thoughts on mozilla

Mozilla Add-ons Workshops (MAOW) are a chance for web developers and extension developers to get together and learn more about creating extensions for Firefox.

On June 30, less than a week before the Mozilla Summit 2010, Mozilla will be hosting a MAOW in London at the Hub Kings Cross. Registration is required, but free.

The announced speakers for the London MAOW are:

• Brian King
• Tobias Leingruber
• Myk Melez
• Nick Nguyen
• Paul Roget
• Justin Scott
• Tristan Nitot

As always, check out the Mozilla wiki for more information on this event.

In an earlier article on the Mozilla Summit 2010, we mentioned that some long time community members like Robert Kaiser were not getting invited to the Summit 2010.

On that topic, Kaiser has written a blog post about why he won’t be attending. From the post:

But my invitation didn’t arrive. I tried to ask back with the person in charge of invitations but didn’t get an answer, so I mailed Mark and Mitchell, the heads of Mozilla. And Mitchell, who I hold in high respect due to her openness among other things, did reply – though unfortunately a bit differently than I had hoped. Apparently some inherently stupid remarks of mine, some passionate tries to prove some arguments back in the days when I was so frustrated (see above) did go as far as to break the trust in me with a number of powerful individuals in the Mozilla community. Enough that they apparently vetoed my being invited.

His post is interesting on a couple of levels. First, the Mark identified is his post is Mark Surman, a relatively new Mozilla community member and the executive director of the Mozilla Foundation (MoFo). In a meritocracy, it usually takes more time for such employees to become a “head.”

Second, while Kaiser never linked to the “stupid remarks” he made, it’s not clear what remarks could get you kicked out of the Mozilla community. The Summit is supposed to be for all active community members and Kaiser, who is very outspoken, is one of the most active community members in Europe. He’s also one of the few non-localization community members who’s not employed by a Mozilla entity. Losing the trust of the “heads” of Mozilla shouldn’t be an easy thing and shouldn’t have happened just because he fired off remarks. If that’s all it took to veto a person from attending, there are a number of Mozilla Corporation employees in the Toronto office that shouldn’t be attending.

The Mozilla Summit 2010 will have a new feature this year, a “World Expo.”

Different from the aforementioned science fair, the Mozilla World Expo will allow community members from all over the world to share bits and pieces of their culture. For the many localizers attending, the expo will give them a chance to show off their community logo and the work they do (e.g., localization, marketing, events, etc.).

Mozilla asks attendees to bring anything from their local culture and even mentions food. I’m sure they’ll have a fun time getting through customs.

In less than a month, Mozillians from around the world will gather in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada to discuss the future of the browser, the future of the open Web, and the future of Mozilla.

Unlike Mozilla Corporation-wide (MoCo) events commonly known as “all-hands”, the Mozilla Summit is a chance for the overall Mozilla community to gather and discuss important topics. The last time this type of event happened was in July 2008, also in Whistler.

The theme Mozilla has chosen this year is “Be More Like the Web”. While details are fairly scarce to those not attending, the summit will likely include several different tracks, some discussing the browser, some the platform, some the community, and others the activities of the Mozilla Foundation (MoFo). Some of the basics are available on the Mozilla wiki.

Some of the details on the wiki include a planned “Science Fair“-style area where attendees can demonstrate their latest ideas, prototypes, or anything else. Unfortunately, neither the wiki or the sign-up sheet shows much about who’s presenting yet or what will be presented.

The same applies to Lightning Talks, a style of presentation where the presenter is given 3-5 minutes to talk about a topic. (Sign-up sheet here.)

And, true to the closed style of this Summit, the same even applies to breakout sessions (the aforementioned “tracks”). Nothing yet available on the wiki, except a link to propose sessions. That said, MoFo has created a wiki page that outlines some of their ideas for the Summit.

Of course, not everyone is invited.

In the comments of a blog post by Gervase Markham, long time community member Robert Kaiser (one of the leaders of SeaMonkey project, commonly known as KaiRo) complains that he wasn’t invited. Despite Mozilla opening up the Summit to every MoCo employee, regardless of hire date, many long time community members like Kaiser weren’t invited and won’t be attending. Why? It’s only for the organizers of the Summit to know. Who Mozilla invites and why is kept quiet and “internal” despite Mozilla’s generally open nature. It is strange that the project coordinator of the SeaMonkey project – one of Mozilla’s last community-run, as opposed to employee-run, projects – wouldn’t be invited. Others from the SeaMonkey group, like Christian Biesinger were invited, despite his relative absence in Mozilla activities.

Regardless of who attends, the Mozilla Summit 2010 should prove to be an interesting event and one this blog will cover thoroughly.