General Discussion • Re: Pale Moon's PR Problem

promoting it as a new browser that is untethered from Firefox's past would be useful

We've already done that for years, unless you mean promoting it as something that has no historic links to Firefox and doesn't draw on Firefox/Mozilla development, and that would just be an outright lie which we will absolutely, without question, be called out for. Then we'll get to deal with being called "fake" alongside other terms opponents are already using. If I wanted to kill the project, then that would be a very good way to do it. Fixing our PR? No way.

In fact, re-writing and replacing everything that is licensed in any way to Mozilla would be quite exciting.

You mean every single one of the 100,000+ files in our tree? I'll get right on that... (might as well make it non-FOSS if we're going to do that, instead of just handing all that work on a silver platter to characters who are happy enough to take and not give back).

I did have a good read through the discussion here once more and there are a few things I think are an issue.

• Our adoption rate in Linux is low. Is that tied to our licensing? Maybe, maybe not. If I wanted to just throw my hands up in the air and let distros or BSDs do their own thing with official branding slapped on, then I could, but would that actually improve our PR or would that be seen as abandonment of Linux? Also, would that actually help with our project being contributed to? Doubtful, and certainly not any time soon. It's like playing "hope chess" -- you hope that a few moves in the future you'll get an opening, or that the opponent remains oblivious to what you're doing, instead of actually having a strategy.
• Closely related: "The distros want to ship our package their way, using their system libs, and just have us be completely hands off, or else they won't touch it if we need things done differently." So, how would use packaging RPMs and DEBs help there? It wouldn't, because the distros would still want to do it their special and unique way. That, and perceived bias for any specific philosophy because "we're publishing package format X or Y associated with distro (and philosophy) Z". Requesting that they change their firstrun page in the browser to indicate they are responsible, or any other restriction, is likely also going to get more pushback unless we give them full freedom over it and effectively making it public domain. The only real solution would be completely stepping back from the entire *nix-like ecosystem. Once again though: would that be good for PR? Or seen as just abandonment?
• "normie" users, regardless of O.S., are just not interested in what we're doing. The current generation's approach to things clashes pretty hard with my approach to what we're doing here. Everything has to work right away, with literally zero effort. We can't deliver on that, because we aren't in control of the levers that make that possible, because it is a web browser. Is that a problem with our PR? No, not really. Unless, once again, we're going to just lie about who we are and what we're doing. I don't like to, as the Dutch say, "spin a wheel in front of someone's eyes" (effectively being deceptive in-your-face and distracting users from real matters)
• I have no issue with people using AI coding assistants - but it has to, much more than normal, be scrutinized in the review process. That would, in turn, put a lot more pressure on reviewers and likely leading to the state a ton of other FOSS projects are in with hundreds or thousands of pull requests just sitting there and going stale for months or years on end. which is pretty disrespectful to the people who actually made the pull requests. I've been clear from the start that using the best tool for the job is actually a thing I strongly believe in. The problem I have with AI is integrating it into the end user's workflow. Are people really conflating the two, now? They are entirely separate things.
• Re-definition of "modern". A modern browser, in my definition, is one that aims to use modern standards. It has zero to do with optics or "looking modern i.e. flat and drab". It contrasts with the whole "old Firefox". Calling us "traditional" won't solve that either. Would any term really work there? People are going to interpret it how they want to see it, either way, I think. If there's a language-shift consensus then I'm happy to adapt the wording on the website accordingly, but it has to be clear and globally acceptable. Leaning into the "single-process security" might be a good angle, though. I'll give it some thought. Effectively, IPC is exposing the guts of the application to the O.S.
• "Non-woke"... While I understand the angle here and I agree there's a ton of PR fluff around some browsers about being "super-inclusive" and what not to a fault, I don't want to be broadcasting such a message. Not in the least because I'm neither "woke" (also: define that for me, please? I've heard plenty of weird explanations what it's supposed to be; I have my own definition of it. And also, it's why I don't actually use the term, because it's ambiguous or people using it as excuses) nor "non-woke", and don't want to put any sort of label or political/cultural/religious message on Pale Moon. Yes, snagging a specific demographic would be easy with the right propaganda, but that would really go against what the project was founded on.
• Our identity is closely tied to XUL and NPAPI. But that isn't Firefox. Should we lean heavy on NPAPI? If so, there has to be a healthy and vibrant ecosystem of plugins in active use... and I don't see that. The constant hammering on the lie that "NPAPI is a security risk" by mainstream has done its job. XUL? People don't even really know what it means. I really do wish there were more people building XUL applications on the platform, demonstrating XUL's flexibility. Maybe someone needs to make a XUL application framework (other than the rather clunky XULrunner), maybe an IDE written in XUL to easily make XUL applications with UXP as a runtime, or what not. It would be an interesting project but not something I personally could put time in.
• Pale Moon being "retro" by default? I really disagree with that sentiment. For me, retro not only means "not the current trend", but it means actively targeting obsolete hardware or platforms by design. I do not want to have the "retro" label slapped on, because that completely misses the mark. But hey, maybe Pale Moon just needs to stop trying to integrate with the O.S. completely and ship with a fully overriding theme that is "new and unique" to get rid of that stigma (along with the Firefox one, if the majority of people really want to dissociate with that)

So, not saying these things are all insurmountable (although some are really putting the future onto a knife's edge) but they do need to be considered very very carefully.