intothefuzz

The first Firefox 4 beta was released two days ago – a big milestone for both Mozilla and the web in general. So, to commemorate the occasion we’ve started a new series of first run page illustrations in the same vein as the Firefox 3 robot saga from a couple of years ago.

Because the beta process is really all about people in our worldwide community working together to build a better product (there are a few different ways you can help by providing feedback while you browse), the illustration is meant to represent that collaborative, innovative spirit. I’ll leave the specifics a mystery for now, but it seems as if it’s taking place in some sort of futuristic biosphere. The initial artwork for beta 1 is only the first in a series, so keep downloading those betas as they’re released to watch the story unfold!

The artwork is inspired by the work of 20th century futurists like Klaus Bürgle…as a kid, I was always fascinated by drawings of futuristic cities like this, so it’s fun to see a Mozilla version taking shape. The illustration itself was done by the very talented Steven Olds, with additional guidance and ideation from Tim Hogan and our friends at the Royal Order. Big thanks to those guys.

Lastly, if you’d like to see a big version of the artwork without the text and other design elements on top, I’ve got one in my Flickr account: check it out.

The Creative Collective’s latest design challenge – “Create the Official Mozilla 2010 T-Shirt” – has been running for a few weeks now, but there’s still plenty of time to add your contribution to the mix if you haven’t done so already. But where to begin? How is even possible to sum up Mozilla in a single t-shirt?

Here are a few tips:

1. You don’t have to use the dino head. Although the Mozilla dino is undoubtedly awesome, the creative possibilities will really open up if you look beyond the logo and explore the main themes of the challenge. There are plenty of Mozilla-related concepts, of course, but for starters the creative brief calls out openness, innovation and community. That’s certainly fertile ground for interesting ideas…the more abstract, the better.

As a relevant example, when we did the Firefox 3 t-shirt contest a couple of years ago, we got a ton of interesting designs that used the Firefox logo, but the winner was the one that went a step beyond and found a clever way to convey a broader theme (in that case, community).

2. If you must use the dino head, do it in an interesting way. In other words, think about how you can integrate it into a design that conveys the key themes mentioned above rather than just sticking the logo in the middle of the shirt and then designing around it. For example, Rogelio Calamaya, the winner of our Five Years of Firefox challenge, has submitted a design that uses the dino head, but only as one part of a larger scene. Cool stuff.

Also, it’s worth noting that our trademark policy prevents us from accepting a design that modifies the dino in any way (such as changing the color, distorting the various elements, etc). If that seems too limiting, definitely refer to point #1!

3. Avoid text! The Mozilla community is very global and includes speakers of pretty much every language, so creating a shirt with a lot of English (or any other language) isn’t a great way of celebrating that. Plus, t-shirts are a visual medium so think in terms of pictures to look at rather than words to read.

4. Remember that this challenge is about Mozilla, not Firefox (or any other specific product). We’ve already done a couple of Firefox-related challenges, and surely will do more in the future, but this one is all about Mozilla. So, make sure your design focuses on those Mozilla qualities of openness, innovation and community rather than any particular product or product logo.

5. Abstract is better than literal. Just to hammer home the first point a bit more, the name of the game is creativity, so ponder the themes, search around for inspiration and see where your muse takes you. Push yourself a bit…awesomeness awaits!

The design challenge ends on April 30, so put on your thinking caps. Can’t wait to see what you come up with!

This post has been localized into Belorussian, thanks to PC

Way back in the summer of 2007, an up & coming young intern known as Fligtar developed a Facebook app that allowed you to share your favorite Firefox add-ons with friends. We called that project Rock Your Firefox, and the design – which was created by Lee Tom and directly inspired by the classic Sesame Street pinball video that had fascinated me as a kid (details here) – remains one of my favorite Mozilla projects.

So, when Fligtar (now a seasoned Mozilla product manger) approached me a few weeks ago about a Rock Your Firefox reboot – this time in the form of a blog – I was all too happy to help once again. We called up Lee, gave him the same set of inspirations (as a fun game, see how many elements from these screenshots you can find in the actual site design) and asked for a 2010 twist on the 2007 original. The results are even bubblier and groovier than ever, and if you’re in Austin for SXSW this weekend there are some good opportunities to grab various swag items.

Most importantly, keep an eye on the Rock Your Firefox blog for the latest and greatest highlighted add-ons. And, for old times’ sake, be sure to check out the original video that started it all:

Thanks to Lee Tom, Justin Scott, Julie Choi, Nick Nguyen, Chris Howse and Elise Allen for their help with this project.

The other day I posted some work-in-progress versions of the potential new Mozilla Developer Network logo. As part of that, I asked for feedback from the community and got a *ton* of great input (142 comments at the last count). Thanks to everyone who took the time to share their thoughts.

Although determining the mood of the group in these ‘design in the open’ projects is never as simple as counting up people’s votes and picking a winner, you can usually spot some larger trends as you read through the comments. In this case, all the options had their fans (and detractors, of course), but the two that rose above the rest were #3 and #8.

We were also gravitating towards #8, but there was something about it that didn’t feel quite right…the skull was a bit too rounded, and we realized that it really didn’t look all that different from the original Mozilla dino. So, we asked Studio Number One to take the style of #8 but use more of the overall shape and elements from #3 and present some new lockups for us.

They did that, and after a bit of debate about where the dino’s mouth should be open or closed, we finally settled on this for the new Mozilla Developer Network logo:

The next step is to create the MDN website, and we’ve already enlisted the talented folks at Happy Cog West to help with that. This logo will certainly inform the site design, and in fact we’ll be working with Studio Number One to create a few additional variations to represent the various sub-categories within the site itself (web developers, mobile developers, etc). Jay Patel will be following up with those details soon.

I should also mention that in the process of reviewing Studio Number One’s work, there was another option that didn’t quite feel like it should be the official logo but was still pretty awesome. So, we’re holding onto it for other things (I hate to spoil the surprise, but the odds are very high that you’ll be seeing it on t-shirt before long).

Thanks again to everyone who viewed the post and contributed feedback, and to Studio Number One, Jay Patel, Alix Franquet and Chris Blizzard for all their great work.

We’re in the process of building the Mozilla Developer Network to be a useful resource for developers working on the various Mozilla-based software projects and the open web in general. It’s a big, far-reaching project so, as Jay Patel noted last week, it’s important that we establish a strong brand identity for the MDN.

The first step is to create a logo that will represent the MDN to developers around the world (and also look great on a t-shirt, of course). To do this, we’ve once again turned to the talented folks at Studio Number One, who last worked with us on the logo for the Mozilla Creative Collective. And, as usual, we want this process to be as open and participatory as possible…in other words, we need your help!

The intended audience for this logo and the MDN in general is most definitely developers. As Jay’s creative brief notes, “the MDN brand will serve to unify our diverse developer communities and represent the innovation we bring to the world through the people, products, and technologies that define Mozilla.” Beyond that, the direction was pretty wide open – the key thing being that the MDN logo would feel both connected to Mozilla’s identity and history, but also be distinctly separate as its own unique entity.

Posted below are some early stage design options from Studio Number One (including different variations on similar themes). At this point in the process we need to start focusing on one for further refinement. Which one should that be? What stands out to you and why? Try to envision these on a website, t-shirt, poster, sticker, etc and let us know what you think by Friday, February 19. Any and all feedback is encouraged.

Thanks!

If you’re a graphic designer looking to get involved with Mozilla, here’s an excellent opportunity: the Mozilla Community of Bosnia and Herzegovina needs a new logo and has launched a contest in conjunction with the Creative Collective to help make it happen.

Kerim Kalamujic has posted the details (and relevant source files) on the Mozilla BiH site, so be sure to check that out if you’re interested. And if you’re not local, I’d suggest doing a little research before you start designing to make sure you capture the right flavor.

The chosen logo will be used in a wide variety of places, so this is a great chance to make a huge impact on the look & feel of one of our most active communities. Submissions are due March 15th…looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

As noted yesterday, there are many good things about Mozilla’s various websites, but the big picture of how they’re organized and work together leaves a lot of room for improvement. Entering our web universe can be really confusing for users, and the current setup limits the ways we can spread the word about all the stuff that’s happening around the organization and community.

So, to kickstart the discussion of how we might solve these problems, we held a public brown bag today to talk about the overall situation and how to improve it. Big thanks to everyone who attended and participated – it was really great to hear people’s ideas and input.

During the brown bag, I framed the solution as having four basic steps (none of which are easy, of course):
1. think about our sites as components of a larger network rather than a bunch of individual pieces.
2. tell our story effectively by making sure each site has a clear role and distinct focus.
3. group related content together so it’ll be where users can find it.
4. connect sites more effectively through cross-linking, UI elements, visual palette, etc.

More specifically, the central proposal that I put out there was that we should have a single Mozilla site (mozilla.org) that would focus on sharing the big picture of who we are and what we do, and would be a central hub for a bunch of product- and audience- specific sites to orbit around. As part of that, we would rename mozilla.com to more accurately reflect its current focus as the main Firefox product site.

The next question, then, is what to call that Firefox product site. For a variety of reasons (that will probably require another blog post to detail) my personal vote is to call it firefox.com, although there are certainly other options – mozilla.org/firefox or firefox.mozilla.org, for example. It’s an interesting discussion, although the specifics of the URL are ultimately less important than the overall goal of making our sites better.

Regardless of the name, though, there’s a lot we could do on this “new” site, such as integrating Firefox add-ons and support to create a single destination for all things Firefox. It would be a powerful communications vehicle for us, and a really useful resource for users.

Of course there are a ton of details that still need to be talked through, and some big questions to figure out. For example, where do key sites like Mozilla Europe fit into all this? Would this create an improper balance between the Firefox and Mozilla brands? What’s the right URL structure?

But, I’m confident we can answer those questions, and once we do the result will be a huge improvement for all involved: more relevant, accessible content for users; a clearer platform for communicating the mission; a better vehicle for talking about Firefox and other key initiatives like mobile, add-ons, services, etc. There are lots of really exciting opportunities, and I can’t wait to get started on them.

If you weren’t able to make it to the brown bag today (or even if you were), I’ve attached the full set of slides here, and Laura has put up a bunch of notes from the discussion session. The slides have way more detail than this this post, so please take a look and share any questions or comments in the comments section below. Thanks!

Update: David Boswell offers up some thoughts from the Mozilla Foundation perspective.

The Mozilla web universe is an interesting place. We operate a number of quality websites that, when viewed as a whole, make us one of the most highly-trafficked web companies around (a rough estimate is around 700,000,000 total page views per month – and that doesn’t include the Firefox start page).

But, right now it’s kind of tough to view them as a whole because they’re all treated pretty individually, without a lot of coordination or linkage between them. This confusing site structure causes a couple of problems that we need to solve: 1) it’s hard for users to learn about Mozilla, get involved or otherwise use the sites in the way they’re intended and 2) makes it hard for us to communicate the full breadth of things we have going on.

So, in the spirit of solving those problems I’m be hosting an upcoming brown bag titled “Rethinking the Mozilla Web Universe”. I’ll be elaborating on the current situation in a bit more detail, and have some ideas on how we might approach making things better, but I’d mostly like it to be a discussion about a revised web universe should look like and how we can get there.

If you’re interested in this sort of thing, please join us! It’s open to the public…here are the details:
* when: Thursday, February 11 at 12:30 p.m. Pacific time
* phone: dial 1.800.707.2533 (password 369) or 1.650.215.1282 (extension 92#), then dial Conference number 8600#
* video: it’ll be broadcast on Air Mozilla
* IRC: you can post questions or comments in #marketing

(David Boswell has also posted a few quick thoughts on this subject.)

The title of this post pretty much says it all, but I’ll repeat it again: if Firefox was a fictional character (from any medium – movie, book, TV show, song, comic, epic poem, etc), who would it be?

Although this might sound insanely frivolous, I’m actually really interested to hear what you come up with. Call it an informal brand perception survey.

So, think about it and post the first thing that comes to mind in the comments section. As added incentive, I’ll send a fabulous Firefox t-shirt (or equivalent merch item) to the person who submits my favorite answer.

Thanks!

Today’s launch of the first-ever mobile version of Firefox is definitely a big deal. So, like we’ve done with other Mozilla big deals, we created a cool design to help celebrate the occasion.

To make it happen, we turned to our friends at the Royal Order and the Delicious Design League. After some discussion about what type of sci-fi direction the illustration should take (we settled on “philosophical and psychedelic”…think 2001), they came up with the artwork below.

You’re certainly encouraged to share this with anyone you think might enjoy it, and you can also download a larger version if you’d like to print a copy for yourself. Here’s to browsing without borders!