@jwz @zzt @firefoxwebdevs we added an extension to send 440 volts through the other guy's chair

1M+ installs first week, 0 users remaining second week

@eckes @fasterandworse I don't see a point in the AI shit and the CEO has already floated blocking adblockers, so here we are

@Tock @theorangetheme @theogrin @mdavis @firefoxwebdevs

countdown to:

1. more AI in Firefox
2. Mozilla drops Gecko in favour of Chromium
3. with all possibility of ad blocking disabled
4. certainty the massive international user base of people *just like them* will show up any day now! just you wait!!

@theorangetheme @theogrin @mdavis @firefoxwebdevs also the new AI CMO. also whichever person started this ball rolling and got Anthony in.

@theogrin @mdavis @firefoxwebdevs that's the other missing poll option, yes

@RAOF @gatesvp yeah, the whole thing is dissembling weasel speak. None of this discussion was proposed by Mozilla with sincerity.

@zzt @firefoxwebdevs this would involve them one day standing before Congress and solemnly declaring "I fucked up", which is why we had to jail them first.

@mdavis @firefoxwebdevs

The Firefox AI "kill switch" is not "complicated" except insofar as it's incoherent. it's not "undisclosed nuance" except insofar as it's incoherent.

the "kill switch" doesn't exist.

this is important to keep in mind. once you remember that NONE OF THIS EXISTS, you will realise that every one of the dilemmas you posit is an imaginary problem that follows from incoherent postulates.

e.g. "AI kill switch purists" is not a coherent postulation because the "kill switch" does not exist.

the "kill switch" is a hypothetical proposed in this post:

https://mastodon.social/@firefoxwebdevs/115740500373677782

the "kill switch" is a proposal to satisfy the demand for an opt-in by providing an opt-out. you might think that's a failure to respect the question, and you might even begin to suspect the proposal was in bad faith.

note that Jake, in presenting the kill switch and calling it a kill switch and getting it into all the papers as a kill switch, says he's uncomfortable with the name he's publicised it as. you might think that's oddly incompetent for literally a PR (devrel) person.

the concept as presented imposes multiple false dilemmas.

the LLM stuff should *incredibly obviously* be an extension. this is the purest possible opt-in, despite jake's past attempts to muddy the meaning of "opt-in".

making it an extension is also eminently feasible. There is literally no technical reason it needs to be a browser built-in.

this suggests the reasons are not in any way technical. some person with a name, who has yet to be named, dictated that it would be a built-in. so that's what Mozilla is going with.

why Mozilla went hard AI is entirely unclear. this would have been late 2024? we have no idea who was inspired with this bad idea nor why they were so incredibly keen to force it into the browser.

nor is it clear what Mozilla will do for external LLM services when the AI bubble runs out of venture capital and pops in a year or so, most of the chatbot APIs shut down and whatever remains is 10x the cost at least. but that's a problem for 2027's bonus, not 2026's.

note how the poll provides no option for "no LLM functions built-in to Firefox", in a pathetically transparent attempt to synthesize consent. jake wants to use this poll as evidence of what the user base wants, deliberately leaving out the option he knows directly a lot of them want.

and in conclusion:

1. solve the "kill switch" naming problem by branding it the "brutal and bloody robot murder switch with an option on the executives responsible".
2. make all this shit an extension like they should have a year ago.
3. and your little translator too.

@firefoxwebdevs @zzt

> I want to make sure the community's voice is represented in these discussions.

if that were true, the poll would have had a "remove all LLM functionality" option.

@eckes @fasterandworse To further the charitable mission, pretty obviously.

@gatesvp @firefoxwebdevs @sil @jmax this is the sort of obfuscatory claim I see from AI marketers. "You say you hate slop, so that means you must hate X-ray scanning! Checkmate, AI hater!" It's not convincing.

@wes @firefoxwebdevs @liquor_american so do I, but also it should be an extension

@tanfonto @firefoxwebdevs "stolen" https://mas.to/@twifkak/115849848003348176

@knowler @firefoxwebdevs it absolutely was not! he means "open data" as in "we found it lying around, bugger the license" https://mas.to/@twifkak/115849848003348176

@zzt @firefoxwebdevs firefox translate is to blame, arrest that instead

@zzt @firefoxwebdevs i'll have you know i'm at least 75%* hinged

* vibe estimate, but we carefully graphed it so it's data now

@tasket @zzt @firefoxwebdevs today i learned that SSL certificates were a *kind* of AI

@zzt @hdv@front-end.social @firefoxwebdevs god forbid someone talk about a technology from an industry of liars, responding to a survey from an organisation that's already lying to its users, with a survey carefully missing the option the majority of respondents actually want (make it an extension), and come across as *cynical*

@jaffathecake @Fnordinger that really reads like chatbot text. are you *sure* it is not?

@cassidy @firefoxwebdevs this is because it's an AI marketing lie. "ha, you say you hate slop, so does that mean you hate *xrays* now? Checkmate, AI hater!"