July 15, 2003

Mozilla Foundation created

The MozillaThe organization behind Firefox — advocates open web standards and internet privacy. Foundation launched on July 15, 2003 to steward FirefoxMozilla's open-source browser — championed web standards and challenged Internet Explorer's dominance., Thunderbird, and open web standards after AOL scaled back NetscapeA commercial web browser company — Navigator defined the early consumer web..

What it was for

Mozilla Firefox logo 2013MozillaThe organization behind Firefox — advocates open web standards and internet privacy. kept a nonprofit home for browser engine development independent of any single vendor — influencing WebKitApple's open-source browser engine — powers Safari and historically influenced Chrome's fork., ChromiumGoogle's open-source browser project — the foundation for Chrome, Edge, and other modern browsers. competition, and MDN documentation developers rely on.

People

  • Mitchell Bakerfounder

Companies

  • Mozilla

Why it's here

MozillaThe organization behind Firefox — advocates open web standards and internet privacy. Foundation preserved an independent browser voice post-NetscapeA commercial web browser company — Navigator defined the early consumer web..

Why it mattered

It sustained open web advocacy when commercial browsers consolidated.

What it solved

Browser innovation risked collapsing into IEInternet Explorer — Microsoft's browser that dominated the web in the 1990s and 2000s. monopoly without nonprofit stewardship.

Media

  • Mozilla Firefox logo 2013
    ImageMozilla Firefox logo 2013

    Sean Martell for Mozilla [2][3], CC BY 3.0, via wikimedia

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