There are now 2.4 million users of Vivaldi (digi.no)

TalGarik

@Ayespy I get your point but Amazon and Tesla operated in newborn markets (which by definition are risky and require some time before being profitable), while browsers have been around for decades, I do not like Brave but comparing - practically in the same time span - Brave's and Vivaldi's numbers and growth rate it is quite evident, 80 millions versus 2.4, that crypto and privacy are à la page, tons of features and customization are not.

Even since the first technical preview I have tried to convince family, friends and colleagues to try/use Vivaldi but in the long term no one has sticked with it, not even the ones who for their job or hobby seemed perfect Vivaldi users who should have appreciated panels and notes.
And from anyone came the killing question: no mobile version?
Opera got the importance of the mobile market immediately, and it has paid, if you look at Opera's numbers you will see that it is a bigger actor there - in what it is now the main browsing market - than in desktop. Opera GX has been another smart and successful idea, creating a version of the browser dedicated to gamers who are heavy browser users (and like in the old times now Microsoft is following suit advertising Edge as a browser for gamers).
Users like us are dinosaurs using a browser for dinosaurs I guess.

Ayespy

@DerHimmelssheriff That is where you differ from Jon's Vivaldi vision. He is not trying, and does not want to, appeal to the "vast majority." He is not competing with the majors, and will not simplify it or dumb it down, to appeal to the lowest common denominator like Chrome and Edge do. "Everybody" or "most people" are not his market. They are the market of the majors. He is looking for a big enough audience of people who appreciate sophistication, multi-capability, and variety. He has found 2.5M of them and will find more, enough to make the project sustainable.

In a way, it's a bit like Linux. Definitely not everyone's cup of tea. Only a small minority of users are even interested. But those who know it and love it are fanatical - enough so that it will always survive.

TalGarik

@Ayespy said in There are now 2.4 million users of Vivaldi (digi.no):

In a way, it's a bit like Linux. Definitely not everyone's cup of tea. Only a small minority of users are even interested. But those who know it and love it are fanatical - enough so that it will always survive.

what kind of linux? certainly not Ubuntu or Fedora that in different ways have backers consenting them to have an adequate team of developers putting out a professional product, certainly better than Sabayon (which looks like a good comparison for Orion), in the end Mageia is the best comparison: an original project which never got enough traction for the slowness of its development. But Mageia - and other similar linux distros - are made by volunteers, that's why they survive, it is a hobby, they are not losing money.
And money is a central issue, as yourself pointed out in another discussion Vivaldi needs to know how many users it has to strike deals with search engine/advertisers/whatever - making money is central to the development of the browser, it is quite obvious that if 2.4 was 24 (still a small number compared to Brave, not to mention the rest) we would not be here discussing this (and I would have a beautiful Vivaldi browser on iOS).

Pesala

To Attract more users

Implement some of the most popular feature requests - All have over 100 upvotes

Multi-Account Containers or Workspaces
Sessions Panel - Make sessions easier to manage
Save Opened files in Temporary Folder
Support for MIME Types - Let users choose directories per file type
Drag and Drop in Downloads Panel
Auto Detect Logos for Thumbnails - Improve the look of the Start Page
Download Manager - Allocate bandwidth
Export/Import for User Settings - Backup and restore settings
Automark Email as read option
Duplicated Bookmark Detection/Cleanup

Catweazle

@DerHimmelssheriff, I don't have many doubts about the sustainability of Vivaldi, there are about 100 different browsers currently on the market, equally marginal as Vivaldi, but despite being a browser with few users compared to the "big" ones, it is mentioned prominently in the height in almost all technical publications, which others with more users, such as Whale, Cent, etc. they never got. It has even managed to be included in two Distros (Majaro and FerenOS) as the default browser, which companies like Renault and Polestar include in their products (perhaps even paying a commission for it).
It is not necessarily a matter of the number of users, but who uses it.
Maybe in the future an extended business model can be created to create income, so suddenly I can think of a paid premium version for companies that includes a function for collaborative works (I think of something like what System D offers*, which is a French FOSS )

alt text

https://github.com/HUB-HUmanBeing/SystemD

Ayespy

@DerHimmelssheriff Brave has huge outside funding and relatively massive promotion compared to Vivaldi (cuz, money). It's not about its design. It's about its exposure.

Ayespy

@DerHimmelssheriff And its iOS offering is literally nothing more than re-branded Safari with a couple of tweaks, which it was able to produce in less time than Vivaldi due to a MUCH larger (roughly five times the size - again, money) development team.

TalGarik

@DerHimmelssheriff have you ever looked at Samsung Internet's market share? there is no doubt that being pre-installed helps, but Samsung's mobile browser demonstrates that putting out there a good product helps (I am talking as a former Samsung user, the only reason it was not my default it was the lack of a way to sync it with a desktop browser, it had been possible for a while though)
first Firefox and later Chrome "destroyed" Internet Explorer because it was a mediocre product.

TalGarik

@DerHimmelssheriff it is interesting to note that Vivaldi "shines" on the social network with way more less users (but well read ones, the people reading technical publications)

TalGarik

@DerHimmelssheriff a few examples of possible reasons

former founder of Mozilla has more traction than former founder of Opera
crypto has traction
selling yourself as a privacy browser sells
word of mouth weighs more than reviews

when I was on the Windows/Fedora/Android route I used Brave for a while, it was basic - no panels or sidebar, no fancy customization options - but it was efficient and fast, alas its iOS version is ridiculous, it is worse than Safari, at the least for the way I browse

RiveDroite

Apple really needs to let browsers be more than just a wrapper over Safari.

treego

Ayespy

@DerHimmelssheriff One of the keys to Opera's early success (arranged by none other then J S Von Tetzchner) was that it was the default browser on multiple cell phones, TV set-top boxes, game consoles, etc.

At present, are Brave, Opera, Firefox installed by default in automobiles? Nope. But Vivaldi is.

treego

Vivaldi is soooo addicting ... other browsers are snooze-inflicting.

Catweazle

@TalGarik said in There are now 2.4 million users of Vivaldi (digi.no):

......

crypto has traction
......

Crypto is currently in freefall, we will therefore see if this is not a shot in the knee in Brave's business model, of basing their income on this. Luckily Vivaldi has said "Vade Retro" to this type of business.
The tulip bubble in the Netherlands a few centuries ago was exactly the same as the hype with cryptocurrencies now.

barbudo2005

@DerHimmelssheriff

Said:

Give normies a chance to explore and don't intimidate them with too many options right from the beginning.

A solution would be to separate the settings into 3 parts, with a menu to select. Newbie by default.

Newbie
Middle
Expert

And add an explication for those settings difficult to understand like this (if necessary with screenshot):

For example, who understand this?

This is Native window:

This is not a Native window:

treego

@DerHimmelssheriff said in There are now 2.4 million users of Vivaldi (digi.no):

I‘d say: Make Vivaldi really modular. After Installation give a chance to add features as if they were extensions. And really add them, not only show or hide them. Make Vivaldi easy to install and simple. Let the users decide, what they need, not what self-declared „power users“ want. I think this would really help to have some market adoption and not sticking with the same number of users and seeing no real progress in years.

Isn't Step 1 of beginning with Vivaldi not helpful enough for new users?

TalGarik

@DerHimmelssheriff said in There are now 2.4 million users of Vivaldi (digi.no):
Why doesn't Vivaldi have not at least some 50m users after six years like for example Brave has?

from 2.4 to 50 millions is a huge step, it is almost the same jump going from Astolfo to Neil Armstrong
for the record Brave now claims 80 millions

Being someone who joined this bandwagon since January 2015 I could try to reply to your question this way:

in 2015, since the TP I used Vivaldi way more than I do now, why?
in 2022 Opera - with all of its iOS shortcomings - is again my default browser, why?
when desktop/mobile sync became essential for me Vivaldi became an afterthought *
"a browser for our friends" then why the most upvoted features are not implemented? why it took years to declare that the most upvoted feature of all would not be implemented?

*nowadays every year you are late to the party counts like ten years of old, IMHO ignoring mobile has been the decisive mistake

8 years ago the declared goal was 5 millions, when you have not reached it during the internet usage growth generated by the pandemic years I do not know what you can do to get there now.

Edit: always IMHO "the team is small" should be erased from Vivaldi's vocabulary, it is like that song you have heard too many times and you cannot stand it anymore.

Edit #2 coincidence, the following graph appeared into my feed minutes ago

danielson

@DerHimmelssheriff - thought Opera got away from their "Chinese connection" maybe a month or two ago?

Although Brave still has huge issues with paying out its BAT and syncing its extensions, history, bookmarks... people seem to appreciate most its way of handling privacy issues and speed.

But ya, what are the top, outstanding Vivaldi user requests sitting on the burner?

TalGarik

@DerHimmelssheriff said in There are now 2.4 million users of Vivaldi (digi.no):

I am curious: What is this ominous most upvoted feature, that‘s not been implemented and won‘t be? IMHO too much power was absorbed for the development of the email-client, BTW.

support extensions on mobile, 490 votes - the second most voted with 367 - is multi account containers on desktop.
Last June we read the following:

"Keeping up with the Chromium updates is a challenge on its own. After some updates it takes a day or so to sort out the changes, after other updates it can take weeks. Then there's the usual feature development and bug fixes.
Adding support to extensions would introduce another extremely unpredictable component to the mix."

the request was opened in October 2018, IMHO it would be better to say - being a browser for our friends - in this and in other similar cases: "sorry people we cannot do it"

Looking at what happens with extensions in Firefox for mobile - notwithstanding Mozilla having total control of its development - I realize that this is as honest as an answer can be, then why is it not marked as "will not do"?
Look at the most upvoted features and you will see that voting them is useless, IMHO that section of the forum drives away users.