How much would you be actually, genuinely, willing to pay, per year, for a great-browser-first Mozilla Firefox?

No AI, no adtech, no sponsored news/search, and so on?

$/£/€0?

$/£/€10?

$/£/€50?

$/£/€100?

$/£/€ more?

#Firefox #Mozilla

Seeing what Free software people use and value on #FreeSoftwareAdvent is wonderful.

Please do keep sharing your daily choices!

Today, I am grumpy about people with multiple images in their email signatures.

*grump*

Warning: fediverse scam alert

You've promised yourself that you'll sit down to just read a few toots and, two hours later, you've read 500+ toots, made six new friends, and installed Linux or BSD on your laptop.

What a scam.

Whoop! My non-electronic copy of nostr:nprofile1qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnddaehgu3wwp6kyqpqy308ge0sppjzaqs5gs33w5d20mu5gqhnzhwj8kg4e03nva7z0n5qvfsc3p's "good internet" zine has arrived from the USA :)

I love the notion of the #SmallWeb, so small/indie publishing? Yes, please!

More info: https://goodinternetmagazine.com/

#GoodInternet #GoodInternetMagazine

Sometimes, I receive questions which leave both me, and the person asking, bamboozled.

> Your website loads so quickly! What CDN do you use?

There is no CDN. It is just really small and simple, mostly text.

> Sure, but is that Cloudflare, or...?

None. It is a tiny website, just a few kilobytes per page, on a tiny server, at my home, connected to the Internet via my ISP, Andrews & Arnold.

> But are you / they in the cloud?

No. The webserver is in Newbruy, in my garage.

> Neil, pease can you pass my questions to your technical person? I don't think you understand, your website cannot be in your home. It must be in the cloud or have a CDN.

*Neil puts on glasses and false nose and moustache*

After not much over three years, the USB-C port on my Pixel 6 has started to play up.

It might just need more cleaning, and it is a nuisance rather than terrible because I tend to charge on a charging pad rather than plugging in a cable. But it is annoying for file transfers, and for charging on my bike etc.

And, if Google is inhibiting GrapheneOS and others from implementing better version of Android on the Pixel range, well, my next phone won't be another Pixel, I guess.

Vibe lawyering.

Where nothing depends on anything but one's gut feeling.

Or you could, you know, sod right off with your advertising pollution.

I've written up my thoughts on installing postmarketOS with full disk encryption on a OnePlus 6, and I'll post them tomorrow.

tl;dr: it is a joy on relatively modern hardware, and I am greatly looking forward to experimenting more with it.

#pmOS #postmarketOS #Linux #FOSS

How far can a toot travel in the fediverse?

I chatted recently with someone who complained that the fediverse lacked "reach".

So I'm curious: if you are up for it, could you please reply to this toot (which started life on single user instance on a tiny computer in a garage in the United Kingdom) saying which country you are in?

Freedom is circular

I run my business on Free software.

I make money from my business.

Because I do so, I can afford to do free (pro bono) work for Free software projects, and donate to developers and maintainers.

And so it goes round.

https://neilzone.co.uk/2025/04/freedom-is-circular/

#FOSS #Linux #FreeSoftware

nostr:nprofile1qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnddaehgu3wwp6kyqpqz4a6t30e8l3me694ynhvhscnqzswzsqc4z45cxuyzhccqz7dg4nqtprys4 I agree. Were it just this, I am not sure I would consider switching from Firefox. This, plus AI, plus helping the advertising industry, is making me want to try something else.

I'm not posting any Valentine's day poetry because someone criticised my actually really quite good poem last time.

nostr:nprofile1qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnddaehgu3wwp6kyqpqwat8lkvg7h8hu2pxmsm9mnkc3pvkzxue8pgplutk6tuhnzmu2c6sjyuqxp Page 7 onwards of https://www.ofcom.org.uk/siteassets/resources/documents/consultations/category-1-10-weeks/statement-age-assurance-and-childrens-access/part-3-guidance-on-highly-effective-age-assurance.pdf?v=388809

Question: what about charities which are really stretched for resources, but are really worried about non-compliance.

Answer: Ofcom understands the challenge. it's about doing the best in a complicated scenario. See what expertise is available in your organisation. Ofcom's digital tools are a good place to start and might save many hours of reading guidance.

Finally, reassurance that, if you are making efforts to do what you need to do, and to have the "very basic" measures in place, Ofcom will always recognise those efforts.

Comment: Many sites won't have the skills/time/resource etc. to do some of what is required, and so they are more likely to shut down. There's a real risk here.

nostr:nprofile1qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnddaehgu3wwp6kyqpqsq6gnrwgljauj6pjrwvxeyu94pqzqcsasvjj0nlenr08xqxt5dlsf7dvjg No

There is a black and white rule around pornography: if you allow or host pornography, you must have highly-effective age assurance in place.

This is going to be very tricky for fedi services which do not prohibit porn, IMHO.

Question 3: I run a site, with a budget of £0. Has Ofcom seen any free or even FOSS tools to help sites comply? Has Ofcom done any thinking about this?

Answer: Nothing we have published could be said to be open source.

We've nothing specific to recommend though.

Sorry that we don't have a more useful answer.

Another question about community-born digital archives, which may have a facility for users to upload content into the archive, which the archive will then display.

Ofcom: start by looking at scope, then about whether it is a "user to user" service (it seems in scope, based on the facts in the question?).

Ofcom has some guidance on file sharing.

But do the risk assessment, and look at how specific measures might apply.

If high risk, there will be different measures.