Hello guys, today I wanted to talk about a project I deeply care about and I’m actively contributing to, as I believe its good for everyone, including privacy concerned users
Ladybird Browser
This browser comes from the project “SerenityOS”, and has since evolved and separated from it. The founders are Andreas Kling, and Chris Wanstrath. The main goal of this project is to create a browser from scratch, avoiding chromium, gecko, etc. The main keypoints that should be of interest for Privacy Oriented Users are the following:
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Ladybird lead (Andreas Kling) states “We’re not monetizing users, in any way. This is uncharted territory for browsers. So we’re not going to do any default search deals. We’re not going to do cryptocurrencies or try to monetize user data, just sponsorships and donations”
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While** Ladybird will implement current web standards including cookie handling and tracking mechanisms for compatibility**, the browser’s philosophy puts the user in control of these decisions, not the company. The browser won’t have built-in incentives to encourage data collection since it doesn’t profit from it.
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It aims to be “free from advertising’s influence” Ladybird, representing a shift away from the current web ecosystem where users like us are the product. This allows the project to implement privacy features without worrying about harming advertising partners or revenue streams.
As of now, the project has hired several developers with money coming from donations, from partners such as FUTO, Shopify, Cloudflare, among many, and is also seeing lots of volunteer activity on github. So well, if you like the web having more diversity and us having another alternative to google, check them out https://ladybird.org/
if you want a browser made by a transphobe just use brave
Lovely way of taking everything out of context
I’d be curious to know what the proper context is for Kling saying that using gender neutral language in the documentation of a project he was maintaining is something he’s opposed to because it’s “ideologically motivated.”
White males are actively discriminated against in tech.
It’s an open secret of Silicon Valley.
One of the last meetings I attended before leaving Apple (in 2017) was management asking us to “keep the corporate diversity targets in mind” when interviewing potential new hires.
The phrasing was careful, but the implication was pretty clear.
I knew in my heart this wasn’t wholesome, but I was too scared to rock the boat at the time.
That’s Kling replying to @danheld, who “is ultimately responding to @shaunmmaguire’s tweet lying about being told he wouldn’t be promoted at Google for being white.”
What’s the proper context for that?
What’s the proper context for Kling calling someone getting dragged for boosting noted far-right conspiracy nut Bryan Lunduke “persecution” for “banal, mainstream positions”?
I mean, sure, being alt-right isn’t very alt nowadays so I guess it’s mainstream, I’ll grant you that.
Quotes and links from this blog post
is this the browser with the terfy devs
That’s it. And it seems like they don’t stop at “mere” transphobia: https://mastodon.social/@alatiera/115272605624599561
Edit: Browsing by “active” threads, I didn’t see that this one was two weeks old. Oh well 😅
I’ve donated to them before, but I remember some anti-LGBTQ+ issues from one of the lead developers I think a few years ago. Has that been addressed?
I believe the project has been parked on neutrality and common respect for a while, the biggest “controversy” I know of is that the lead developer and founder said something about hiring back when he worked at apple, based on inclusivity vs talent, being a bad way of doing things, and people went crazy over that
The controversy was about a pull request being submitted that changed documentation to have gender-neutral pronouns, and there was some back and forth with the lead dev about not making “political” statements. Also lead dev is German and apparently (just what I have been told) in German the male pronouns are used when making gender-neutral references; so that muddied the waters of the back and forth - he may have assumed he was doing intended grammar in English and others may have assumed he was fighting against inclusivity (which as been going around a lot lately, in case that was not obvious…)
As far as I know it was eventually straightened out and the changes were implemented
German here: in german all nouns have a gender. and virtually all nouns used to describe people in general are male (like user, human, citizen) and a majority of professions as well. As such using male pronouns in documentation is common as you refer to a user (and the word user has male gender). However there is a big debate in Germany about gender inclusive language that moves away from this “generic masculinity” of nouns. And of course the political left is pro inclusivity while the right is against it.
So if a (german) dev is actively defending the use of male-only pronouns they probably fall into the anti-invlusive-language camp in Germany as well. Its reasonable they would make the mistake when just translating from German, but starting a fight over changing it is sus.
When I first became aware of this project I was pretty dismissive.
I’m very happy to admit in this case that the project has come further than I thought it would.
Their FAQ says they have 8, paid, full time devs and resources for something like 18 months. IDK how much it really takes to get a browser off the ground but they’ve got something, at least.
I’m looking forward to their Alpha release in 2026, and really hope they can achieve that.
I hope they come out with extension support immediately and uBO follows up with compatibility after.
Extension support is basically a minimum requirement for me (especially uBO, but also some others like Bypass Paywalls Clean, FastStream, and SponsorBlock). They can add overhead to the browser, but if the browser itself is solid and as efficient as they are pushing for. Then I can handle knowing that any extra RAM or processes are my fault. I imagine that if they truly keep all the data collection and telemetry we see in other browsers. Then the overhead of extensions might just make resources only about as bad as a clean install of the others without extensions. Which would still be a win in my book. Even if they don’t have extensions, it will still be fun to have around and see how it evolves over time. Might even inspire folks to try doing the hardest part of making new browsers instead of endless forks that are at the whim of the base they came from.
I’m sure they’ll get extension support at some point. They also said they intend to add a built in adblocker
I don’t mind an adblocker extension installed by default (for non tech-minded users), but a built in adblocker is just irritating. I want to have control over which extensions I use. Building an adblocker into the browser just takes more development time, and reduces freedom for everyone.
having a pre-installed adblock extension is also a great way to dogfood the extension implementation, whereas if it’s a built-in adblocker it’s likely to use a bunch of special privileged code and when extension developers complain about being unable to do things the browser devs will just say “yeah we can’t be bothered to fix this, just use the built-in adblocker dude”
i wish they wouldn’t add a built in adblocker… i just want it to be the most minimal browser engine, and i want to be able to choose the adblocker
How soon might it be ready to use?
There’s also !Servo@programming.dev browser engine that is being actively developed.
I knew of their existence, but I should keep an eye on servo
Lady/Thunder/Betterbird seem excellent.
What other fowl software is worth a try?Linux is great, mostly because of its foul mascot.
That said, I think ladybird is more likely to refer to the dog in King of the Hill than a bird.
Not for nothing, in these use cases it’s fowl with a w, unless you mean to imply that it’s wicked, immoral, or offensive.
Who are browsers usually built for? Dogs?
Statistically speaking, for advertisers. That’s, like, four levels removed from “dogs” and three from “bitches”.
Lol, this graphic is not relevant here.
HTML is the standard, ladybird isn’t changing the standard, they’re creating a web browser to comply with the standard.They’re creating their own web browsing privacy standard
If you want it to sound bad you got to try harder.
Ok, how does this sound.
Privacy that is funded by giant corporations who provide man-in-the-middle services to 19.3% of the internet’s websites.
That does not mean it won’t be compliant with the current standard.
You’re really channeling the scumbag depicted in your avatar with your disingenuous framing of this project’s mere existence as a bad thing.
I never said it won’t be compliant with web standards. I said it will have its own privacy standards. You’re really channeling the scumbag depicted in my avatar by twisting up my words.
Im not saying they should halt the project. Im not sayin we don’t need more browsers. Im not saying this is doomed to fail. Im not saying it will succeed.
But its another browser among hundreds of other browsers. They’re all mostly compliant with web standards.
But the difference is is that only a few browsers are what you’d call successful (chrome, safari, firefox). If the new one catches on, it’s a needed contribution, not “just another standard”
Just one more browser, bro
This graph is terrible for proving your point. Which browsers are … ?
- building a new engine and/or rewritting old code; instead of just being another fork/reskin of browser xyz;
- still active, with expectations of continuing for the next few years; with funding from people and companies;
- doing rapid advances towards being a good enough replacement of Chrome, Firefox, Safari;
This graphs says nothing of that.
edit: autocorrect
To be fair, currently most web browsers are based either in Firefox or chromium. In the past Opera used to have its own engine, and the same applied for other browsers.
I’m fine with current efforts on ladybird and servo.
Yeah but in this situation it’s like, going from 3.5 standards to 4.5.
What do companies like Shopify hope to gain from this?
My guess would be to have their business less dependant on Google’s whims and more reliant on actual web standards
I’m excited to see Ladybird developing, but the project accepting money from Cloudflare makes me wary. Between Cloudflare’s man-in-the-middle position in a great deal of web traffic, and their similarly invasive position as a major DNS-over-HTTPS provider, they are not remotely privacy-friendly.
Ladybird is a nom profit, and its system consist in limiting sponsor max donation to 100k per year, so no company can sponsor more than that and make ladybird dependent on them. On top of that, they try to balance budget to keep money for 18months of salaries at all times, so they dont feel the need to rush decisions and can have stable development
Nom nom nom.
Their website says:
All sponsorships are in the form of unrestricted donations. Board seats and other forms of influence are not for sale.
So Cloudflare and other sponsors don’t get a say which is comforting.
Well, it’s definitely not optimal, but I doubt they have any say in the project’s direction, so I’m OK with this as long as there’s no proof of shady shit going on.
I’d rather they take the money (as long as Cloudflare isn’t using the threat of pulling funding as leverage to affect development) than refuse it on the grounds of Cloudflare being a shit company; having alternative browser & JS engines is more important than ideological purity, imo.
Like I said, not optimal, but not a lot is nowadays…
Yeah, this fits with the “don’t correct your enemy when they’re making a mistake” category. Take their money and use it for good. As long as they don’t have a say in how it’s spent, it’s better to take it from them than it go to effect something in a bad way.
The project needs money from somewhere.
I’m not sure I follow, are you saying cloudflare isn’t privacy friendly due to their unique position and general success as a CDN, or are you alluding to them doing something actively privacy invading?
I’m just trying to understand the argument here, I don’t quite follow what it is that CF has done wrong.
They have nearly monopolized a lot of web traffic with their CDN, proxies, and other services. Yes they can provide a good product, but this much influence over the internet is not a good thing. it’s not healthy for maintaining an open web, but that’s long since been killed.
