Mozilla defends Firefox rapid release strategy

Mozilla over the weekend defended its rapid release cycle strategy for its Firefox web browser, saying they need to keep up with new threats on the Web. Jonathan Nightingale, director of Firefox engineering, said their push to ship faster is not "software machismo" but a necessary response. "The push to ship faster isn’t some kind of software machismo. We push ourselves to ship faster because the web is under threat. Amazing and innovative people are doing amazing and innovative things and right now they have a choice: build for the web, or build for the walled gardens. The web can win that fight," he said in a blog post. Only last week, Mozilla released version 6 of its Firefox browser, keeping with a six-week release cycle policy. Nightingale said this was the first true rapid-release milestone, which he said showed Mozilla can maintain such a pace. Some critics had noted that while Firefox 6 came six weeks after Firefox 5, it did not have major improvements. But Nightingale said the rapid release advances Mozilla's mission in important ways. "We get features and improvements to users faster. We get new APIs and standards out to web developers faster. We are delivering on the promise of the web at web speed," he said. He added small, frequent releases improve quality. Also, he said they would rather be agile and responsive in helping the open web develop as a communication and distribution platform. "The open web is the most amazing, universal communication and distribution platform ever built. To win, the web needs to be agile and responsive. To help it, we need to be agile and responsive, too. That’s why rapid release matters," hesaid. — TJD, GMA News