Ads will appear on Live tiles
Mozilla wants to keep Firefox profitable, and one way to do that is with ads. But they can't just scatter them everywhere, so they're going to appear in tiles, where they'll be less disruptive.
Users don't like ads in their products, and they certainly don't enjoy them in an app that was built for surfing the Internet, a place full of ads by itself. On the other hand, Mozilla wants to make money, and it no longer earns $240 million a year from its partnership with Google. Yes, you read that right, but that was the case some time ago, in 2012.
Firefox is no longer ahead of Google Chrome, and Google isn't giving Mozilla the same cash it used to, so it has to get that money through other means. In-browser advertising seems like the only idea left on the table.
Users will not be excited
The community made it clear that it will not tolerate something like this, but on the other hand, the community does not seem to have much power either. Suggested Tiles have been available in the American version of the browser for quite some time now, so this “feature” is dead.
Mozilla says things like “improving the state of digital advertising,” “promoting content,” “adding value,” and so on. This is some high-end corporate jargon, but in essence, it all means the same thing: ads in the browser. To be fair, Mozilla does n’t take any money at all for now, and it works with partners like the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
«From the beginning of August, we have promoted content provided by our first wave of partners including Yahoo, a series of top-tier news titles including Fortune Magazine and Quartz, and partners for the purpose of the mission, such as the Make-A-Wish Foundation and the Electronic Frontier Foundation », noted Darren Herman of Mozilla.
The protection of personal data is important, and they know it
Mozilla is willing to remind everyone that it does not intend to collect any kind of data, that ads will be transparent, and that users will be able to know why they see a particular advertisement.
Even with all the assurances, however, it will be difficult for users to accept it and we remain to see how well Mozilla will cover up the fact.
