it handles tabs. Chrome’s power and innovations are more about taking WebKit and hardening it, and making V8 really fast. It’s actually more about stuff that melts away the browser chrome.
Firefox has always had a better chrome, in my mind – and with a faster engine, it is undoubtedly the best browser.
Also, and this one is obvious – Mozilla is already extending WebExtensions to do things that are not possible in Chrome. Firefox post-57 is not a Chrome clone, so moving to Chrome will leave you using a browser with worse add-on support.
Do people really think that by moving to Chrome they just get to what Firefox will be earlier? That may explain some of these “I quit” posts. Again, Firefox has already extended WebExtensions past what Chrome can do.
Context
Readers can learn more from a development perspective by reading Mozilla developer David Teller’s account of why Mozilla removed legacy extensions.
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