6 ms·

Mitchell Baker Named CEO of Mozilla

57 points by cpeterso 7y ago

wodenokoto 7y ago
If that name rings familiar it is because Mitchel has been the chief lizard wrangler at the Mozilla foundation since forever. I think they stopped with the wrangler title and changed it to chair woman though. She now sits as the head of both the foundation and the corporation.
- kbrosnan 7y ago
  Mark Surman is the Executive Director (CEO)[1] of the Mozilla Foundation. [1] - An executive director is a chief executive officer (CEO) or managing director of an organization, company, or corporation. The title is widely used in North American non-profit organizations, though many United States nonprofits have adopted the title president or CEO. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_director https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_director
bobajeff 7y ago
Seems to me like every year there's a new mozilla CEO.
- aswan 7y ago
  Not sure why you have that impression. Chris Beard, the previous CEO served from 2014 until December.
tpmx 7y ago
Mitchell is well-known in the community for writing this In Memoriam for her past co-worker, Gervase Markham after he passed away: https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2018/08/07/in-memoriam-gervase-markham/ https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2018/08/07/in-memoriam-gerva... > Gerv’s default approach was to see things in binary terms — yes or no, black or white, on or off, one or zero. Over the years I worked with him to moderate this trait so that he could better appreciate nuance and the many “gray” areas on complex topics. Gerv challenged me, infuriated me, impressed me, enraged me, surprised me. He developed a greater ability to work with ambiguity, which impressed me. > Gerv’s faith did not have ambiguity at least none that I ever saw. Gerv was crisp. He had very precise views about marriage, sex, gender and related topics. He was adamant that his interpretation was correct, and that his interpretation should be encoded into law. These views made their way into the Mozilla environment. They have been traumatic and damaging, both to individuals and to Mozilla overall. I'm an atheist, and "liberal" in case that matters. I was just really shocked by that whole thing - a manager of a large organization writing something like that publicly about a long-time worker who just passed away after a long battle with cancer. In my mind that post disqualifies her from managing people, period. This will be read by his immediate family eventually. Edit: Found the previous discussion on this topic, 83 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22059686 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22059686 Selected quotes from that thread: > She also wrote this incredibly rude and grotesque obituary for Gervase Markham after he died of cancer (working for Mozilla until the end). > She used the sandwich feedback technique for a eulogy - an interesting approach > That's appalling. How did that make people still working at Mozilla feel? I can't imagine working under somebody like that.
- rbetts 7y ago
  I hope readers follow that link and read the full text.
  - neosat 7y ago
    I read the full content in the link posted and the still agree with the original comment poster(not sure why they are being downvoted) . At best, the post seems like poor judgment in choice of what to say for that occasion.
  - kamikaz1k 7y ago
    > To memorialize Gerv’s passing, it is fitting that we remember all of Gerv — the full person, good and bad, the damage and trauma he caused, as well as his many positive contributions. Any other view is sentimental. We should be clear-eyed, acknowledge the problems, and appreciate the positive contributions. Gerv came to Mozilla long before we were successful or had much to offer besides our goals and our open source foundations. As Gerv put it, he’s gone home now, leaving untold memories around the FLOSS world.
  - itronitron 7y ago
    >> Gerv had many roles over the years, from volunteer to mostly-volunteer to part-time, to full-time, and back again. Mozilla certainly had plenty of opportunity to cut the cord.
- cat199 7y ago
  from the link: > Eventually Gerv felt called to live his faith by publicly judging others in politely stated but damning terms. ... in essence, kind of what the post is doing ...
- xkal 7y ago
  "I worked with him" is usually used by corporate psychopaths who do not actually contribute anything.
- packetslave 7y ago
  Definitely worth reading the entire thing instead of cherry-picking quotes from it (which I'm cheerfully about to do): > To memorialize Gerv’s passing, it is fitting that we remember all of Gerv — the full person, good and bad, the damage and trauma he caused, as well as his many positive contributions. Any other view is sentimental. We should be clear-eyed, acknowledge the problems, and appreciate the positive contributions
TheDesolate0 7y ago
Mozilla is quite dead as a company, sadly. And I really LOVE using Firefox...when it works. But I extra especially HATE building FF from source. I'll take chromium any day for that.
- mschuetz 7y ago
  Had the same experience. Mozilla source & build are a mess.
- mintplant 7y ago
  Uh, really? In my experience Chromium takes far longer than Firefox to build, especially from scratch. Not to mention all the steps and bespoke repo-management tools involved in just checking out the code and bringing up a working build environment. What problems did you run into building Firefox?
- st3fan 7y ago
  Dead? We are all here and not going anywhere.
hutzlibu 7y ago
Does anyone can tell anything positive about her? I am not saying there isn't any, I don't know her. My limited knowledge about her, is that while she was chairwomen and interim ceo, Firefox marketshare dropped a lot, while her compensation went up a lot - and it seems she was responsible for firing 70 people from the mozilla workforce, while she never wrote any line of code of firefox. https://www.i-programmer.info/news/86-browsers/13394-mozilla-layoffs.html https://www.i-programmer.info/news/86-browsers/13394-mozilla... So from my limited understanding as an outsider: she does not really seem the best fit, for the job.
- nlaq 7y ago
  I haven't heard anything notable or positive either. It is possible that some interest groups who want to sink Mozilla hope that it goes the way of HP under Carly Fiorina.
- wodenokoto 7y ago
  She created the foundation and has had a leading role in it since forever. She’s not someone who came in left field as an interim and started firing people left and right. I’m not sure why you think a ceo should also be a programmer.
  - mjw1007 7y ago
    I think a programmer might well do a better job than a lawyer. Some years ago, Mozilla decided to relaunch their browser under the name "Firebird". That was a poor choice of name, because there was already a free-software database using it. There was a kerfuffle about it for some time before Mozilla switched to the (much better) name "Firefox". During that period, the Mozilla lawyer running the show (one Mitchell Baker) was insistent that there was no reason to change because their legal advice was that they weren't infringing on any trademarks. A programmer might have realised earlier that trademark law isn't the only relevant consideration in a situation like this (consider, for example, what `apt-get install firebird` is going to do).
    - petercooper 7y ago
tpmx 7y ago
I guess some people tactically flagged the post, it's 3-4 pages from the front page now.

57 points by cpeterso 7y ago

If that name rings familiar it is because Mitchel has been the chief lizard wrangler at the Mozilla foundation since forever. I think they stopped with the wrangler title and changed it to chair woman though. She now sits as the head of both the foundation and the corporation.

kbrosnan 7y ago
Mark Surman is the Executive Director (CEO)[1] of the Mozilla Foundation. [1] - An executive director is a chief executive officer (CEO) or managing director of an organization, company, or corporation. The title is widely used in North American non-profit organizations, though many United States nonprofits have adopted the title president or CEO. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_director https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_director

bobajeff 7y ago

Seems to me like every year there's a new mozilla CEO.

aswan 7y ago
Not sure why you have that impression. Chris Beard, the previous CEO served from 2014 until December.

tpmx 7y ago

Mitchell is well-known in the community for writing this In Memoriam for her past co-worker, Gervase Markham after he passed away: https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2018/08/07/in-memoriam-gervase-markham/ https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2018/08/07/in-memoriam-gerva... > Gerv’s default approach was to see things in binary terms — yes or no, black or white, on or off, one or zero. Over the years I worked with him to moderate this trait so that he could better appreciate nuance and the many “gray” areas on complex topics. Gerv challenged me, infuriated me, impressed me, enraged me, surprised me. He developed a greater ability to work with ambiguity, which impressed me. > Gerv’s faith did not have ambiguity at least none that I ever saw. Gerv was crisp. He had very precise views about marriage, sex, gender and related topics. He was adamant that his interpretation was correct, and that his interpretation should be encoded into law. These views made their way into the Mozilla environment. They have been traumatic and damaging, both to individuals and to Mozilla overall. I'm an atheist, and "liberal" in case that matters. I was just really shocked by that whole thing - a manager of a large organization writing something like that publicly about a long-time worker who just passed away after a long battle with cancer. In my mind that post disqualifies her from managing people, period. This will be read by his immediate family eventually. Edit: Found the previous discussion on this topic, 83 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22059686 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22059686 Selected quotes from that thread: > She also wrote this incredibly rude and grotesque obituary for Gervase Markham after he died of cancer (working for Mozilla until the end). > She used the sandwich feedback technique for a eulogy - an interesting approach > That's appalling. How did that make people still working at Mozilla feel? I can't imagine working under somebody like that.

rbetts 7y ago
I hope readers follow that link and read the full text.
- neosat 7y ago
  I read the full content in the link posted and the still agree with the original comment poster(not sure why they are being downvoted) . At best, the post seems like poor judgment in choice of what to say for that occasion.
- kamikaz1k 7y ago
  > To memorialize Gerv’s passing, it is fitting that we remember all of Gerv — the full person, good and bad, the damage and trauma he caused, as well as his many positive contributions. Any other view is sentimental. We should be clear-eyed, acknowledge the problems, and appreciate the positive contributions. Gerv came to Mozilla long before we were successful or had much to offer besides our goals and our open source foundations. As Gerv put it, he’s gone home now, leaving untold memories around the FLOSS world.
- itronitron 7y ago
  >> Gerv had many roles over the years, from volunteer to mostly-volunteer to part-time, to full-time, and back again. Mozilla certainly had plenty of opportunity to cut the cord.
cat199 7y ago
from the link: > Eventually Gerv felt called to live his faith by publicly judging others in politely stated but damning terms. ... in essence, kind of what the post is doing ...
xkal 7y ago
"I worked with him" is usually used by corporate psychopaths who do not actually contribute anything.
packetslave 7y ago
Definitely worth reading the entire thing instead of cherry-picking quotes from it (which I'm cheerfully about to do): > To memorialize Gerv’s passing, it is fitting that we remember all of Gerv — the full person, good and bad, the damage and trauma he caused, as well as his many positive contributions. Any other view is sentimental. We should be clear-eyed, acknowledge the problems, and appreciate the positive contributions

TheDesolate0 7y ago

Mozilla is quite dead as a company, sadly. And I really LOVE using Firefox...when it works. But I extra especially HATE building FF from source. I'll take chromium any day for that.

mschuetz 7y ago
Had the same experience. Mozilla source & build are a mess.
mintplant 7y ago
Uh, really? In my experience Chromium takes far longer than Firefox to build, especially from scratch. Not to mention all the steps and bespoke repo-management tools involved in just checking out the code and bringing up a working build environment. What problems did you run into building Firefox?
st3fan 7y ago
Dead? We are all here and not going anywhere.

hutzlibu 7y ago

Does anyone can tell anything positive about her? I am not saying there isn't any, I don't know her. My limited knowledge about her, is that while she was chairwomen and interim ceo, Firefox marketshare dropped a lot, while her compensation went up a lot - and it seems she was responsible for firing 70 people from the mozilla workforce, while she never wrote any line of code of firefox. https://www.i-programmer.info/news/86-browsers/13394-mozilla-layoffs.html https://www.i-programmer.info/news/86-browsers/13394-mozilla... So from my limited understanding as an outsider: she does not really seem the best fit, for the job.

nlaq 7y ago
I haven't heard anything notable or positive either. It is possible that some interest groups who want to sink Mozilla hope that it goes the way of HP under Carly Fiorina.
wodenokoto 7y ago
She created the foundation and has had a leading role in it since forever. She’s not someone who came in left field as an interim and started firing people left and right. I’m not sure why you think a ceo should also be a programmer.
- mjw1007 7y ago
  I think a programmer might well do a better job than a lawyer. Some years ago, Mozilla decided to relaunch their browser under the name "Firebird". That was a poor choice of name, because there was already a free-software database using it. There was a kerfuffle about it for some time before Mozilla switched to the (much better) name "Firefox". During that period, the Mozilla lawyer running the show (one Mitchell Baker) was insistent that there was no reason to change because their legal advice was that they weren't infringing on any trademarks. A programmer might have realised earlier that trademark law isn't the only relevant consideration in a situation like this (consider, for example, what `apt-get install firebird` is going to do).
  - petercooper 7y ago

tpmx 7y ago

I guess some people tactically flagged the post, it's 3-4 pages from the front page now.