Mozilla Awards Nearly $600,000 to Qualifying Open Source Projects

Last year, Mozilla launched the Mozilla Open Source Support Program (MOSS) – an award program specifically focused on supporting open source and free software. As The VAR Guy notes: "The Mozilla Foundation has long injected money into the open source ecosystem through partnerships with other projects and grants. But it formalized that mission last year by launching MOSS, which originally focused on supporting open source projects that directly complement or help form the basis for Mozilla's own products."

Now, Mozilla has reported that it awarded a hefty $585,000 to nine open source projects in Q2 of this year alone. Here is more on a couple of the most interesting projects and what they are focusing on.

 PyPy. PyPy is a fast, compliant alternative implementation of the Python language (2.7.10 and 3.3.5). Its developers tout its performance advantages over Python.

Tor: Tor is a system for using a distributed network to communicate anonymously and without being tracked. We've covered it a number of times.  Mozilla wants its developers to significantly enhance the Tor network's metrics infrastructure so that the performance of the network can be monitored and improvements made as appropriate.

Tails:  Tails is a secure-by-default live operating system that focuses on preserving the user's privacy and anonymity. Mozilla's investments will go toward developing reproducible builds.

You can find a complete list of the projects that Mozilla is supporting, and the dollar amounts of support, here. 

According to Mozilla, your own open source project may be eligible for future grants:

"If you think your project qualifies, we encourage you to apply...You can read more about our selection criteria and committee on the wiki.

We are keen to enable applications from groups not currently connected with Mozilla and from communities outside the English-speaking free software world. Therefore, applications for Mission Partners do not require a Mozillian to support them. Instead, they must be endorsed by a well-known and respected figure from the wider software community of which the project is a part."

"Mozilla is proud to support the open source community of which we are a part and from which so many benefit," the company reports. "We look forward to enabling even more OS maintenance, improvement and innovation through MOSS, so please apply! The committee meets next in early September, so get your applications in by the end of August." Applications for a “Foundational Technology” award remain open.