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Thinking about the Open Web

I’ve been thinking about how to talk to people about what the Open Web is, why it’s so important, and why they should care.

The Open Web as a global public resource

It struck me that the Open Web is analogous to some other fundamentally vital things in our society:

• public libraries
• public schools
• public parks
• public broadcasting
• public roads
• public art
• public museums
• public galleries
• etc.

Many of these things are deemed so vital a part of our everyday lives and societal infrastructure that we support them through our tax dollars. Others are supported by concerned citizens who believe so deeply in their importance that they donate not only their hard-earned money, but also their time, skills, and creativity.

The Web is an increasingly important part of our lives, and it is absolutely essential that it remain free and open and accessible to all. If it doesn’t — if the Web becomes closed, restricted, controlled, and inaccessible to anyone who is disadvantaged or marginalized in some way — our whole, global society will suffer as a result. The Web cannot become something that further delineates the haves from the have-nots. It is already far too important for that, and it is still only in its infancy.

Mozilla exists to support the Open Web

Mozilla is an organization devoted to ensuring that the Web continue to develop as and remain a global public resource — akin to libraries, schools, parks, and roads — and everything we do, every resource at our disposal, is focused towards this end. This is the absolute core of our mission as outlined in the Mozilla Manifesto, and it is the heart of everything we strive towards.

Why Mozilla makes a browser

Making a browser is one of the most important things Mozilla currently does — not as an end unto itself, but rather in support of our larger mission and goals.

The browser is by far the most important tool we use to create and consume the Web. Without an open browser there is no Open Web. This is why we build Firefox, and why we’re pushing hard to get Firefox on to as many devices and desktops as we can. The Open Web is an increasingly crucial part of our lives and our society, and Firefox is one way we’re working to ensure that the Web remain open and available for everyone.

What do you think?

Is this a useful way to think about and talk about the Open Web to people who might not quite get what we’re so excited about? Not everyone is going to grok the analogy in the same way — and this certainly isn’t the only way to talk about it — but I think that most people understand that public works are a good thing, and that ensuring open and equitable access to fundamental resources and infrastructure — which now includes the Open Web — is an essential part of a just and civilised society.

Just a quick reminder that if you post your Mozilla Summit 2010 photos to Flickr, please tag them with “moz10″ so we can find them!

Also, if you have photos posted but don’t use Flickr, please leave a comment here with a link to where you’ve hosted them. Thanks!

As promised…

1. Copy/paste these rules and questions into a blog post, answer the questions, then tag some other people (however many you like) and encourage them to do the same.
2. Include a link to the original post.
3. You don’t have to be tagged to take part — if you see this post and want to play, just dive on in. Simple!

How (and when) did you originally get involved with an open source project? Which projects have you contributed to?

I first got involved with open source-related stuff in 1999 when I started Linuxchix (still going) and the Open Source Writers Group (long since dead). In addition to those, I’ve contributed to the PA-RISC/Linux project (about forty million years ago), and the Mozilla project, plus little fiddly-bits here and there.

Why did you choose to contribute to an open source project?

Because I could. I had been using Linux for a few years at that point and I loved it — I loved the community and the openness and everything else about it. When I realized that I had the skills and ability to make real and useful contributions, I got involved. Linux and the open source community had given me a lot, and I wanted to give back however I could.

If you were to pick one or two people who have had a major influence on your involvement with open source, who would those people be? Why?

Chris Beard: Some 10 or 11 years ago, I read about Chris and the Puffin Group (a small Linux consulting company) on Slashdot and sent Chris (a complete stranger) an email asking for a job. He hired me. This is a pretty short story for what has ended up being a decade-long friendship. I have an enormous amount of respect for Chris and the work he does — easily one of the most visionary and driven people I’ve had the privilege of working with.

Mike Shaver: Some 10 or 11 years ago, I met shaver the day before his wedding to which he immediately invited me (a complete stranger). I declined, and I regret that decision to this day because Mike has turned out to be one of my best friends. I’m going to stop now because I’ll just get teary-eyed, and it would take more than a few hours to talk about how his friendship has (actually, and for reals) changed my life.

Both Chris and Mike are why I’m part of Mozilla now, and I believe I still owe them both a beer or two for that.

How have you personally benefited from being involved with open source projects?

Getting involved with open source turned into a career for me. Mozilla, in particular, has been spectacular because this project encourages people to push beyond themselves and to reach for and learn new things all the time. I’ve learned more and done more in the past five years of being involved with Mozilla than I would have been able to do in any traditional organization, had I been able to wedge a foot in the door.

Not only has it become a career, being involved with open source has (as I foreshadowed before) lead to some of my deepest and most lasting friendships. It turns out that open source projects are a fantastic way to meet like-minded (but oh-so-entertainingly diverse) people. I know, talk to, and work with incredibly brilliant and passionate people all over the world, every day. I wouldn’t trade this for anything.

What advice and/or encouragement would you give to someone who is considering getting involved with an open source project?

Do it! Get involved. Persevere. Step up. Be brave. It can be awfully intimidating and overwhelming when you first start out, but don’t give up. Find some niche where you can make a contribution, then just get started. It could be the best thing you’ve ever done.

• Chris Beard
• Mike Shaver
• David Humphrey
• Lukas Blakk
• Mike Morgan

I know these sorts of things can often be silly and annoying, but I’m really interested in hearing people’s stories about how they got involved with Open Source and what it has meant to them, both personally and professionally. I’m hoping this is fun and lightweight enough that everyone will take a few minutes and blog about their experiences. Everyone is welcome (and encouraged!) to play.

The rules:

1. Copy/paste these rules and questions into a blog post, answer the questions, then tag some other people (however many you like) and encourage them to do the same.
2. Include a link to the original post.
3. You don’t have to be tagged to take part — if you see this post and want to play, just dive on in. Simple!

The questions:

1. How (and when) did you originally get involved with an open source project? Which projects have you contributed to?
2. Why did you choose to contribute to an open source project?
3. If you were to pick one or two people who have had a major influence on your involvement with open source, who would those people be? Why?
4. How have you personally benefited from being involved with open source projects?
5. What advice and/or encouragement would you give to someone who is considering getting involved with an open source project?

That’s it! I’ll post my own responses soon :)

One of the awesomest new features in the revamped Rypple system is the ability for anyone to send kudos to anyone else. Kudos are a very simple, fun way to thank people for being amazing, doing a great job, going above and beyond the call of duty, etc.

It might sound sort of silly or contrived, but it turns out that a simple note of appreciation really can have a huge impact. Since I’ve started using Rypple to send out kudos, I’ve received a few notes from folks telling me that I’ve basically made their day. It’s a little thing, and doesn’t really take more than a couple of minutes out of your day, but it can really make a difference. We don’t often get genuine, heartfelt, positive feedback, so it’s really incredibly energizing when we do.

Everyone with a Rypple account (which is anyone, since everyone can sign up) can log in and send kudos to anyone with an email address. It’s totally wide open and anyone can do it — so if you have a few minutes sometime today, think of someone who’s done something awesome, head over to Rypple, and send them a kudos. The more you do it, the more fun it becomes.

Benoit Girard has offered to develop some materials to help new people learn about Mozilla and how to get involved. He’s looking for feedback about the initial topics he’s outlined over on his weblog. It would be really great if people could take a quick look and help him out.

Last week, I asked for suggestions about possible screencast/video introductions we should produce to help people learn about Mozilla, our tools, our methods, and how to get involved with the project. It was pointed out (and rightfully so) that we already have quite a few resources along these lines, they’re just scattered and hard to find.

So, in addition to getting new content produced to help people, I’m going to start collecting existing materials together and figuring out how to make those easier to find and use.

I’ve created a new page on wiki.mo called Learning Mozilla, listing on it some of the useful things I already know about. Now I need your help: if you know of other resources that would be useful for someone who wants to learn more about Mozilla, please take a few moments to add it to the page or leave a note (with a URL) in the comments here.

Anything and everything is great — I’ll dig for more content as I can, and I’ll take it upon myself keep the page cleaned up and organized, so don’t worry too much about where to list things or how to format stuff. Just add the links and we’ll sort out the rest as we go.

Feedback is an interesting thing. Critical feedback, while incredibly valuable and vital to improving and learning, can also sort of gut you. And working out in the open — in this crazy transparent fishbowl that is the Mozilla project — critical feedback can often come fast and furious. It’s great, of course, and absolutely fundamental to how we do things, but it does require a thick skin, and it can be profoundly exhausting at times.

On the other hand, positive feedback is absolutely energizing. Those moments where someone goes out of their way to say “thanks” or “awesome job” or “you rock” really does make it all worthwhile. Feeling appreciated — knowing that someone genuinely cares about and values the work you do — can often make the difference between something being a burden or a joy. For me, receiving positive feedback is the most powerful motivator out there — more so than money, fame, or anything else.

Rypple (which we use at Mozilla) recently built a new feedback mechanism into their service called “kudos” that you can use to send someone a quick “thanks”, “you’re awesome”, or “you rock” sort of message. The message you send is visible to everyone in the organization, so serves as a public note of appreciation. Other people can comment on the kudos as well, so there’s a way to quickly add a “+1″ or otherwise pile on the love. You can read more about the Rypple kudos feature (and an ongoing contest they’ve launched to promote it) over at WorkplaceHero.com.

The Rypple kudos system really is fantastic. We don’t often go out of our way to publicly acknowledge the awesome things our coworkers do, but Rypple has given us a fun, fast, simple, lightweight, and unintimidating way to do so. If you haven’t checked it out yet, you should — take a minute to send a kudos and make someone’s day :)

Johnathan Nightingale and Rob Campbell recently put together fantastically useful screencast introductions to Bugzilla (Johnath) and Firebug (Rob). The response to these has been phenomenal, so I’ve been gathering suggestions for other screencasts we could put together to help people learn about our tools, code, culture, community, and so on.

So far, people have suggested the following:

• Lifecycle of a Bug – introduction to the stages involved in fixing a bug from start to end
• Building Firefox – introduction to getting the Firefox source code and compiling it, while going over the basics of hg
• Test Frameworks – introduction to the different test frameworks we use, and how to write a basic test in each of them
• Drinking from the Firehose – how to stay on top of the news, difference between “stream of development and ideas” and “announcments”, how to understand things like what the next milestone is
• Bugzilla for Developers: Getting your patch into the product – how to nom for review; how to determine if you need to nom for approval, blocking, etc.; writing tests; checkin wrangling; watching the tree.
• Gaining Traction – how to publish that wicked cool idea you have; how to rally people around it to see if there’s interest; moving from idea to implementation
• How to navigate the code using MXR/DXR
• How to use and contribute to MDC
• Writing your first automated test
• How to do your own screencasts/videos
• Mozilla Developer Tools & Workflow
• How to optimize edit/compile/test loops
• Presentation tips & tricks

What other screencasts or video introductions do you think would be useful for learning Mozilla and getting involved with the project and community?

Just jumping on the adblocking yea/nay blogging train: I don’t block ads. I could but I don’t bother. Most of the time they don’t bother me unless I’m trying to read a long article, at which point I use Readability, which is infinitely better than an adblocker for that situation.

Before Readability

After Readability

Note: Readability runs fine on Minefield if you use Nightly Tester Tools to force-install. There’s also a bookmarklet version if you don’t want to install an add-on.