A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 11, 2024 2:48 UTC (Sun) by zaitcev (guest, #761)
Parent article: A new CEO for Mozilla

Mitchell Baker was compensated lavishly for presiding over the decline and fall of Mozilla.

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 3:16 UTC (Mon) by milesrout (subscriber, #126894) [Link] (8 responses)

Your comment implies that Baker is responsible for the decline and fall of Mozilla. But that's not necessarily true. Maybe the alternative would have been an even faster decline and a bigger fall. Or maybe it would be ascension to great heights.

I am no big fan of what Mozilla has done for the last few years, but it also hasn't been unusual. They've done what basically everyone has done: lost focus on technology. They're not unusual in that, and so you'd need a pretty unusual CEO to do something different.

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 7:00 UTC (Mon) by mb (subscriber, #50428) [Link] (7 responses)

>Your comment implies that Baker is responsible for the decline and fall of Mozilla

She is not responsible for the path Mozilla went?
What exactly did she get $7m for?

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 14:53 UTC (Mon) by pizza (subscriber, #46) [Link] (6 responses)

> She is not responsible for the path Mozilla went?

She is responsible for the things under her control -- ie the direction and steps Mozilla takes -- but she has only tenuous influence over what the rest of the industry does.

In other words, even if every decision resulted in the objectively best possible outcome, Mozilla could still be in the same position it is now; it could be in better shape, or could actually be in _worse_ shape.

I do know, that at the end of the day, Mozilla has always been a relatively small fish in the pond, and at this point, there are what, two other (considerably larger) fishes left still swimming?

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 15:35 UTC (Mon) by mb (subscriber, #50428) [Link] (1 responses)

>She is responsible for the things under her control -- ie the direction and steps Mozilla takes

As is any other CEO of any other company.

The numbers are:
$7m/a and barely 4% market share, constantly falling share during the last decade.
These numbers speak for themselves.

>or could actually be in _worse_ shape.

There's not much share left to loose.
It can't get much worse.

That's worth $7m/a? I don't think so.

I hope that the new CEO takes the right path now.
I'm not against $7m/a per se. But only if the product is excellent. FF went far away from that.

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 15:53 UTC (Mon) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

> The numbers are:
> $7m/a and barely 4% market share, constantly falling share during the last decade.
> These numbers speak for themselves.

Only if you're blind to market economics.

You do realise those EXACT SAME figures could apply to the UK Supermarket market over the last 20 years or more?

Sadly, Mozilla has been following the TYPICAL path followed by any medium-sized fish in any mature pond since about - when? - I'd say 1980 in my experience. Others would quite likely put an even earlier date on it.

Cheers,
Wol

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 16:31 UTC (Mon) by paulj (subscriber, #341) [Link] (3 responses)

Surely the core job of a CEO is to navigate the changing market dynamics and steer the organisation towards success? "Decline less swiftly" isn't really what I would call success.

You could have had several absolutely industry-leading, trend-setting, engineers if she'd been on $5m less pay. Or 1 absolutely world-leading eng, plus 20 to 40 top-class engineers. And she'd still have been paid /generously/. Surely the organisation would have been more likely to reverse the decline in that case?

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 16:41 UTC (Mon) by pizza (subscriber, #46) [Link] (2 responses)

> Surely the core job of a CEO is to navigate the changing market dynamics and steer the organisation towards success? "Decline less swiftly" isn't really what I would call success.

When most of your competition no longer exists, yes, "decline less swiftly" is a considerable accomplishment.

(Even infinitely-more-resourced-Microsoft canned their in-house engine in favor of a Chrome reskin)

> You could have had several absolutely industry-leading, trend-setting, engineers if she'd been on $5m less pay.

"Browser market share" hasn't been a technical/engineering problem for the better part of three decades. Heck, raw engineering prowess has _rarely_ ever driven market share, in _any_ market.

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 16:46 UTC (Mon) by paulj (subscriber, #341) [Link]

I didn't write that success required succeeding with their browser. I wrote "steer the organisation towards success" - with what product or service I left open.

She has not succeeded there has she? Taking higher and higher pay, as revenues decline, is not a path towards success. Rather, it is asset stripping.

A new CEO for Mozilla

Posted Feb 12, 2024 16:56 UTC (Mon) by mb (subscriber, #50428) [Link]

>"Browser market share" hasn't been a technical/engineering problem for the better part of three decades.

Yes, you are absolutely right.
Mozilla barely engineered anything that could have helped the user in the last decade.

Instead they decided to burn the money and implement anti-features and shift GUI elements from one place to another and back and actively cripple their product (FF on Android).

That's certainly not how you (re-)gain market share.