Following AOL's layoff of its browser development team, the Mozilla browser suite has now been placed under the care of its own nonprofit corporation, the Mozilla Foundation. Here is the full announcement which was issued by Mozilla.org yesterday . . .

Mountain View, CA, July 15, 2003 -- Mozilla.org, the organization that coordinates Mozilla open source development, today announced the launch of a new foundation that will continue to promote the development, distribution and adoption of the award-winning Mozilla standards-based web applications and core technologies, including the Gecko browser layout engine. The Mozilla Foundation will continue and expand on the efforts of mozilla.org, the group managing the daily operations of the Mozilla project since its inception.

“It has been a long-standing objective of the Mozilla team to create an independent organization so we can continue to lead and innovate,” said Mitchell Baker, Chief Lizard Wrangler at mozilla.org, who will become President of The Mozilla Foundation. “We're grateful for the past and ongoing support of America Online, and we look forward to continuing to work with AOL over coming years. Mozilla was developed in an open source environment and built by harnessing the creative power of thousands of programmers on the Internet. Going forward, we will continue to partner with developers and industry leaders to keep content on the Web open.”

Mozilla.org's flagship product, Mozilla, is rapidly emerging as the most widely acclaimed web browser, with PC World's July issue honoring it as "Best of 2003" in its category, LinuxJournal Magazine giving it an "Editor's Choice Award" for "Best Web Browser" (July issue) and eWeek raving that "eWEEK Labs found the new features in Mozilla 1.4 … to be remarkable improvements that enhance what was already the best browser option out there." (July 1). The Guardian recently predicted that mozilla.org's upcoming new products "could make Microsoft's offerings look very shabby indeed" (July 10).

In addition, Mozilla is a cross-platform toolkit for developing Internet-based applications. By offering a set of components that can be used in a wide range of applications, are all open source, free of charge and have been tested through their use in Mozilla 1.4's end-user applications, Mozilla 1.4 enables developers to build applications for a cross-platform, network-centric world.

To help launch the new organization, America Online has pledged $2 million in cash to the Mozilla Foundation over the next two years. AOL will also contribute additional resources through equipment, domain names and trademarks, and related intellectual property, as well as providing some transitional assistance for key personnel as they move into the new organization.

Other industry leaders also offered their support to the new organization: Mitch Kapor, the new Chairman of the Mozilla Foundation, is making a personal contribution of $300,000, and Red Hat and Sun Microsystems are among the companies planning to continue their contributions to the Mozilla project.

"As an independent organization, the Mozilla project will have even more freedom to innovate and provide meaningful choice to users on all computer environments. A competitive, standards-compliant browser suite is vitally important to maintaining freedom and innovation on the Internet, so I'm delighted to make a contribution," commented Kapor. Kapor was the designer of Lotus 1-2-3, the "killer application" that made personal computers ubiquitous in the business world in the 1980s. He currently chairs the Open Source Applications Foundation.

“PC World's recognition of Mozilla in its Best of 2003 is further proof that great software can be built using licenses that grant freedom instead of imposing onerous restrictions,” said Michael Tiemann, Chief Technology Officer at Red Hat. “Mozilla has long been important to Red Hat, not only for the experience it offers or the features it implements, but because it extends our commitment to supporting W3C standards, interoperability, and choice in the marketplace. We are pleased to support the creation of the Mozilla Foundation, and will continue to devote engineering resources to increase the value of Mozilla over proprietary alternatives.”

“Mozilla has consistently offered users the features, performance and innovation instrumental to the evolution of the Internet,” said Curtis Sasaki, Vice President, Engineering, Desktop Solutions, Sun Microsystems. “Sun is committed to the Mozilla technology and is contributing significant engineering resources to move it forward. By the end of July, Sun will ship Mozilla for the Solaris Operating System and make Mozilla the standard browser for Mad Hatter, Sun's Linux-based desktop software stack, due later this year.”

About mozilla.org and the Mozilla Foundation

Mozilla.org (www.mozilla.org) is the group that exists to make Mozilla a successful open source project. Mozilla.org provides open source Internet client software that includes a browser, mail and news functionality, and a toolkit for developing web-based applications. Mozilla.org was founded by Netscape Communications Corporation.

The Mozilla Foundation has been incorporated as a California public benefit corporation and is seeking to obtain 501(c)(3) status as a non-profit organization. It will continue to be based in Mountain View, California.

 
This article was originally published on LinuxDevices.com and has been donated to the open source community by QuinStreet Inc. Please visit LinuxToday.com for up-to-date news and articles about Linux and open source.