What this text carefully avoids stating directly: thats the only nine add-ons which you will be able to install on Firefox for Android now. Particularly given that there appears to be no technical reason why none of the other add-ons are allowed any more, it being merely a policy decision.
It isnt merely the cost of developing and maintaining the necessary functionality, there is also the performance and security impact of browser extensions. It was a costly process which also introduced delays, so by now all add-ons are published immediately but are still supposed to be reviewed manually eventually.
Mozilla is currently facing challenges both in terms of market share and financially, the latter being linked to the former.
While there has been some communication around Recommended Extensions program, it was never mentioned that participating in this program was a prerequisite for extensions to stay usable.
This allowed amazingly powerful extensions, for example the vimperator extension implemented completely different user interface paradigms which were inspired by the vim editor.
In future, all innovation will have to originate from browser vendors themselves, there will be no space for experiments or niche solutions.Original article