There's something about being a woman in a technology space, unless you happen to be model beautiful, where there's always, always talk about what you look like.
Mitchell BakerWe should probably figure out a new word for this. For us, "open" means transparent, as in "open source" - you're not locked in to what the original creator did. And in our case "open" also means distributed decision making.
Mitchell BakerBut I think it's always difficult when a product that you're using and accustomed to changes.
Mitchell BakerBut most of us who aren't models aren't models, right? And so, you just have to get used to that and sort of read right past it. So. On the sex symbol piece, I don't get that piece. On the personality piece, that people are excited to meet a leader from Mozilla - maybe there's more about meeting me personally than I give credit for, but I find that people are excited about what Mozilla is, more than 'Oh my god, there's Mitchell, look, her hair,' whatever.
Mitchell BakerI've learned that for many people, change is uncomfortable. Maybe they want to go through it, and they can see the benefit of it, but at a gut level, change is uncomfortable.
Mitchell BakerOur sense of "open" is that the authority to make decisions about that gets distributed based on merit and understanding and participation and leadership, not solely on employment or a title or a business plan. Technical colleagues will define "open" as "open standards," "interoperable" - you can find it, search it, cut and paste it, view source, mix and match - all those things that we associate with text on the Web, that you can continue to do that with audio and video and whatever's next.
Mitchell Baker