Mozilla Launches Paid Subscriptions To Its Developer Network

Mozilla today launched MDN Plus, a paid subscription product on top of the existing (and recently re-designed) Mozilla Developer Network (MDN), one of the web's most popular destinations for finding documentation and code samples related to web technologies like CSS, HTML and JavaScript. From a report: The new subscription offering will introduce features like notifications, collections (think lists of articles you want to save) and MDN offline for when you want to access MDN when you're not online. There will be three subscription tiers: MDN core, a free limited version of the paid plans; MDN Plus 5, with access to notifications, collections and MDN offline for $5 per month or $50 per year; and MDN Supporter 10 for those who are willing to pay a bit more to support the platform in addition to getting a direct feedback channel to the MDN team (as well as "pride and joy," Mozila says). As the name implies, that more expensive plan will cost $10 a month or $100 for an annual subscription.

Asking for money??!!

[Merk42]

NO! They should do explicitly what I want, and 100% for free forever!

Re:

[narcc]

I'm sure we'll see a lot of complaints like that, even though no one is being deprived of nothing.

I don't care about any of those services, but I might subscribe anyway. Without Mozilla, there is nothing to stop Chrome from becoming the new IE6.

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[DarkRookie2]

Sorry to say, Chrome is the next IE6 and Mozilla is dead set on chancing it tail.

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[NateFromMich]

even though no one is being deprived of nothing

In this case, I think everyone is being deprived of nothing.

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[narcc]

Yeah, that started out as "even though they are being deprived of nothing". Embarrassing things happen with hasty edits.

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[Merk42]

Without Mozilla, there is nothing to stop Chrome from becoming the new IE6.

As of right now, it's Apple, but only because they are even worse, locking every iOS/iPadOS device to use their Safari browser (under the hood).

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[fermion]

My concern is it actually profitable? The costs of collection, managing, customer support, must be significant. Apples $99 a year developer program is clearly just to weed out the casual developer, while the $5 a month iCloud program is a loss leader to keep users credit card on file for other purchases. I can figure what Mozilla gets out of this. The $100 might be a profit, but why?

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[dowhileor]

if you are interested in anything attached to a desktop environment and are about open source? mozilla has long been there. most people os dev'ing in their spare time are also there to learn how things work. for example how long can you explore how to make a custom linux distro without imagining how a browser will click in to it? avoiding that question will stop most people in their tracks eventually, for sure.

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[narcc]

My concern is it actually profitable?

Why wouldn't it be? A Netflix subscription is $10/month and their costs are very likely much higher. Other similar services are less.

I can figure what Mozilla gets out of this.

Money. They don't want to be dependent on a single large donor, for obvious reasons.

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[drinkypoo]

They have plenty of Google money. They spent $20M on Pocket and nobody was even asking for it.

Huh?

[DarkRookie2]

What is the point? I can bookmark to my HDDs content.
I can save web pages for offline access
And pay for notifications. No thanks.

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[slashdot_commentator]

Mozilla "management" is so damn stupid. You need to provide a service worth charging money for, before you can start charging money for it. The only thing their web browser provides is web browsing, and everyone else has found ways to monetize that feature without charging the user. Such stupid wishful thinking.

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[NateFromMich]

Such stupid wishful thinking.

Is it stupid wishful thinking, or pathetic gasping?

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[nightflameauto]

YES!

Anybody outside of tech circles forgot that Mozilla exists years ago. It's pathetic grasping that includes a massive element of wishful thinking. They need money, and are convinced the users will provide it just because.

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[bill_mcgonigle]

> everyone else has found ways to monetize that feature without charging the user

Many of them have done so with Surveillance Capitalism. That's nothing to brag about.

Brave went in the other direction. It's where most of the based MoFo people went.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

No Push API support in current Safari

[tepples]

And pay for notifications. No thanks.

If I had to guess, I'd imagine that Mozilla charges for notifications in part to cover the cost of interoperating with the proprietary Apple Push Notifications Service [apple.com] used by Safari for macOS, as opposed to the standard Push API [caniuse.com] that Chrome and Firefox implement. The document "Configuring Safari Push Notifications" published by Apple [apple.com] states:

You are required to register in the Certificates, Identifiers & Profiles section of your developer account to send push notifications. Registration requires an Appl

I abandoned all Microsoft Development work.

[oldgraybeard]

Because of the Microsoft's annual Developers tax(MSDN subscription prices) back in the day. Wonder how long before the Mozilla shakers and movers just sell out to an Advertising and Marketing company(malware company).

I thought W3Schools was the main source

[thesjaakspoiler]

for web developer....
Would have been fun if Mozilla had posted this on April 1st.

Now if they would stop thinking of their users...

[Casandro]

... as enemies, I'm sure they could just ask for donations to keep the company afloat. Unfortunately with more and more bugs designed in (e.g. menu bar hidden, HTTP/2 on by default, no pipelining on HTTP/1, Pocket, etc) it is obvious why nobody wants to donate to them. Also considering the hundreds of millions they got in the past per year, it's hard to see how they could possibly burn through all that money.