Case #4: Principles of Free Economy
Mozilla Firefox, the popular internet browser, is a software company and subsidiary of Mozilla Foundation, a nonprofit organization incorporated in July 2003 in California. The subsidiary is responsible for coordinating the development and marketing of Mozilla technologies and products. The Mozilla Foundation has no outside shareholders with a unique structure that allows it to “financial support and cultivate competitive, viable community innovation.” They products are available in more then 35 languages, are compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux computers. Their purpose is mainly to promote openness, innovation and opportunity on the Internet.
All Mozilla software is open sourced, meaning it is not only available for download free of charge, the source code may be accessed, modified, and redistributed between users. Generally, their software and services are free. They do have the Mozilla Store to help build revenue through the company, which offers particular products at a small cost to the consumer. Their products include t-shirts, “gear”, outerwear, software and guides, art and décor, and other merchandise. They also have trademark rights including logos and names. Aside from their merchandise, all their products are free for users to utilize. Individuals can also offer donations to the non-profit organization which also helps build revenue for the company.
The Mozilla Foundation clearly falls under Chris Anderson’s Gift Economy free pricing strategy as shown through their goals and mission. According to their website, “We are helping make the internet a place where you and your neighbors build the world you want, that generates not only economic value, but also civic and social value, that is optimized for multiple languages and locales, that is trustworthy and has minimal risk for users. They have a Mozilla Manifesto that articulates their altruistic intentions with their products. The purpose of their software, plainly, is to benefit society.
Link: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/about/
You’ve correctly identified Firefox as an example of the gift economy model that Anderson talks about. What’s need here is more detail on the foundation and specifically how they generate revenue. You could also discuss the gifting of add-on services and features for Firefox contributed by other programmers. There’s also some element of zero marginal cost in distributing this software to a large group of users.
Grade – 4
Kristina:
The grade for additional web content is 1 out of 5. There’s no other content here but your case studies. The site is very attractive visually and there are a couple of links but you need more content.