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The Mozilla Foundation was launched on July 15, 2003 as America Online (AOL) drastically scaled back its involvement with Mozilla, laying off or reassigning most of the Netscape browser developers and announcing that it would no longer finance the day to day running of the project. The Mozilla Foundation essentially replaces mozilla.org (also known as the Mozilla Organization), a much looser and more informal group that was established (and mainly funded) by Netscape in 1998. AOL assisted in the initial creation of the Mozilla Foundation, transferring hardware and intellectual property to the organization and employing a three-person team for the first three month's of its existence to help with the transition. AOL has also promised to donate $2 million to the foundation over two years.
The remit of the Mozilla Foundation is much wider than that of mozilla.org, with the organization taking on many tasks that were traditionally left to Netscape and other vendors of Mozilla technology. As part of a wider move to target end-users, the foundation made deals with commercial companies to sell CDs containing Mozilla software and provide telephone support. In both cases, the group chose the same suppliers as Netscape for these services. The Mozilla Foundation is also becoming more assertive over its intellectual property, with policies put in place for the use of Mozilla trademarks and logos. New projects such as marketing have also been launched.
Funding for the foundation comes from donations from corporations and individuals. As well as AOL's initial $2 million donation, Mitch Kapor gave $300,000 to the organization at its launch. The group has tax-exempt status under IRC 501(c)3 of the US tax code.
The Mozilla Foundation Board of Directors consists of Mitch Kapor (Chair), Mitchell Baker (President), Brian BehlendorfBrian Behlendorf (Born March 30, 1973) is one of the most respected leaders of the international open-source software movement. He was a primary developer of the Apache Web server, the most popular web server software on the Internet, and a founding membe, Brendan EichBrendan Eich is a computer programmer. He created the JavaScript (now ECMAScript) programming language. He works at the Mozilla Foundation as Lead Technologist and is also on its Board of Directors. Career Eich started his career at MicroUnity Systems Eng and Christopher BlizzardChristopher Blizzard is an open source hacker who works at Red Hat. He has done a lot of work on Mozilla and is a member of the Mozilla Foundation Board of Directors.. The foundation has ten employees: David Baron , Asa Dotzler , Brendan EichBrendan Eich is a computer programmer. He created the JavaScript (now ECMAScript) programming language. He works at the Mozilla Foundation as Lead Technologist and is also on its Board of Directors. Career Eich started his career at MicroUnity Systems Eng, Ben GoodgerBen Goodger (b. March 31, 1980, London, England) is an employee of the Mozilla Foundation and lead developer of the Firefox web browser. His key areas of responsibility include: Extension system Software update system Download system Options interface Per, Chris Hofmann , Scott MacGregor , Myk Melez , Chase Phillips , David Bienvenu and Johnny Stenback . (Mitchell Baker and Bart Decrem are employed by OSAFThe Open Source Applications Foundation OSAF is a non-profit organization whose purpose is to effect widespread adoption of open source computer software. One significant project undertaken by OSAF was Chandler. As of February, 2004, nineteen people worke, but have part of their time allocated to Foundation work.) The employees develop Mozilla and help to coordinate the operations of the organization. The committee that runs the Mozilla Foundation is known as mozilla.org staff and is composed of a mixture of foundation employees and volunteers.