Mozilla is a company that has a long track record of dedication to openness and the free and open internet
True, and that's why I never stopped and recommending Firefox since I first installed Phoenix. That said, they're already installing and enabling Cliqz by default (for some users), and that's no bug. So it's not absurd that people might assume this isn't either. Reputation is hard to gain and easy to lose.
I'm not happy with how this rolled out, and I'm not here to justify it.
I wasn't involved in its development, so I can't speak to its origin or the decision to use Shield for distribution, but
I can gather feedback and answer technical questions about Firefox and the add-on.
Automatically sending URLs visited of random German Firefox users to a German company (CliqZ) owned by a publishing, advertisement and tracking company (Burda): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15421708
Mozilla forcefully enabling toolkit.telemetry.enabled in Nightly and Developer versions, and, upon being asked, saying that "below the download link is a text telling you that by downloading these, you opt-in to telemetry".
Benefit of the doubt is over, it’s time to get the pitchforks out.
That doesn't make it OK, but it would make me look at them with suspicion instead of hostility.