All Pocket accounts will be converted to Firefox accounts

[muxator]

At the dawn of browser sync technologies, it was possible to self host a Firefox sync server. I think I remember there was a component for authentication and one for storage proper. You could use each one of them, or both.

Is this still a thing? How would today's firefox handle a custom sync server?

[drdaeman]

Theoretically - yes.

Practically, it's poorly documented clusterfuck of very confused technologies (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18448125). I hope they've possibly sorted that out over the years, but I don't have much hopes. Although they seem to went monorepo for FxA stuff (IIRC, it used to be that Accounts and Content services were separate). Still, no end-user docs - best you can get is assorted bunch of articles aimed at developers: https://mozilla.github.io/ecosystem-platform/tutorials/devel... - summing it up, it's a project that no one seem to have ever meant to be able to use outside of Mozilla, an ability to self-host it is an accident.

It used that one could've host a single simple program and have everything working. After switch to Firefox Accounts, trying to deploy all those services and their dependencies (and keeping up as it grew) quickly became complicated. I used to maintain my own half-assed almost-all-in-one re-implementation (https://gitlab.com/drdaeman/firesync, still required Kinto as a dependency), but I gave up.

[depereo]

It'd handle it fine, considering that's still an option. The account hosting side of things is a little trickier but it's doable.

https://mozilla-services.readthedocs.io/en/latest/howtos/run...

[zerocrates]

As far as I know you can still self-host Firefox sync.

[ano-ther]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34674569

[vorpalhex]

Even though I have a firefox account, I'm glad I have moved off Pocket (to Readwise Reader).

I don't want all my accounts joined. I don't want a threat model where being locked out of one service takes down everything, especially when that service has no support. This applies to gmail and Mozilla equally.

[freefaler]

I don't see it either for 108 USD/year. I get that they need to pay for servers, for developers and etc, but I pay less for Spotify and somehow they manage to license vast amount of content.

[suddenclarity]

It will be $8 a month if you signup during the beta and pay yearly. Seems kinda steep if you're just using Pocket as a "read later" tool that scrapes the page.

[Jaepa]

Readwise looks really good, but I have a hard time understanding the value proposition. For the full application with the Readwise Reader it is 9 dollars a month. Then again its certainly worth more than a blue check-mark.

[pessimizer]

All Youtube and Gmail accounts will be converted to Google+ accounts...

[black_puppydog]

That was my immediate reaction, too.

I guess for me the difference is that if my firefox account goes away tomorrow, it is an issue I can resolve by making a new one. It's annoying but it doesn't concern anyone but me.

Losing access to my gmail address because of some youtube fuckup, now there's something that disrupts my communications with others and is hard to recover from.

[fsckboy]

that's the Buzz I heard too! I guess it's the next Wave

[jacquesm]

Browsers shouldn't have accounts to begin with.

[kibwen]

Browsers shouldn't require accounts, and thankfully Firefox doesn't. But having a way to synchronize my passwords across all my devices is pretty important.

[feyman_r]

Where does one store favorite links so I can handle them on phone and two separate machines?

[TheFreim]

I like that my browser (Vivaldi, Brave) has accounts so my phone, desktop (2x OS), and laptop (2x OS) are always completely in sync, with no downgraded functionality if I choose to not use an account.

[mock-possum]

It’s pretty easy to see a use case for a work account and a personal account - or accounts for five different users of a shared home computer.

[politelemon]

For a while there was an announcement that pocket would stop working on kobo devices, due to this announcement. But now it seems kobo will be given an extension and will make their pocket integration work with Firefox accounts.

[uxjw]

I already killed my pocket account and switched to self-hosted wallabag when I saw they were killing off Kobo integration.

[booi]

This sounds like a good thing imo. Pocket is a great tool that should be fully integrated

[autoexec]

pocket is a... well, it's a tool anyway, that never should have been anything but an add-on. Including it in the browser was one of the biggest signs that firefox was willing to sacrifice their user's privacy and security for revenue. If people are fine with telling Pocket what they read and letting them push related ads at them all day they should absolutely have that choice, but it should never have been shoved on everyone.

Firefox Sync already had a Reading List which was encrypted and open source, they really didn't need to bundle a third-party proprietary cloud service that required an account and increased attack surface (https://web.archive.org/web/20150818175419/https://www.gnu.g...). People who wanted pocket, and found it valuable would still be just as well off with it as an add-on, everyone else would have been spared the extra trouble of disabling it.

Firefox is still the best browser in terms of privacy and security but only after you make an ever growing number of about:config changes, many of which exist only to remove or disable anti-features added by Mozilla. I really wish Mozilla would embrace privacy, security, and customization as what (apart from the rendering engine, which most users will never be aware of) truly differentiates them from chrome and every other popular browser which are also chrome, but again and again their choices are in direct opposition to those very same principles

[krono]

What's there to integrate, really? You click a button, the URL of your current opened page is transmitted to their service along with your user ID, they scrape the page content, and voila.

[cobertos]

Well, it sounds like it's still going to have extensions for all the other browsers. Im not sure if the integration is changing other than the auth method to pocket.

I'd rather it not become any more integrated, I just want to browse the web and use extensions for additions like this.

[pottertheotter]

Pocket was a great tool until the released a new iOS app the other month. The app has only a fraction of the features in the prior app.

[user6723]

I have a script that runs in the background and exports my bookmarks, merges them with the existing file, then syncs that file over Syncthing.

I am not sharing my bookmarks with Mozilla, I am way too smart for that.

[timetraveller26]

I think maybe this would be finally the year I stop paying for Pocket.

It kinda worked to quickly save items but I have always wanted it to be better at organizing items. Tagging is a hassle and even though it has suggested tags most of the time they are not useful, and also you have to apply them individually!

Lately they added Lists, which I don't know how is different from pinned tags, adding more confusion.

Also I am not really sure, but I think the search functionality don't work reliably.

I just hope wallabag or Matter don't just let my unreaded links rot.

[mariusor]

I used it for synchronizing web series to my Kobo reader, and indeed the lack of proper organization makes large amounts of items a very tedious task.

[andrewstuart]

I love Pocket.

It's the only bookmarking tool I ever stuck with.

I also use Firefox as my main browser.

[criddell]

I want to love Pocket, but I just can’t. Every time I open it, all I see is a lot of work that past me wanted future me to do. I’ve stopped using it because I’m trying to be kinder to future me.

[themadturk]

I've loved Pocket as well, but I didn't like paying $45 a year for it. It was more of a bookmarking service for me than an actual read-it-later site. Now that I've found Raindrop.io, which works fine for me on the free tier, I can save a little money and have better organization than Pocket gave me.

[pyrophane]

Seems like pocket is losing a lot of its value due to more sites not working with its article view. I've stopped using it because of that and also because it doesn't work well for pages that aren't articles and I didn't like having to maintain multiple bookmarking tools.

That being said, if it was more integrated with Firefox and Firefox's bookmarking tools, that might make it compelling for me again, so maybe this is a good thing....

[Ntrails]

I hate the way pocket was just plonked in as a feature i never wanted along side a bunch of splash screens.

Gits

[ochronus]

Moved to Matter - https://hq.getmatter.com - never looked back.

[torsday]

What do you like about it?

[m-p-3]

And they almost fubar'd the Pocket integration witht the Kobo eReaders in the process.

[fefe23]

Hey Mozilla, have you considered that maybe I don't want to open an account?

In fact I don't want to open accounts with anyone. Not with social media, not with newspapers, certainly not newsletters. Accounts allow better tracking that cookies, and cookies are now regulated.

If a web site tries to get me to open an account, it will reflect poorly on my view of them, and I will be less inclined to come back.

I only opened an account here after years of lurking and trust building and I still only log on if I want to comment or upvote something.

[felipelemos]

> In fact I don't want to open accounts with anyone

Then it's not and issue for you, as you probably didn't want to open an account with pocket in first place, right?

[lawgimenez]

I have been iMessaging myself as my read it later methodology. It has worked quite very well for me.

[brewdad]

I’ve done the same with Signal’s Note to Self.

[Simulacra]

This is disappointing. I love Pocket but I don't trust Mozilla, I will not use a Firefox account, and this ends my subscription.

[amarshall]

Pocket has been owned by Mozilla since 2017; why didn’t you end your subscription then?

[LanternLight83]

lol, I see this the other way around;

Cheers to consumer choice!

[mozman]

fxa auth is superior to pocket auth