Mar 11
Void My Firefox Warranty?
I just upgraded to Ubuntu Hardy Alpha 6 to start testing, and am delighted to try the new Firefox 3 beta. Amongst other changes, I found this peculiar warning message when trying to view about:config. In case you’re not aware, about:config allows you to change some backend settings to your Firefox profile, similar to the Windows registry. When trying to navigate to the page, you get a warning:
This might void your warranty!
Changing the default values of these advanced settings can be harmful to the stability, security, and performance of this application. You should only continue if you are sure of what you are doing.
It’s a useful message, as you can do a lot of damage with about:config. But void my warranty? Since when does Firefox ever come with a warranty? Check out the screenshot for a closer view.
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March 11th, 2008 at 10:42 am
Haha, I like that idea, voiding your warranty on something free. Either they don’t realize that you can “throw it away” and get a new one, or they are thinking of some kind of pay-to-use feature in the future. Let’s hope this isn’t a sign of some sort of revenue scheme in the works by Mozilla; I am getting used to the idea of free.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:37 am
I can’t image there is any pay-to-use plans in the future. Firefox is open source, which completely contradicts the idea. Besides, they have far too many users at this point to just throw it all away. If I had to bet, I would say that this warning message gets changed before the final release.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
It’s a joke, people. Relax a bit.
- A
March 11th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
Although I now stand corrected on my pay-for-use rumors, I could see something like additional features or high-level customization being sold to companies eventually. It’s not a bad business model and still keeps things open-source and free for the typical user.
March 14th, 2008 at 3:53 am
omg. its a joke. they put a lot of silly things in the browser. try about:robot or about:mozilla
anyway, it would discourage people to mess with it.
March 14th, 2008 at 8:35 am
I’ve seen about:mozilla–that’s kinda fun. But about:robot doesn’t work for me. Can anyone see it?
March 14th, 2008 at 9:25 am
No robots on my machine. Although I do have a paper bird, an orange stress-crab, and a small yellow gummy fish on top of my monitor.
Random comment of the day award?
April 8th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
the robots one is only for ff3 beta 5
April 9th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Its about:Robots in plural.
June 14th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
hi,
about:about
June 23rd, 2008 at 6:47 pm
about:about apparently only in Sea Monkey
http://kb.mozillazine.org/About_protocol_links