Mozilla & Firefox messaging

As you know, the challenge of communicating the nature of Mozilla and the benefits of Firefox is not for the faint of heart. We've probably all had the experience of occasionally being met with vacant stares from friends, family, spouses, etc when trying to explain why we do what we do.

So, we've created two documents to help make talking about Mozilla and Firefox a little easier. They're still very much works in progress, but we wanted to go ahead and share them. The idea is that they're aimed at the broader consumer audience (rather than developers and other tech experts), as they're the people who probably need this info the most.

Here at Mozilla, we'll be using these docs as a checklist of sorts whenever we launch a new campaign. For example, when we developed our latest round of Firefox banner ads a few weeks ago, we made sure they were themed around concepts from this document (security and customization, to be specific).

Although we're by no means saying that you have to use these points when you spread Firefox (or Mozilla), we're hoping that they prove useful. Our basic idea is that, whether you're writing a blog post, speaking at a conference or just talking to a person on the street, these can be handy ways of explaining to people why they should make the switch to Firefox or what exactly Mozilla is all about.

It's also worth noting that this is very much a beta release...we'll certainly continue refining these documents as we go, and are counting on your input to help with that. One great way you all could help would be to test these points out on your non-technical friends and family members...what do they look for in a browser? Are they even aware that browser choices exist? And are these specific points compelling and useful in explaining the benefits of Firefox and Mozilla?

The actual documents:
* Firefox messaging
* Mozilla messaging

More background, details and context:
* Post on my blog about the Firefox messaging
* Melissa Shapiro's blog post about the Mozilla messaging

Thanks!
John