Firefox has turns 10 years old. On September 2002 Pheonix was released, later renamed to Firebird, then renamed to Firefox. Mozilla Firefox started as the uber-lightweight version of the Mozilla Suite and has grown as paragon of open web browsers. In the dark old days, of IE6 having 98% market share, Firefox was held the line against the hegemony of a single business controlling how we access information. Firefox lead the technological race to improve the web. And today it has grown into a mature browser, one of the big three, continuing to advocate for the free and open web.

Originally a fork of the Mozilla Suite, Firefox used the Gecko rendering engine with a razor thin interface. The idea was to keep it simple and just a browser. It focused on creating an positive browsing experience; simple, direct and fast. Slowly Firefox clawed it's way up the browser usage stats and into our hearts.

Firefox focused the importance of technological development of the web as a platform. When IE6 languished in simple security fixes Firefox was adding features, increasing speed and improving web standards. Firefox added tabbed browsing, integrated search, anti-phishing tools, extensions, and--my favorite--inline spell check. Firefox has pushed the boundaries of standards by supporting early and often, including SVG and early Javascript improvement.

Today Firefox continues it's mission of offering an open web browser. Mozilla, the company behind Firefox, participates in HTML working groups with other browser builders to push for improvements to the web as platform. Firefox includes these specification standards along with new features, including a JIT Javascript complier and cutting edge audio codec.

Firefox is a remarkable piece of software. It holds a special place in history, a pivotal point where openness and freedom could have been but a dream. When most other browsers fell to Microsoft's dominance Firefox stood fast. Stood for us the users, and continues to stand for us. Firefox has a long and glorious road ahead of it.