Mozilla CEO pockets a packet, asks biz to pick up pace the 'Mozilla way'
- Reference: 1704195907
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/01/02/mozilla_in_2024_ai_privacy/
- Source link:
According to the company's filings, Mitchell Baker's compensation went from $5,591,406 [1]in 2021 [PDF] to $6,903,089 [2]in 2022 [PDF]. It's quite the jump considering that revenues declined from $527,585,000 to $510,389,000 in [3]the same period [PDF].
Despite the executive payout, Firefox continues to trail Google and even Microsoft in desktop browser market share. While it has not suffered any catastrophic losses, neither has it made any significant gains.
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Baker, however, would very much like to speed things up and says in the [5]State of Mozilla report : "The pace is not enough, the impact is not enough."
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Unsurprisingly for a technology company, the report is heavy on AI going mainstream where Mozilla reckons it can make an impact in the technology, particularly with regard to open source developers and privacy.
Mozilla's adventures in AI? The organization says it has 15 engineers working on open source large language models and is working on use cases in the healthcare space. Moez Draief, managing director of Mozilla.ai, said: "There's a lot of structured data work in that industry that will feed the language models; we don't have to invent it."
[8]Mozilla decides Trusted Types is a worthy security feature
[9]Penguins get their Wayland with Firefox 121
[10]Firefox slow to load YouTube? Just another front in Google's war on ad blockers
[11]Google, Amazon, Microsoft make the Mozilla naughty list for Christmas shopping
Earlier this year, Mozilla had to [12]hit pause on its AI chatbot after the service served up a worrying amount of nonsense in response to user queries.
Chief product officer Steve Teixeira notes in the report the rapid growth of AI and social networks, although warns that Mozilla.social is unlikely to move beyond the experimentation phase in 2024. He says that Mozilla would be "exploring ways to better integrate advertising while adhering to our focus on privacy and choice," including web browsing.
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Teixeira also acknowledged subscription services such as Mozilla VPN and Relay.
It will be interesting to see how Mozilla picks up the pace in 2024. As well as Teixeira's comments regarding advertising, Baker notes: "We need to be faster in prototyping, launching, learning, and iterating ... This requires rich data, and so we will be moving in that direction, but in a very Mozilla way."
Surely not slurping telemetry?
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According to the report, the "Mozilla way" is all about privacy, encryption, and keeping customer data safe. Hopefully, it will also be about [15]innovation rather than scattering AI fairy dust over its product line. ®
Get our [16]Tech Resources
[1] https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-990-ty21-public-disclosure.pdf
[2] https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2022/mozilla-fdn-990-ty22-public-disclosure.pdf
[3] https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2022/mozilla-fdn-2022-fs-final-0908.pdf
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZZRBNy7vvyePyvsHIMXTPAAAAdQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[5] https://stateof.mozilla.org/#
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZZRBNy7vvyePyvsHIMXTPAAAAdQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZZRBNy7vvyePyvsHIMXTPAAAAdQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/21/mozilla_decides_trusted_types_is/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/20/firefox_121_released/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/21/ad_block_google/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/15/google_amazon_microsoft_mozilla/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/06/mozilla_ai_explain_shift/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZZRBNy7vvyePyvsHIMXTPAAAAdQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZZRBNy7vvyePyvsHIMXTPAAAAdQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/29/mozilla_asleep_at_wheel/
[16] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
But they've got 15 engineers on AI - what more do you want?!
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
CEO should start on $300,000 and receive increases (or decreases) in line with overall market share.
I'm just glad I never donated.
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
Fully agree.
I know it's a non-profit and so it can't be seen to be making a profit. The easiest way for it to do that is spend. But spend the majority of that CEO's wage on engineers and designers to produce something that is world beating.
I worry for Mozilla really. Will there be a Mozilla in 5, 10 years? Will we have a Firefox? I don't think we will if it keeps going the way it is, and spending wages like it is in the wrong places.
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
"it can't be seen to be making a profit"
The term used is "surplus". That's not a profit, just as senior management's salaries aren't profit.
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
Have to agree.. I'll support in non-financial ways, as I believe we need to retain some diversity in the space, but won't be putting a single £ into the pot when there's also one single person taking 5500000 of them out.
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
You have to look very carefully at non-profits. Salaries (let's not get into euphemisms such as "compensation") to those running it don't count as profits no matter how profitable it may be to those receiving them.
Re: "Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
Indeed.. it needs some research into the yacht(s) and mansion(s) factor. For corporates that seem to be charging a "reasonable" price too, and ofc public bodies (heated swimming pool in your Yorkshire manor, anyone?)
Umm?
"Mozilla had to hit pause on its AI chatbot after the service served up a worrying amount of nonsense in response to user queries."
How is this different from any other AI chatbot?
"Better integrate advertising"? Like hovering an ad for some other service over every single text input field, all the time, forever?
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1870661
"Mitchell Baker's compensation"
What terrible misfortune has happened to him that requires he be compensated in this way?
Happened to 'her' ;)
Whatever.
"What terrible misfortune has happened to
Being a lawyer.
But let's face it, what Mozilla really needs is to be led by a massively overpaid lawyer, because it's not a technology organisation, apparently.
Retire
Baker: "I want enough money in the bank so I can retire when Mozilla goes under!"
Is there even a board of directors and who's on it? Baker's friends and relatives? I mean, the execs of Mozilla should've been fired long ago, but for some nefarious reason aren't.
And if they're so concerned about privacy why didn't they implement a true Incognito Mode using the Tor network? Did someone pull their shirt and tell them not to?
Re: Retire
Mitchell has been at Mozilla for a long, long time. She knows a lot about the Mozilla company and Firefox, Knowledge is power, and power gets rewarded.
I think a lot of CEOs, etc. are overpaid but that's how things go, there are plenty of people out there not worth the salary they get but I would say Mitchell isn't one of them.
Firefox continues to trail Google and even Microsoft in desktop browser market share
Isn't it a pity that practically nobody yet seems aware of the snooping carried out by the leaders. Firefox is the least snoopy of the mainstream browsers, but that message still has to register against the 'convenience' of having a snoopy browser already installed. My impression is that however often and loudly we draw attention to this, nobody seems to be listening -- maybe they just don't care. Well, like governments, maybe you get the browser you deserve.
Easy AI replacement!
How about replacing the CEO with AI and redirect the compensation to develop AI (and other technologies)?
"Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
Taken from the Mozilla website:
"Backed by the non-profit that puts people first"
Advertising it as a non-profit and asking for donations makes it sound like they are putting most of the money into running and developing the product. But the CEO gets a payrise to $6.9m. Just think what they could achieve if they used some of that money to invest in Mozilla products or even just advertising them. I have no objection at all to paying a CEO well if they are performing at a high level. But with market share declining year after year this does not seem the right time to give a big payrise to the CEO. I regularly donate to FOSS projects and love Firefox but I would have to think carefully before donating to a non-profit that pays one member of staff $6.9m.