A critique of (the deceased) Firefox OS

Mozillians
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In the wake of Firefox OS’s premature death and its miraculous resurrection, the internet has been filled with bad feelings towards the deceased. I found a comment on Reddit which I found particularly interesting: https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/3vyvys/mozilla_will_stop_developing_and_selling_firefox/cxs9v82. Since I’m not familiar with Reddit, I’d like to move here the discussion.

##Monetization issue

I think that comment has a point here. Virtually every app on the Marketplace comes for free, including high-quality apps. On the other side, those few apps asking for money usually don’t deserve any. While this scenario is (apparently) good for users, money are a good way to attract good developers, and good developers make good apps, of which there is a desperate need in the Marketplace.

The point is that FxOS has far too few users to make not-for-free apps convenient: I guess many of us would be willing to pay a little fee to have an official Whatsapp client, but still this would not cover developement costs for Whatsapp.

On the other hand, ordinary apps are forced to be for free. If they had a price, they would be ignored by most users. This is, I think, because people usually prefer not to pay for something if they aren’t sure of the quality of the product beforehand.

How to make Marketplace apps remunerative for developer without anger users? I think the solution may be spontaneous donations. Free, open source software has a history of asking for donations, which is percieved as a fair practice for both developers and users.

Still, it is a well known fact that people are lazy. If to donate I need to follow less-than-trivial procedures, I won’t probably do that. In this case, though, I can see an immediate way for users to donate to developers. That is, through the Marketplace itself. The user could donate from the very app page on the Marketplace, just like it can leave a review. The donated amount could be taken directly from the SIM credit, just like it can be done with purchases. On the other side, the developer would just need to provide a bank account’s details, and the rest would be done by the Marketplace.

I think this could be a good approach to the issue, making good apps produce some cash for the developers without angering users. On a plus, it’s a practice which is well accepted among the FOSS world and would feel just right on FxOS.

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I saw the email but I don’t get it. Is Firefox OS done?

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Long story short, a TechCrunch article based on an ambiguous tweet from someone at Mozlando sparked the fake news that the Firefox OS project is dead, which has spread all over the Internet since then.

In reality, what Mozilla decided is to stop searching partners to sell devices, which just means there won’t be further phones “sponsored” by Mozilla like the ZTE Open, the Geeksphone, and the Flame.

On the contrary, work on the Firefox OS software is well alive. The OS is meant to be ported to commercial Android devices by users themself, just like Foxfooders are doing right now. There will also be a shift towards IoT and connected devices, whatever that means.

This is what I got. The situation is quite confused, most well-informed people are busy at Mozlando right now and inaccurate news spread fast. In a few days I expect the details of Mozilla’s future strategy will be clearer.

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Oooh! Phew! I got worried for half a day there.

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The Back Button

This is a divisive issue I’ve heard before, over which opinions tend to be polarized.

What puzzles me is that Firefox OS is not the first not to have a system back button. iOS, Windows 10, Sailfish, Ubuntu Touch all have no back button, as far as I know, and I don’t remember complaints about that.

I’ll propose a theory to explain this phenomenon, on whose accuracy I cannot guarantee anything. Those complaints come from Android users who try Firefox OS. Whith respect to the other OSs I’ve mentioned, at first it looks fairly similar to Android and quite familiar. The biggest difference is the lacking of the back button, and this creates an annoying dissonance: the user feels home but something is lacking.

Truth to be told, FxOS’s apps back button is not always coherent. Sometimes there is a < button, sometimes a X button, sometimes nothing. Sometimes it’s placed in one corner, sometimes on the other. (Though, the situation has much improved since earlier versions.)

Long story short, I’m still not so sure a system back button is necessary. I think that, after a little time, users gets used to that being missing. It would help if FxOS had a more distinctive design. For sure, finally, navigation inside system apps has to be consistent.

I may be wrong on this but I think the general trend in the mobile world is to reduce the bezel as much as possible, in favour of virtual buttons in place of physical ones. Whether a virtual system back button is better than in-app navigation, this I don’t know.

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https://discourse.mozilla-community.org/t/firefox-os-is-dead-no/5847

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It is worth noting that although Firefox OS may still be alive, but the developers do not appear to be working on their Firefox OS apps.

For example, I’ve just checked Telegram that hasnt updated their FFOS version since Nov 2015 although there have been numerous updates to their app on other platforms.

In fact, their FFOS version does not support most of the new changes and results in “This message is not supported on your version of Telegram”.

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This is true and perfectly fine! In the future B2G OS will not have (dedicated) apps anymore, as the idea is to solely rely on web-apps. On this side, things are bright: web-apps are finally gaining traction. Telegram is an example of that: their web version of the client is great, and that’s all future B2G OS users will need!

Of course not all apps have (or will have in the foreseeable future) a web version. Whatsapp is probably the biggest name. All in all, though, I believe the web(-apps) are the future, and that’s the way to go.