Celebrating the Web We Want

Benjamin Sternthal

197 responses

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The latest version of Firefox is a huge milestone for Mozilla and represents the combined efforts of hundreds of people from around the world. To celebrate this launch we revisited Glow, a real-time visualization of Firefox downloads originally used during the launch of Firefox 4 in 2011.

This time we wanted to do more than just show downloads. We wanted to give people a chance to express what they want the Web to be. To this end, users visiting https://webwewant.mozilla.org/ have the option to share with Mozilla and the world their hopes for the Web. These “shares” are displayed on the map and we display information about which issues are most important in each continent and country.

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The dots on the map represents people: either someone downloading Firefox or sharing the Web they want. For me, watching the map is both humbling and inspiring. When people use Firefox— a free and open source browser made by an amazing community— and choose to share with the world what matters to them, it shows a global commitment to the future of the Web.

Technical Details

How do we process millions of interactions and display them?

The site processes request logs for Firefox downloads, auto-updates, and users who share via the website. We perform geolocation lookups on the data and aggregate the information for consumption and display by the Web application.

We have a particular love of the Simpsons on our team and elements of our project are named appropriately:

  • Mr. Burns – The overall codebase.
  • Smithers – The “servant” scripts who provide data to Mr. Burns.

Mr. Burns relies on three main scripts to display data:

  • Bart – Parses log files looking for Firefox downloads or auto-updates.
  • Lisa – Geolocates parsed data and aggregates into buckets.
  • Milhouse – Packages data into JSON for consumption by the front-end.

The flow of data can be seen in this diagram:

glow-data

Data is stored in Redis and the JSON files are delivered to the front end application via CDN. The front end app renders the individual “glows” and the stats using D3.js.

To learn more visit our Wiki and explore the code on Github.

Special Thanks

This was a large project with many participants, all of whom deserve thanks. I would like to thank a few people who worked especially hard:

Eric Petitt – Project Sponsor

Paul McLanahan – Senior Developer

Steven Garrity – Senior Developer

Ali Almossawi – Metrics Engineer

John Slater – Creative Director

Sean Martell – Art Director

Matej Novak – Copy Director

The Localization Team & Contributors

And you! Without you the world would have no Glow.

197 responses

  1. Kyo wrote on :

    It should be multiple choices.

  2. Husnain Shaikh wrote on :

    fantastic work

  3. Adam Suchi Hafizullah wrote on :

    Lots of people enjoyed with Mozilla, including myself. I use Mozilla Waterfox

  4. Fathur wrote on :

    Good

  5. Fco.Carlos wrote on :

    Thanks Mozilla.

  6. Timothy Su wrote on :

    Thank you for fighting for internet privacy! Firefox is more than just a browser to me and I love it <3

  7. M. Hesel wrote on :

    Die Werteilung ist sehr interessant. Nimmt man den Datenschutz mal beiseite, spiegeln die Nennungen in manchen Ländern vermutlich auch die grundsätzlichen globalen Bedürfnisse wider. Schöner Einfall, Daumen hoch!

  8. R S GURU wrote on :

    I WOULD LIKE MOZILLA FIREFOX BROWSER !

  9. Cody Poletti wrote on :

    Thanks for being awesome. I will support any way I can!!!

  10. shimaoh wrote on :

    very good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! south korea!!!

  11. Conqueror wrote on :

    Thanks FireFox for this amazing browser!!

    GJ

  12. Aman Nougrahiya wrote on :

    I’m a big fan of Google.
    Apart from that, I was curious how the counter for those people who are using Firefox is increasing at almost a fixed rate of 666 increments per 7-8 seconds?!
    Anyways, great Job with the update..

  13. Shiva wrote on :

    Mozilla is awesome . Keep the Great work , We are all with you

  14. robert paz wrote on :

    very good job. you guys are the best

  15. ED wrote on :

    I Respect your hard work 🙂 and appreciate it. mostly like the rest of MOZILLA users. Thanks Mozilla FireFox.

  16. RockerJoe wrote on :

    Good job,Mozilla!!! I love this browser 😉

  17. Science Teacher wrote on :

    I love it! Great advocacy piece! Thanks, Mozilla! :o)

  18. mojo706 wrote on :

    I’ve been using Aurora version 30 and Its amazing the improvents on privacy controls and memory use. I compared FF to Maxthon and Firefox is just too damn good.

  19. Giordano Sconti wrote on :

    Great initiative from your side!
    I was just watching the video when something of amazing has happened:
    Thousands of enlightened points have appeared on the screen bringing with them the meaning of freedom.
    You’ve gave us the access to a powerful tool for staying tuned with the rest of the world and we’ll do our best to keep it alive by using it day after day!
    Keep your wonderful work up, guys.

  20. Jesús Famiglietti wrote on :

    Firefox is the web’s best friend. I only use Internet Explorer for write firefox.com and download it.

  21. Gavin Matthew wrote on :

    Mozilla, you’ve got the awesome stuff. Awsome community.
    Evolve to Linux !

    Gavin (Australia)

  22. Liz wrote on :

    I would not use anything but Mozilla Firefox. It has been my choice for years. What a beautiful message,
    thank you. I admire your sense of community. You are the one, is because of people like you that the internet has grow to become the learning tool that it is. Freedom 4 ever. Thanks.

  23. Matt. Wilkie wrote on :

    I’ve been a staunch Firefox and Thunderbird fan and user since Netscape’s early days. I like what Mozilla stands for and believe in the principles that drive the foundation forward. I hope it continues for a long long time to come.

    This “web you want” campaign leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Its propaganda. For a good cause, but still propaganda. You’re not asking people what they want. You’re presenting a preselected list of make-me-feel-good memes and inviting them to click. Of course we’re going to click. But what does a click mean? Is that counted as a vote? What if I wanted to rank the selections? Or just wanted to read more about them, to understand more deeply? What about things which aren’t on the list? What if I actually disagree with one or more of them?

    This campaign is straight up manipulation, attempting to create/fuel/extend a movement. You’re doing it on purpose, and it stinks.

    Keep to what is good and true. Leave the social manipulation exercises to those who have something to conceal.

  24. Fabio wrote on :

    Amazing!!! Just a couple of things: 1) It should be more than one choice. 2) What about the Mozilla android app downloads??? Keep the good work!!!

  25. Dr Gautam Kaul wrote on :

    Excellent work, Keep it up and very best of Luck.

  26. Freddy wrote on :

    Excelente Mozila se han superado sigan igual

  27. JAYASANKAR NILAGIRI wrote on :

    I like MOZILLA FIREFOX – THE BEST WEB BROWSER

  28. TarisMan Kasis wrote on :

    i like this web browser very much, everything i need are here

  29. Rafael Lobato wrote on :

    Good job, Mozilla 😉

    Caçapava (São Paulo – Brazil)

  30. Uttam wrote on :

    Nice Work….

  31. Harley Alderson wrote on :

    you guys should really develop an app for iphone it sucks that there isnt any real app on there for it

  32. Jason wrote on :

    Mozilla Firefox is my choice for many years. And I like that the Community is connecting with the users, and I hope that they will do that once a month or so. And I want to thank every developer for making Mozilla Firefox.

  33. ytzak mark wrote on :

    This is great .You given me the motivation to move ahead as i go on with my programming lessons.good work .

  34. THOR wrote on :

    I DO LOVE MOZILLA FIRE FOX – THE KYUBII ;D

  35. Hossein Rad wrote on :

    دمتون گرم
    Thanks Mozilla.

  36. MaggieP wrote on :

    I agree with those who’d like to select more than one priority choices. Several are critical to one another’s function. Learning is key, for instance, but not widely possible without accessibility. Thank you Thank you for being Mozilla!

  37. James wrote on :

    Thank You.

  38. Gopi wrote on :

    It is nice and cool.

  39. lalo lolez wrote on :

    AGUANTE LA INTERNET 1.0 CARAJO ! ! !

    Viva Firefox, viva el codigo abierto y vivamos nosotros !!!

    😀

    GG (lopez argentina)

  40. william pilon wrote on :

    i love mozilla, good job everybody that worked on this project<3

  41. Lipittoo wrote on :

    Lembram que diziam que o mundo iria acabar em fogo?
    Pois bem, aí está: O Mozilla da Firefox.

  42. Jerry wrote on :

    Mozilla is #1 – it’s fast and reliable.

  43. Bob Clark wrote on :

    i agree – choices should feature multiple options – but anyway thank you FF for all you do

  44. Davis wrote on :

    FF is awesome and certainly above Chrome. Why? One word: OPEN SOURCE.
    Thank you to keep developing for the people.

  45. The_User wrote on :

    Thank iu mozilla… from Argentina!!! 😀

  46. fidel kastor wrote on :

    yes, bre Mozila!

  47. Tony.W wrote on :

    We the people! Everybody should have the freedom to express themselves by gender, religion, political and by use of content.” FREE THE WEB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

  48. ALEXI DIAZ wrote on :

    NICE

  49. Ant wrote on :

    looks great love the work implied into creating such a gorgeous visual

  50. Emilio. T wrote on :

    Great work is realy realy amaizing the work that you are doing for the people so in name of the people I know: thank you and great work.

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