Emma Irwin

Teaching Contribution

Posted by Emma in community, contribution, Mozilla, remo

There are a lot of wonderful challenges in open source: opportunities to learn, to make a difference and to impact the world in a positive way. There are good difficulties learning in open source: hard problems we need to solve-for, but usually we’re OK with that- we’re problem solvers, fixers, inventors, builders… we invest in challenge for causes we care about. But for technical contributors, the potential impact of an individual person weighs heavily on their ability to survive on-boarding. The not-so-good difficulty: Navigating wikis, understanding communication tools, getting a…read more

Dec.15

#mozlove for Nigel Babu

Posted by Emma in community, contribution, remo

Two weeks ago some 1000+ Mozillians gathered in Portland for a workweek. Attendance was, as usual, from all over the world – staff and volunteers all working really hard, together, to visualize 2015 – and in the evenings we met at various restaurants all over town to unwind and socialize. It was on one of these nights at the Deschutes Brewery , I met and was inspired by Nigel Babu and the story of Mozilla Sheriffs. ‘Sheriffing’ is not just the coolest contributor title – but a truly amazing collaboration…read more

Dec.02

Radical Participation – Scaling the Human Network

Posted by Emma in community, Mozilla, remo

Co-written with Larissa Shapiro At Mozilla we’re always thinking about how to improve our products, how to continue a legacy of innovation and quality while shipping often. That said, we can’t talk about Mozilla’s history, or future without acknowledging the critical role of our global volunteer community in our success, and of it’s importance to our future. Software is made by people, and community is made both by and of people. This year’s learnings around the challenges of contributor growth and retention, come with a recognition that we have two…read more

Nov.22

Being a Mozilla Rep Mentor – Training & SOP Updates

Posted by Emma in community, remo

This post has been a long-time coming, as there are important changes to the Reps Mentorship program SOP and process as a result of RemoCamp Berlin. A quick background! I believe very, very much in the power of mentorship in general, and in Reps specifically I know that in mentorship lies the potential to unlock the possibilities of all Reps can achieve together if we value the opportunity of empowering each other. That said, this role to-date, has been loosely implemented as more of a administrative role – and that’s…read more

Nov.20

Mozilla Guides Call – Nov 19, 2014

Posted by Emma in community, remo

In an effort to make the call more accessible to other timezones we had an early call (7AM PST) today. EtherPad We covered a few things I want to highlight: Guides Update Guides continues to get busier, and as we’ve had an expected drop-off of Guides from our original group, I want to thank those who are really championing the development and leadership so far in Guides David Teller Vesper Diziewonski Ioana Chiorean Julien G Stefan (Costenslayer) Jennie Rose Halprin Abhishek Potnis Saurabh Diane With a special shout-out to Ioana,…read more

Nov.12

A Web Literacy Pot Luck

Posted by Emma in community, parenting, remo, Teaching Kids, Webmaker

This afternoon I met with a group of parents – a group of fantastic, involved parents who want to learn, understand, and just – ‘get‘ what their middle-school aged children need from them to navigate and survive the web. At least that’s my take on what they were expecting. These are also very good friends of mine: home-schoolers, public-schoolers, farmers and many industries of experience between us – we had our first babies at together, second babies together – and we’ve supported each other through many a thing. This time,…read more

Nov.04

Mozilla Guides Community Call – Nov 4th

Posted by Emma in Mozilla, pathways, remo

Mozilla Guides was launched recently in coordination with the new (and beautiful) Mozilla Get Involved Page. Guides is a program to help brand new and potential contributors orient themselves, choose a pathway, and gain confidence in the early days of contribution. Guides themselves play a critical role in helping new contributors overcome both common and personal obstacles, through mentorship. Guides curate content, and resources for their functional area (like coding, testing, writing), but anyone from the community interested in helping new contributors find their way are very welcome. Guides is…read more

Oct.29

My #Mozfest 2014

Posted by Emma in community, remo

As per usual, the Mozilla Festival was amazing. I always find attending this event unofficially sets my course for the new year – and it’s already clear that will be the case again for 2015, as a result of Baroness Beeban Kidron’s keynote. “Young people must understand not only how the web works, but be aware of it’s purposes, it’s social outcomes, and they have to be participants in creating the web of the future.” “Parental controls do not work, do not build resilience and subsequently block the opportunity.” “Digital…read more

Oct.29

Open Hatch & Mozilla

Posted by Emma in community, contribution, higher ed, remo, Webmaker, women in technology

In recent years, I’ve organized loads of Webmaker events for youth. And on the opposite end, I’ve also run many hackathons for experienced engineers interested in contributing to open source, through my work at SocialCoding4Good. For just as long, I’ve noticed the absence of opportunity for higher education students to get involved, which is why I was so excited to partner with Open Hatch Comes to Campus for an event at the University of Victoria on October 18th. Open Source Comes to Campus is a one-day workshop to teach the…read more

Sep.19

Drupal and Open Badges Contribution Opportunity

Posted by Emma in contribution, drupal, Mozilla, remo

Cross-post of a blog I wrote for SocialCoding4Good. I’m looking for a contributor to help me build a volunteer platform using Drupal+ Open Badges. Development and contribution will focus on the Drupal and Mozilla projects, and my offer to mentor the chosen contributor. More on the project and how to apply here. mage credit: infomatique