Microsoft executive tells Mozilla to give up and move on with Chrome

Causing a stir on social media, a Microsoft executive has suggested that Mozilla should give up on its Firefox and embrace Google Chrome.

A Microsoft program manager Kenneth Auchenberg recently tweeted suggesting that Firefox-maker Mozilla should accept its defeat and move on with Google Chrome’s technology, mentioning that Mozilla is only used by less than 5% now.

Thought: It's time for @mozilla to get down from their philosophical ivory tower. The web is dominated by Chromium, if they really *cared* about the web they would be contributing instead of building a parallel universe that's used by less than 5%?https://t.co/0zi2NCtzb4

— Kenneth Auchenberg (@auchenberg) January 25, 2019

Auchenberg clearly mentioned that it was his personal opinion and not on behalf of Microsoft. He referred his tweet to Mozilla’s response to Microsoft when it announced last December that it would end its Edge search engine for Chromium’s, wrote ZDNet.

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Back in December, Mozilla CEO Chris Beard had said that Microsoft’s decision will give Google more power to ‘single-handedly’ determine how people make use of the web. As of Mozilla, Beard said that it needed to compete with Google ‘because the health of the internet and online life depend on competition and choice’.

Though few people agreed with Auchenberg, some of them didn’t with one Mozilla employee Asa Dotzler saying that only because Microsoft gave up, it does not mean other should too.

Just because your employer gave up on its own people and technology doesn't mean that others should follow.

— Asa Dotzler (@asadotzler) January 27, 2019

The single tweet led to a huge discussion where Mozilla and Chrome exectutives jumped in. In response to one Chrome engineer who said that Mozilla is doing great work and they don’t want them go, Auchenberg clarified that instead of going, they should re-organize into a ‘research institution’.

I don't want them to go either, but they should re-org into a research institution instead trying to justify themselves with the "protectors of the web" narrative. It's tiring.

— Kenneth Auchenberg (@auchenberg) January 25, 2019