So, Mozilla and Google are upset because Firefox and Chrome won’t be able to run on Windows RT. But isn’t that obvious? For all the talk of “no compromises” out of Redmond, that’s exactly what Windows RT is: a compromise.

It’s a less-powerful version of Windows 8 that needs to be more tightly controlled to be able to run on less powerful ARM chips. Again, that means compromises. One of them is apparently browser control.

And Microsoft can probably do this because they’re a total non-player in the tablet space right now. While Mozilla and Google obviously think this should fall under the “browser choice” antitrust stuff from the 90s, this is clearly different. Windows RT is not going to have a monopoly over the market in any way, shape, or form. At least not anytime soon.

John Gruber brings up a good question:

What if Windows 8 for ARM, instead of being called “Windows RT”, were instead called, say, “Metro OS”? Would that make a difference? Is Dotzler arguing that Microsoft should not be permitted to ship a version of Windows that locks out third-party browsers, or that Microsoft should not be permitted to ship any OS that locks out third-party browsers?

In light of what Apple has done with iOS, it’s not clear how you can actually make the second argument. As such, it would be humorous if Microsoft continuing to use the “Windows” brand (even when they probably shouldn’t) came back to bit them in the ass here (but I don’t think it actually will).

This is much more interesting than it may appear at first. Mozilla has previously been not just opposed, but vehemently opposed to using the H.264 codec. They view it as patent encumbered.

If you ask Google, one of the reasons they started work on the rival VP8 (the video portion of WebM, which may still also be patent encumbered, by the way) was because of this. They wanted a HTML5 video codec that would span the entire web.

It caused a bit of a shitstorm when Google announced they’d drop H.264 support in Chrome — even though they were keeping Flash built in. It sounded like a nightmare scenario that wouldn’t work. 

And it didn’t. In fact, over a year later, Chrome has yet to drop H.264 support.

Now Mozilla is talking about supporting H.264 because basically they have no choice. Their Boot2Gecko mobile OS project will be a complete non-starter without it. And if they do it there, they’re thinking about doing it elsewhere, it seems.

The most interesting quote from Mozilla director of research, Andreas Gal:

Google pledged many things they didn’t follow through with and our users and our project are paying the price. H.264 wont go away. Holding out just a little longer buys us exactly nothing. 

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Google over-promised and under-delivered. Badly. 

Looks like the thought that Bing could step in as the new Firefox benefactor weren’t far off the mark at all. In fact, Microsoft tried to make such a deal happen, Kara Swisher reports. 

Ultimately it didn’t happen for one reason: money. At $300 million a year (with a minimum three-year contract), Google is nearly tripling their annual payments to Mozilla to keep Microsoft away.

Also interesting: Yahoo was bidding for the contract as well. But they didn’t have enough money to throw at Mozilla to compete with Google or Microsoft. Considering Bing powers Yahoo search, you’d think the two could have worked together on a bid to displace Google. Though who knows how high Google would have been willing to go. 

On the other hand, considering how much Microsoft spends to try and make Bing competitive each year, you’d think they’d be willing to go all-in on such a deal. 

Regardless, Mozilla played this well. Historically, over 80 percent of their revenues have come from their Google deal, and that will be much higher now as revenues will likely triple as well. 

Well, it looks like the fears were unfounded. Google has renewed their search agreement deal with Mozilla for Firefox. 

It’s a multi-year agreement (lasting at least three more years), with neither side disclosing the terms. But we’ll at least partially see them next year when Mozilla posts their revenue numbers. I just wonder if the terms are the same as they have been given the rise of the Chrome.

Marco Arment brings up the most fascinating aspect related to Ed Bott’s report that Google may not be renewing the search deal that essentially keeps Firefox (and really, Mozilla) alive:

What if Bing steps in to fill Google’s shoes?

That would basically mean Microsoft would be funding the demise of their own product, Internet Explorer. 

But because Firefox has a huge user base, this is something that Microsoft would have to consider. Such a deal could potentially finally turn Bing from a multi-billion dollar suck hole into an actual business.

I’m also with Marco — this just makes me feel sad for Firefox. I remember when I started using it instead of IE; it was so refreshingly fast. It felt like it opened up a whole range of new possibilities for the web after years of Microsoft stagnation.

Then Firefox too became bloated. And it slowed down. I started using Mozilla’s Camino (their Mac-focused browser) as a result. Then Chrome arrived, in a similar way to the way that Firefox had. It was refreshingly fast…

The (potentially) good news for Mozilla is that now Chrome seems to be continuing that cycle. It’s gaining huge amounts of market share (as Firefox had before it) but the product itself is getting a ton of stuff crammed into it. It’s getting bloated…

But Marco is right, the real key going forward is mobile. And Mozilla is going to have a very hard time competing there simply because they do not control their own platform. 

Firefox Phone, anyone? 

I like how Mozilla isn’t simply porting Firefox to tablets, they’re re-imaging what the experience should be like on a tablet. 

Tabs in portait mode leave something to be desired, but I like the landscape mode (though I do hope there is a way to hide the tab chrome if you want to).

Heh. I like Mozilla’s CEO suggesting that the founder of Firefox ripping Mozilla isn’t newsworthy. I’ll be sure to take that passive-aggressive advice into consideration.

In case it’s not clear, there seems to be a direct correlation between some of the most interesting posts and people (with some stake) getting worked up about those posts. That, in turn, makes those my favorite posts.

I’ll write what I please. I am not your PR agency.