I suppose, but by that logic any web browser is funded by ads unless it either:
1) Doesn't set any default search engine
2) Leaves a great deal of money on the table for no reason whatsoever
Option 2 is stupid, so it's no surprise none of the browsers do this.
Option 1 is a bad user experience regardless of finances. When users type stuff into the search bar, they expect results to come up. You could have a search engine ballot on first startup, but a subset of very-non-technical users is going to be confused by the dialog; there's no good reason to not set a default.
Option 2 isn't stupid, because once you take that money you are beholden to a contract, which comes with both explicit and implicit clauses.
For example Apple would never implement ad blocking by default in Google's Search, not as long as they keep getting payed with _billions of dollars_.
And would Apple even bother to keep improving Safari if they weren't earning so much money from it? Given what happened to IExplorer back in the day, when Microsoft dropped the ball on its development after version 5, I'm not so sure.
Also Safari's content blockers are really easy to circumvent by anti-ad-blocking tech. Doesn't hold a candle to uBlock Origin, which isn't possible to implement on top of Safari. And the available content blockers are so bad many people don't even bother. Fact is Safari is a favorite for ads companies and publishers.
Yes, all browsers are funded by ads, that was the point.
1) Doesn't set any default search engine
2) Leaves a great deal of money on the table for no reason whatsoever
Option 2 is stupid, so it's no surprise none of the browsers do this.
Option 1 is a bad user experience regardless of finances. When users type stuff into the search bar, they expect results to come up. You could have a search engine ballot on first startup, but a subset of very-non-technical users is going to be confused by the dialog; there's no good reason to not set a default.