[sameerds]

A close friend who is a professional has been losing customers because he was too careful and wanted only the most reliable thing for every customer. Customers drifted away, and business dwindled. Our guess is that word-of-mouth publicity stopped because "he takes too much time to get anything done". Things have started improving ever since he pulled back his quality slightly, thinking that if say a "small N" out of 100 customers are dissatisfied, at least the remaining will retain business.

Is that what is ailing Firefox? I mean is Firefox losing because it tries to be safest and the best for every user, while Chrome just carries on with basic safety and nothing more?

[EDIT: Clarified the question.]

[eviks]

Given the fact that Firefox was ailing long before mandatory signing, this seems like a clear no?

Besides, this isn't "safest and best for every user", just like the quality vs speed tradeoff in your friend's story is not something he can decide entirely on his own for his customers (though there are other complications in real life)

[ttoinou]

Good point, maybe it comes from who's paying for the browser, hence how companies behind browsers are incentivized. Google gets money from advertiser and Mozilla from Google and users donations