06-21-2024 11:55 AM - last edited on 10-18-2024 02:19 PM by Jon
Hi folks,
In the next few days, we will start the Nightly experiment which provides easy access to AI services from the sidebar. This functionality is entirely optional, and it’s there to see if it’s a helpful addition to Firefox. It is not built into any core functionality and needs to be turned on by you to see it.
If you want to try the experiment, activate it via Nightly Settings > Firefox Labs (please see full instructions here).
We’d love to hear your feedback once you try out the feature, and we’re open to all your ideas and thoughts, whether it’s small tweaks to the current experience or big, creative suggestions that could boost your productivity and make accessing your favorite tools and services in Firefox even easier.
Thanks so much for helping us improve Firefox!
09-10-2024 12:23 PM
Absolutely not. So much of AI is unclear, privacy is murky, we don't know what is going on, energy is a real concern, and is often not at all helpful and is in fact wrong. Why in the world are you even considering it?
09-10-2024 12:25 PM
NO AI PLEASE. I have been forced to use it in many scenarios and it is nothing but a hassle! It doesn't make anything easier, I just end up spending half an hour trying to get the random number generator (because that's really all AI is) to spit out the correct 1s and 0s that I previously could do myself in just a few minutes! I switch to firefox to avoid google's data scraping, which is the foundation of AI! The grand majority of your users are people like me, and you will loose us all if you implement AI.
09-10-2024 12:26 PM
C'mon guys, you should know your userbase well enough to know that nobody's gonna want this. People download Firefox to get AWAY from stuff like this
09-10-2024 12:39 PM
Absolutely not, please do not integrate anything involving the current fad definition of "AI" into this browser. I WILL be finding a different, non-AI supporting browser to use if anything like this is implemented.
09-10-2024 12:44 PM
This should be a browser extension, not baked in.
You can mention it in the settings but it should be something installed separately.
09-10-2024 12:48 PM
I was thinking of purchasing some other mozilla services, but now that I know my money would be going towards AI development/integration, I'd rather purchase said services elsewhere.
Additionally, though you're saying it's optional for now... I've been burned by too many services saying that at first, and suddenly making AI garbage mandatory anyways (ala Windows). if the AI is indeed integrated into Firefox in this manner, I will be switching to a new browser ASAP. No thanks.
09-10-2024 12:50 PM
NO NO NO NO AI!! As if being unreliable garbage weren’t bad enough, it’s trained on things without creators’ consent, AND it uses absolutely absurd amounts of power! It’s not profitable either, it’s a TREND. And a bad one at that! If Firefox starts with this AI crap rest assured I’ll be switching browsers permanently and encouraging everyone else I know to do the same.
09-10-2024 12:52 PM
Please no
09-10-2024 12:52 PM
No thank you
09-10-2024 12:54 PM
Please don't do this. Not that I'm a statistics person, but like 90% of your users will leave you if any AI stuff gets added to Firefox. Trust me.
09-10-2024 12:56 PM
I know that the obsession with so-called "AI" is the work of a bunch of rich venture capitalists who have poured money into it and now want a return on their investment, but can we not? This fake AI (it's not AI! it's machine learning!), apart from being useless, uses up a colossal amount of natural resources. Please stop drinking the tech bro Kool Aid.
09-10-2024 12:58 PM
Please don't put AI in firefox. While it may initially seem helpful to some, I have seen supposedly good ai tools deteriorate at lightspeed over and over and over again. besides that, the AI you are testing would actively create a worse experience for users who assume it is doing what it claims to.
Ai summary is not good; it easily degrades in quality, and it's difficult to repair once it does. people may read the summary assuming it is accurate, when in reality, they have been given a bad summary they should have reported. because they trust firefox, they would trust the ai, even when it is giving a false output.
there is also a major concern for power usage and water consumption. as generative ai, Chatbots often require huge amounts of energy, which builds up quite a bit when tons of people are using it at the same time. and due to their nature as a computer, they require cooling, which is usually done with Water... and most generative ai i have seen end up consuming entirely too much during a time we are already struggling with consumption for humans and crops. average internet use does not compare to even a small niche market of chatbot users.
most firefox users i know switched from chrome to firefox specifically because firefox was the more trustworthy browser that cared about its users, didn't spy on them, and didn't push speculative techbro crap on them every step of the way. please maintain that status as a trustworthy browser, or you will lose a LOT of user trust, and that is extremely difficult to get back. as you can see from the comments already given by other users, this is very concerning, and some people are already messing with their settings to lock themselves to specific versions of firefox just incase you betray their trust and make the AI a regular part of the browser. this is not a good sign.
i apologize to anyone on your team who is excited about these features and their potential, but i'm sorry, this is a bad idea and it should not be continued.
09-10-2024 12:59 PM
hell **bleep**ing no
09-10-2024 01:01 PM
Please gods NO.
09-10-2024 01:05 PM
🤮
09-10-2024 01:06 PM
we do not want this !!!!!!!!!!
09-10-2024 01:10 PM
no. good god no. why does every company have to shill out with the AI trend. it doesnt help anyone. and it shouldnt be forced. "oh but we can just make it an option to disable and turn it off" no. adding it at all proves intent and therefore loses a ton of trust in users. look at how many people swapped to firefox to AVOID AI from chrome. and now look at this. why. why does every company have to try to shill to these bad practices just to appeal to the handful of vocal cryptobros
09-10-2024 01:11 PM
I use firefox on all my devices to avoid stuff exactly like this. I don't why you think your userbase who have all switched from Google would enjoy something like this. If I want an AI that doesn't function, I would just use Google Chrome.
09-10-2024 01:12 PM
I use Firefox partly because I don't have to deal with the privacy violations from other browsers and AI would absolutely not make my Firefox experience easier or more productive, it would just make Firefox like every other browser that I avoid using. I have no desire to use AI and just knowing it is part of the browser would have me concerned over my data and the potential for the AI to access my work and history, which I am not okay with in the slightest.
09-10-2024 01:16 PM
Absolutely not. I use firefox because it's more secure than what google chrome is, and with adding AI it will lose that security that makes it the preferred browser. Also AI is a environmental hazard that shouldn't be perpetuated.
09-10-2024 01:20 PM
I really like how AI features are being implemented in Firefox, being inobtrusive and opt-in, but still very easy to reach for those who want it. 👍
Although I can't use it frequently, as my sidebar is already occupied by tree tabs addon all the time.
09-10-2024 01:18 PM
Absolutely not, no. No, no, no.
09-10-2024 01:27 PM
I tried it, and within a minute it was giving me medical advice. I don't object to AI as much as many people do, but IT SHOULD NEVER BE RELIED ON FOR ANYTHING EVEN A LITTLE IMPORTANT. There WILL be people who ask it for advice on important things, there WILL be people who follow that advice, and that WILL lead to them making terrible mistakes.
Don't be part of it.
Thanks for making it opt-in and being open to feedback!
09-10-2024 11:37 PM
precisely one of my concerns!! by putting this thing in, it gives the impression that it can be trusted, and a percentage of users will follow that trust and believe the ai when it starts giving bad information. this isn't just a bad idea, it is outright dangerous.
09-10-2024 01:30 PM
DON'T
YOU'RE THE ONLY GOOD BROWSER LEFT
DON'T DO IT
09-10-2024 01:34 PM
PLEASE DON'T! Thank you very much.
09-10-2024 01:36 PM
I, and many others, come to firefox for privacy. This would work deliberately against that, and make me switch to another product.
09-10-2024 01:35 PM
Please do not add any sort of AI features of functionality into Firefox. I am on my knees begging for AI to stay out of Firefox. I am so tired of being forced to find ways to turn off and disable AI in online products, especially from Google and Microsoft. I honestly do not use Google as my search engine anymore because of insane advertisements and AI. Firefox adding AI would feel like a slap in the face, especially with how it touts itself as a bastion of user privacy and customizability. How can I trust you won’t start selling my data or training an AI with it after it’s been implemented? I implore you, if you care for keeping your userbase that you have built back up, do not add any sort of AI features.
09-10-2024 01:38 PM
please do NOT deploy this to the normal version! I use firefox to avoid Google and their tracking bull**bleep**. don't en**bleep**tify the greatest anti-Chromium bastion in the pursuit of a trend that the majority of users HATE
09-10-2024 01:38 PM
PLEASE don't integrate an AI system with Firefox, I moved to the browser because of praise of its privacy features and I do not want an AI installed that will raise questions about privacy and what it reads from me.
09-10-2024 01:41 PM
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE NO
09-10-2024 01:49 PM
@asafko wrote:Hi folks,
In the next few days, we will start the Nightly experiment which provides easy access to AI services from the sidebar. This functionality is entirely optional, and it’s there to see if it’s a helpful addition to Firefox. It is not built into any core functionality and needs to be turned on by you to see it.
If you want to try the experiment, activate it via Nightly Settings > Firefox Labs (please see full instructions here).
We’d love to hear your feedback once you try out the feature, and we’re open to all your ideas and thoughts, whether it’s small tweaks to the current experience or big, creative suggestions that could boost your productivity and make accessing your favorite tools and services in Firefox even easier.
Thanks so much for helping us improve Firefox!
Do not add ai features. We do not want them and we will stop using firefox if it goes down this route. We already avoid using google despite its prevalence, we are fully willing to avoid firefox and go to some other godforsakenly tiny browser option if it means having real privacy.
I dont care if it's optional or opt-in, and i dont care if you say it wont sell my info. I dont want ai. Stop please.
09-10-2024 01:49 PM
Oh god please don't do this. We really don't need Firefox to be like the other browsers. Why do you think i'm using it? We don't need AI. It is an absolutely abysmal slope into privacy breeches and datacollection. No matter how much you say it won't, I will not believe you, I will not trust you.
09-10-2024 01:51 PM
Please don't
09-10-2024 01:55 PM
I feel like the side menu could use some improvement at the moment. I’ve been hiding and reopening it using Ctrl+H and then switching to the AI, but even if there were a hotkey specifically for this, it might not be the most effective solution. A button on the toolbar could work better.
Also, while it may not make that big of a difference, I really don't know, it would be nice if the side menu was in a special container that prevents it from accessing any information in your browser that you prefer to keep private. Maybe this is already the case, and I’m just not aware.
Considering all of the user feedback so far, it might be worth exploring alternative implementations. It could be an add-on. While it doesn’t bother me personally, I understand that it’s a concern for many others.
I genuinely hope this can be implemented in a way that satisfies users and helps avoid negative discussions on platforms like Twitter and Reddit.
09-10-2024 02:32 PM
I also see it as an "easy access to AI services from the sidebar," as you said. There's the "Show queries on text selection" feature, which displays a shortcut for queries when you select text. Since Firefox sends the text, page title, and queries to the chatbot, it may be a little too much for a lot of people. I know that Pocket is disabled in a lot of Firefox hardenings, so you know how people feel.
I use AI for some small things, and having it in a more handy way is really cool. As I said before, if you can make it more secure—maybe if the Multi-Account Containers add-on had a special type of container for this kind of stuff and the add-on was also implemented with this feature—it could be really nice.
Maybe you could make the "Show queries on text selection" feature more suitable for this private browser. A little bit. At the end of the day, you're just making it easier to access. People will go to the websites if they want; you're just making these people's lives more convenient.
Bing's Copilot could be useful, but I don't know if you can implement it.
It will really be what people would be mad about, but if you could easily send the page as a PDF to the AI, it could be useful. Like, you already have the "Ask me" shortcut there. So, if you could send an article easily to the AI to have a quick exam, it would be nice.
TTS AI can also be interesting. It's a more fluid voice. Again, it would be up to the user's choice to have this. Sell some privacy for convenience. As long as you don't force it, it can be really great.
I think that's it. Have a great day!
09-10-2024 01:57 PM
I would be in the market for a new browsers if ai is implemented into Firefox.
I want you to do well, but this is nonsense.
09-10-2024 01:58 PM
I will not even entertain trying this "feature." The mere fact that you thought this was a good enough idea to include in a Nightly release, and didn't can it before it got to development, is already a massive breach in trust. Mozilla is supposed to be dedicated to safety and ethics, and LLMs are bastions of hallucinated information and data theft. I'm seriously considering finding a different browser just from reading this post, and I ABSOLUTELY will if you implement it, even if it's entirely opt-in. I do not trust that you would actually honor my opt-out status if you're morally bankrupt enough to include a built-in AI search or chatbot feature.
09-10-2024 01:59 PM - edited 09-10-2024 02:17 PM
Please for the love of all good things left on this planet... DO NOT ADD AI TO FIREFOX!!!
I very specifically chose to switch to Firefox so this kind of thing wouldn't happen.
AI integration has been extremely badly received by the users of any platform it has been added to.
Where did your ML model get its training data? How can you confirm that everything your model has been trained on has been ethically aquired and is free of ingrained bias? Are you going to be collecting our user data to train your models further??
Please just take one look at Google's stupid Gemini project and at how badly their model functions to this day.
Adding AI to Firefox would be a massive mistake, please don't ruin your good image for some tech start-up's lie.
09-10-2024 02:00 PM
Happy to add my voice to the chorus of no's. Firefox is the refuge from the desperate and aggressive push to ruin the planet and our user experience with so-called AI. Please, just don't.