They made it “FREE” for linux users? why ? lol anyway - If I had to use a chromium browser, Helium period.
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They know if anybody is going to fork their open source code to remove the bloat, it’ll be Linux users. So they remove the incentive for Linux users to bother.
So far, they’ve been in the clear for years. There are several reputable Firefox forks that remove the bloat and telemetry, but zero Brave forks I know of.
No such thing as a free lunch - if something’s free, you’re the product.
Both standard and “diet” versions, Brave and Brave Origin, come with features that don’t make sense to maintain without incentive, which begs the question of where the money comes from, and that given how things go nowadays, I point to the opening phrase.
Though having less features may indicate a failed product, one that is bleeding the company too much?
I don’t see the removal of features as evidence of a failure. If anything, it’s something a lot of people in the niche browser market have wanted from Firefox for a long time.
When Mozilla adds
- AI toolbars and
- AI windows and
- AI context menu options and
- AI summaries and
- a shopping toolbar and
- advertisements disguised as news and
- advertisements disguised as frequently visited sites and
- advertisements disguised as a handy weather widget and
- an invisible advertisement framework and
- a Tab Notes feature that was already an extension and
- a VPN that basically was already an extension
I see this as desperation.
Firefox? Thought we were talking about Brave.
We are, I’m just using Firefox as a counterexample to the idea that less features = desperation.
Ah, ok.
Still, if the Brave team is expecting to profit through some mean, which is what I theorized, to stop the project from facing losses without completely shifting strategies would usually mean cutting parts of the project that bleed the most money as contingency.
In Firefox’s case, I’d say the scope is another. While Brave markets features, Firefox from what I can tell markets simplicity and modularity, even if both point to safety. So if Firefox gets bloated, it strays from its purpose and “betrays” their usebase. If Brave gets bloated, as long as they go in the line of “features for the users’ safety”, it should still be in line with their initial pitch.
That makes your point clearer now, thanks for elaborating.
The features removed in Brave Origin are its moneymakers: the VPN and AI assistants have a paid tier, the ads are obviously ads, the crypto pushes you towards their preferred tokens. Even the News portion of the app requires some data collection, which can be monetized.
So to me, it doesn’t look like any of their features are hemorrhaging money. Rather, they are making money, and Origin gives users a one-stop shop for opting out of the monetization schemes.
Brave is a trap. Figure it out by yourself.
