Blake Ross just turned 21 this week. Think back to what you were doing at 21. Ross was speaking at the CityClub about his popular (100 million downloads?) web browser, Firefox. 
Happy 21st Birthday! (on Monday)
He started working at age 14 so his mother had to drive him to and from work. "How embarrassing" he joked. He was doing "simple web site stuff" and then when AOL got big he did some "simple chat-based games for AOL." He got involved with Netscape (bought by AOL) by submitting bug reports as part of the online community. This led to an invitation to work on the browser in California as a summer job.
He's on leave from Stanford now saying, "School can be delayed a year or two but Firefox couldn't be."
Ross thinks the "software industry is failing" and is sometimes "ashamed to be called a programmer and be part of it" because of those failures. He cites an ever-widening gap between software creators and end users. "I just want technology to live up to its promise - making life easier," he said.
When he worked on Netscape under AOL he spent untold late hours working on user concerns but was told by Marketing, "Don't talk to users." The lack of concern for end users (like his Mom and grandmother) led him to create Firefox as an open source project springing from Mozilla which came from Netscape.
He received $1 million in seed money from AOL for the project and the Mozilla Foundation has been a self-sustaining non-profit since then.
Taking a question from the audience
The challenge was to spread the word about the browser without using the standard despised marketing. They came up with a cause, a rallying point. He realized that ½ the potential audience was anti-Microsoft and another ½ were open source fanatics. This realization led to their tagline "Take back the Web" with the implication that they were taking it back from Microsoft.
He tells how his grandfather ("He's converting the entire state of Florida to Firefox") ran into the head rabbi of Israel at the airport. He approached him and started talking software and said "I use Firefox religiously." Much to his surprise, the rabbi knew about it and said, "That's the browser that blocks all the schmutz."
When asked he said that he uses Windows saying he wants to know what users deal with and that "I don't not like Microsoft." He also has "some concerns that Google is getting into everything" but it's a lot easier to switch search engines than operating systems so he's not real worried. Firefox has some neat features and deserves the attention and market share it is getting. Plus, it has spurred Microsoft to enhance Internet Explorer. The new version of IE which was scheduled for Vista will now be made available for Windows XP too. This is due in part to competition from projects such as Firefox.
Signing copies of Firefox for Dummies for fans
The Great Lakes Geek got a kick out of youngsters like Jason Therrien and Henry Gomez feeling "old" in the presence of Ross. Take it from me, you have to get used to it guys. ;-)
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