Why Firefox is more that just the browser

As I commented in the last post, I could not see any reason why the new Ubuntu version would use the new Firefox beta.

I've since read peoples suggestions that it was a good decisions because Ubuntu 8.04 will be supported for several years because its a long term support (LTS) version. This means they will support it for three years, and it will be two years before the next LTS release. Over that period of time Firefox 3 which is currently a beta will be the main release and Firefox 2 will disappear. So it makes sense to include v3 not v2 in the new Ubunutu release.

This is a reasonable argument. And I have to say that Firefox 3 appeared finished and stable even if its still a beta.

However this ignores the fact that addons mean that Firefox is more than just a browser in a way thats not true of say Internet Explorer (because their addon market is less mature and crucially its mostly commercial whereas the Firefox market is mostly free). The fact that there is a healthy use of addons in the tech savvy Firefox user base, and that this is going to be even more widespread in the even more tech savvy Ubuntu/Firefox user base, means that the maturity of these addons are almost as important as the browser itself. If you upgrade the browser and this breaks the addons this effectively breaks browser for a large number of users.

I think the Ubuntu decision to include the beta browser is wrong for this reason. They have forgotten that Firefox is more than just the browser, its now a platform of sorts and you cant upgrade a platform until the stuff that runs on it is broadly ready.