Firefox in Russia dumps Google for Yandex

[bill]

Firefox in Russia dumps Google for Yandex [news.cnet.com]

Russian-language Firefox users will see a new default search provider soon: Google rival Yandex.

Mozilla currently has Google set to be the default search engine in Russian Firefox, but it concluded that Yandex was the better choice, according to a blog post by Mozilla General Counsel Harvey Anderson [lockshot.wordpress.com] on Friday.

"Over the past few months, we have listened to feedback, talked with our localizers, studied the trends of our Firefox Yandex builds, and reviewed the Yandex user experience. All this activity led us to the conclusion that our Russian users really wanted direct access to the Yandex search services in official Firefox RU builds," Anderson said.

[Rumbas]

Well, Yandex is as far as I know the player in Russia. Makes good sense for Firefox.

Interesting development though as most of the rest of the World seems to hop on the Google train for search.

[Quadrille]

FF should certainly act on local info, rather than making one worldwide decision, no problem there.

The question might be, is this decision being made for the reasons given - or is there just a little bit of politics too?

[bill]

or is there just a little bit of politics too?

Yeah, that was a bit of my thinking as well. I just noticed that the Google Pack software now features Chrome first and selected by default while FF is still offered it is no longer selected by default.

Perhaps we'll see this happen more in areas like Korea, China and Japan where Google is not the market leader either.

[nomis5]

Everything in Russia is politics or bribery. Time will tell, but IMHO Google will win over Yandex in the long term.