raindrop

Mozilla Labs absorbs Thunderbird group

Mozilla, which had hoped its Thunderbird e-mail software would rise to financial self-sufficiency like its better-known Firefox project, unveiled a Plan B yesterday that instead increases the organization's focus on other communication technology.

The Thunderbird group, called Mozilla Messaging, will become part of Mozilla Labs--a research center rather than a profit center--and lose its official name. David Ascher, who has led the Mozilla Messaging group, "now will lead a new innovation group within Mozilla Labs focused on online communications and social interactions on the Web," said Mitchell Baker, chair of the Mozilla Foundation, in a blog post … Read more

Mozilla's e-mail group looks toward the cloud

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--For almost all of its existence, Mozilla Messaging has been known for Thunderbird--e-mail software with the traditional view that a person's PC is the center of their computing existence.

Now, though, the Mozilla Foundation subsidiary's scope is expanding beyond the confines of the computer under your desk or on your lap. In the near term, the new Thunderbird 3 is becoming more integrated with the Web. And in the longer term, the Raindrop project has the potential to lift your inbox all the way to the cloud.

"For us it's really important to … Read more

Mozilla's messaging story gains credibility

Mozilla isn't just about browsing anymore.

While the foundation made its name with the increasingly popular open-source Firefox browser, it is quickly moving beyond its roots, particularly in the area of e-mail. With the launch of Raindrop, its Google Wave-like unified messaging and collaboration system, as well as corporate uptake of Thunderbird, Mozilla may soon extend its reach well beyond its browser base.

Corporate America hasn't done much with Mozilla's Thunderbird, a competitor to Microsoft Outlook. Europe, however, has given it a warm reception. For example, the French tax authority recently selected Thunderbird to power 130,000 … Read more

Mozilla tries to build the ultimate in-box: Raindrop

Mozilla's Thunderbird team has been working on software called Raindrop that aims to unify communications channels such as e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter into a single interface with enough built-in smarts to separate the important messages from the routine.

"E-mail used to house the bulk of the conversations that took place on the internet, but that's no longer the case today. In today's world people use a combination of Twitter, IM, Skype, Facebook, Google Docs, e-mail, etc., to communicate. For many of us this means that we have to keep an eye on an ever-growing number of … Read more