Boris Zbarsky and commenters replying to him made some great points. Warning, he describes feelings as opposed to facts, so don’t freak out.

I’ve finally been able to pin down what it is that really bugs me about Firefox, by the way. It’s not having a say in the behavior of a product in which I’m investing a lot of time and effort. Feeling that you’re irrelevant (and easily replaceable) slave labor is no fun.

This is a keen insight. A commenter in that post named LarryB made a good point, which can be paraphrased that while a common-end-user focus is good, one must not then ignore or disregard the community that built and supports all things Mozilla. Deciding we’re wrong, that’s acceptable if done with respect. Deciding we’re wrong and saying, “shut up and smile” won’t cut it. Yes, I’m saying the community must be treated with respect. Companies who lose focus and ignore their clients lose, such as SCO, Netscape, 3DFX (yes, I spend far too much time in the IT world, since I can’t name any non-IT related failures off the top of my head). They all lost focus of the market and their clients, and died (SCO is near death, after actively damaging their clients by suing them for NOT buying the crappy products and going to competing products).

Now, Brendan still gets the idea of market focus, and core features.

First, let me just say that there is no way Firefox would ship without View / Source or any other UI that goes back to Netscape 1, and is therefore part of the “body plan” of browsers. Not while I’m around and involved, at any rate.

Bravo. Sure it’s a somewhat geeky feature. It’s also been around forever in Internet terms. Brendan also has a few other extremely interesting and insightful things to say, and you’ll come out ahead by spending a few minutes to read them.

Asa then made a follow-up post to his own blog, which also offers some intersting points. And while I disagree with Asa at times, this guy is an asshole. I did the math, and at worst, Asa is a papercut. But seriously folks, this guy is way out of line. Bugzilla is not for that kind of verbal vitriol. Sadly, this wasn’t this clown’s first transgression. His first was posted under the Bugzilla account mozbugs@gl00on.net where he said:

------- Additional Comment #507 From mozbugs@gl00on.net 2004-08-18 09:10 PDT ------
Changing this to "enhancement" and removing the "regression" keyword is a lie and a skewing of the past.
I unfortunately can't undo those changes myself due to a lack of privileges, but I hope someone who does will.
And to asa, a heart-felt "fuck you".

That account was suspended. He was told he needed to re-read the Bugzilla rules and ettiquette, and send a mail in saying he understood and would play by the rules. Apparently, he did because he later then poster:

------- Additional Comment #514 From mozbugs2@gl00on.net 2004-08-19 13:52 PDT -------
Asa: your abuse of power to censor unpleasant opinions just shows again why I said what I said (and why I still mean it).

That’s when he created a second account as Micky Mouse and posted the hitler/cancer comment twice in seven minutes. This guy’s a goon and a twerp, and the project as a whole is better off without him.