[rjknight]

I think we should be very wary of mainstream media coverage (and yes, Slate is mainstream media here) of this issue, because writers like William Saletan know relatively little about the specifics of Mozilla, technology or the personalities involved. This article ignores the specifics of the case and places it entirely within existing "culture war" political narratives. It's designed to present the story to people without having to actually tell them anything they don't already know.

A much better attempt at the same basic argument (that it's a shame Eich was forced out) can be found here: https://medium.com/p/7645a4bf8a2

Given the tools at our disposal and the massive number of people from the tech community who blog, there's really no need to rely on Slate to tell us what to think here.

[forgottenpass]

Each situation is unique, but leaning too hard on that fact starts to resemble "It's different when I [Mozilla] do it."

there's really no need to rely on Slate to tell us what to think here.

It's OK, good even, to stick your ear outside the tech bubble. But you shouldn't let anyone - in or out - tell you what to think. Everyone has ideas, synthesize them with a heavy scoop of context. You should be as skeptical of tech-bubble sources as you are mainstream ones, just in some different ways for different reasons.

[mcherm]

While I think David Flanagan's essay is excellent, that in no way detracts from Slate's coverage. And this deserves to be placed in the context of the broader "culture war" -- no part of this fiasco turned on any technical or browser-specific details.

[jessaustin]

Thanks I had missed that. The crux of the issue, for me:

Most (or perhaps all) of the Mozillians who tweeted this were employed by the Mozilla Foundation, not the Mozilla Corporation which means that they report to the executive director of the foundation and not to the CEO. As foundation employees, they did not share the same org chart as Brendan.

I didn't realize the foundation had so many employees.

[001sky]

So, Mozilla is a three headed monster:

> Executive Chairwoman, Mozilla Foundation (Mitchell Baker)

> Executive Director, Mozilla Foundation (Mark Surman)

> CEO Mozilla Corporation (New position, 2008)

Mark Surman's employees using @mozilla handles were calling for the resignation of a competing CEO?

Am i reading this right? In other words this was under political air-cover.

The Mozilla Foundation now focuses solely on governance and policy issues...

The corporate governance here actually seems like a problem.

The new CEO and the New COO of @mozilla are going to look at this with ???

[dragonwriter]

The Mozilla Foundation owns Mozilla Corporation, and each organization has its own Board of Directors.

[001sky]

Yes, the Foundation CEO basically signed off on a PR stunt very damaging to Mozilla:

Mozilla Foundation Executive Director Mark Surman issued a statement to Ars in response to employees speaking out against Eich's hiring. "Our culture of openness extends to letting our staff and community be candid about their views on Mozilla’s direction," Surman wrote. "We're proud of that inclusiveness and how it distinguishes Mozilla from most organizations."

So, the split boards governance is a problem. Baker is the Chair and head of the project. She created the Corp CEO job and led the hiring process. She's the Chair of both Boards.

Its slightly awkward for a company to use its political activsm against itself in this way. It's even more awkward to manipulate the media to do it in public. Its even triply awkward that it was aknowleged publicly (usually indicates legal signed off on it).