Firefox uses on-device downloaded-on-demand ML models for privacy-preserving translation.

[object Object]

@hdv @firefoxwebdevs thanks for telling me about some software you use and then insulting me!

wyngman

@zzt @firefoxwebdevs OK, now make the same argument for the spell-checker, sync, and the set of CAs, etc. etc. supplied with the browser. Its as if y'all were trained by Microsoft PR to take the arguments Mozilla used against tying IE to Windows and extend them ad-absurd-um to features in Mozilla's own browser ("just turn it around back in their faces" said the Armani suit).

Meanwhile, Red Hat is quietly undermining any legal basis for copyleft and leaning into the idea that gratis products (Fedora) shouldn't have robust & transparent system update tools. Oh and the umpteen other for-profit controlled (opposite of Mozilla) FOSS projects that get plugged in these spaces pretty much constantly. Linux Foundation being controlled by Microsoft and Google...? crickets chirping.

This is what makes me tired of IT and geek culture. Its become like everything else, just kneejerk crap with zero reflection and sense of proportion. As I hinted above, it morphs into this shadow of corporate PR. Consider, if people spent their time criticizing actual badness in Firefox, like ad tracking and DoH, that would be inconvenient for certain interests from Brave on up to Apple and Google. I think the style and quality of venting we usually see about Mozilla serves those interests, much of it probably fed by sock puppets.

mkj

@firefoxwebdevs I think the best might be to generalize the "yes, but" answer.

Have a set of toggles, one for each feature. Whatever the default state is:

When I (the user) press the TURN OFF AI button or whatever the mechanics are, force them all to (as actively selected) OFF and make the default for any newly added such features also OFF (by implication of the default).

Let me manually toggle a given, specific feature back ON if I want to, *while* keeping the rest including default OFF.

½

[object Object]

@tasket @firefoxwebdevs k

David Gerard

@zzt @hdv@front-end.social @firefoxwebdevs god forbid someone talk about a technology from an industry of liars, responding to a survey from an organisation that's already lying to its users, with a survey carefully missing the option the majority of respondents actually want (make it an extension), and come across as *cynical*

mkj

@firefoxwebdevs I realize that there's a lot of very vocal people about this, and you might note that I specifically say "whatever the default state is". *At least put the user in a position of being able to easily control these features* and turn them on or off per their preference. For some people, some of those features can be genuinely useful (as illustrated by some replies in this very thread, even). Not *having* to throw the baby out with the bathwater is advantageous.

2/2

Monokeros

@firefoxwebdevs Remove all the LLMs, then you won't need the kill switch

wyngman

@twifkak Wouldn't that be a valid working definition of "open"?

[object Object]

@firefoxwebdevs an important addendum regarding Firefox translate: by my math (N = my replies), 25% of its users are fucking unhinged

I told them not to use the necronomicon to train the base model but here we fucking are

David Gerard

@tasket @zzt @firefoxwebdevs today i learned that SSL certificates were a *kind* of AI

Monokeros

@decadecity @firefoxwebdevs "their consent is being taken seriously" this thread and the entire behavior of Mozilla prove this false

David Gerard

@zzt @firefoxwebdevs i'll have you know i'm at least 75%* hinged

* vibe estimate, but we carefully graphed it so it's data now

[object Object]

@davidgerard @firefoxwebdevs I know you, you’ve read much worse things than the necronomicon

you’ve written wiki articles about most of them

Jane Doe

@firefoxwebdevs Of course, ML translation suffers many of the same problems. Also, why are you integrating translation as a core browser feature? Seems more like an extension feature.

taye

@firefoxwebdevs Thanks for involving the community in this! I've found the translation feature really useful even if the results aren't state-of-the-art!

I agree with other commenters that there's an issue with the term "AI", but I don't have any suggestions.

To match my current preferneces, I would like an AI kill switch to keep translations with local models, but disable LLM chatbots, summarizers, and agents.

David Gerard

@zzt @firefoxwebdevs firefox translate is to blame, arrest that instead

Monokeros

@gatesvp @firefoxwebdevs @sil @jmax They could engage with the nonspecific anger by removing the VERY SPECIFIC technologies at issue

Instead they want to make us argue about "well, if we haul away the shit, do you want us to haul away the bark dust, too? Some people need bark dust, so you have to let us smear shit all over everything"

Monokeros

@mage_of_dragons @cassidy @firefoxwebdevs We also know exactly what lies in store for the current slate of AI: 20 years of funding drought, just like all its ancestors

twifkak

@tasket It would be, much in the way that "guaranteed not to turn pink in the can" is a valid description of bad salmon [1]. A disingenuous mislead from what people really care about in the product.

[1] I know it didn't happen. It's a good metaphor.

Firefox for Web Developers

@firefoxwebdevs My closest answer would be "no", but I think the question is kind of mis-phrased here, and that's probably going to lead to a confusing and potentially misleading outcome.

The problem that people have is not with "AI" as a generalized category, but with the current generation of thieving, climate-destroying, grifting systems that are marketed as AI to an overwhelming degree - notably LLMs and "generative AI", but really anything with those inconsiderate properties.

If your kill switch is presented as an "AI kill switch", then depending on the person they're either going to understand that as "exploitative tech", or as "machine learning", and so make different assumptions as to whether local translation is included in that.

So I think you'll have to be a lot more explicit about what you mean; either by describing clearly what the kill-switch includes, or what it excludes, right in the place where the option is offered. Otherwise it's damned if you do, damned if you don't; depending on whether you include translations, either one or another group is going to be upset with the unexpected behaviour.

So, ethically, if the translation feature is built on ethically collected data, and it has no outsized climate impact, then I would not consider it something that needs to be included in a "get rid of all of it" kill switch. But to convey this clearly to users, both that and why it isn't included should be explained right there with the button, with potentially a second-step option to disable it anyway if someone still feels uncomfortable with it.

That way you've transparently communicated to users and shown that you have nothing up your sleeve by immediately and proactively offering them an option to disable that, too, if they have already shown interest in removing "AI" features.