Hi,
This post has one question and one (very emphatic) message. I’ll start with the question:
Question: I have had an add-on listed at AOM for quite a few months, when (for reasons described below) AOM in their wisdom decided to disable it. I was told that there would be no disruption to current users, but that future updates would have to be hosted by myself. Now, if I had known from the start that my add-on would have to be self-hosted, I could have included a link to an update manifest file on my host site by adding an update_url key in my manifest.json's browser_specific_settings section. But how do I make sure that the current users of my add-on, who downloaded it from AOM, will have their version of my add-on automatically updated? I did of course not include an update_url value in the manifest.json of the AOM-hosted version, and AFAICT, I can’t edit it now, neither can I upload a new version to AOM. Is this a catch-22 situation, or is there a remedy for this?
Statement: The reason AOM decided to disable the add-on was that intended for a “limited/non-public audience”. This was based on the fact that the add-on is designed to facilitate the use of the Canvas Learning Management System, which indeed is not a public website; however, as it is used extensively by schools and universities worldwide, it has a huge number of users, including millions of students. To classify that audience as “limited” is sophistry to my mind – you could as well regard vast parts of Facebook (all its non-public posts) the same way.
Now what triggered the decision by AOM to change their minds and disable my add-on was that when I subsequently submitted another add-on for Canvas, it was rejected for the same reasons. I then objected to that, pointing to my previous Canvas add-on that was already hosted on AOM. AOM then promptly responded by disabling that first add-on, thus causing the situation that led to my question above.
I think this is both disgraceful as a way of treating non-profit add-on developers, and completely self-defeating for the Firefox project. Firefox’s market share is vastly overshadowed by that of Chrome, and thus AOM shouldn’t raise unnecessary and indeed ridiculous barriers to access to software that might make its browser more competitive. Chrome Web Store certainly does not have such a picky attitude – in addition to Chrome being a much more convenient environment for the development of extensions.
I sincerely wish for the Firefox project to succeed, as the thought of a Chrome monopoly does not attract me. Therefore, I would like my extensions to be available for Firefox as well. But after experiencing the royal contempt with which AOM treats add-on developers, I can’t really muster as much grief at the thought as before.