Almost two weeks ago, I had an emotional last day at Mozilla, the best place I’ve ever had the honor of calling “employer.”  The 22 months I’ve spent at Mozilla have been the most rewarding and challenging of my career.  I joined at a time of transition and had the great honor of working with some of the smartest people I’ve ever met, on a mission that has fundamentally changed the internet for everyone, regardless of the browser they happen to use.  Mozilla has a reach and influence that is the envy of many organizations in tech, and they will continue to grow and advance the state of the art in some obvious and surprising ways.

I’ve always told people that Mozilla was the last job I would ever have, and there was only one thing that would get me to leave- the opportunity to start something new that has the potential to change the world.  Of course, like many asterisks and related clauses, this one was fated to happen to me, and when Joshua Schachter asked me to start a company with him, I said no.  I couldn’t leave Mozilla, and I felt that my participation was vital to the company and the very future of the internet.

It took a while for me to realize that there would never be the perfect time for a person to leave an organization where they feel like they’re making a difference.  It took an even longer while to crank my ego down to the point where I realized that no one is irreplaceable, and in fact, learning how to delegate and give others the opportunity to grow is also an honorable way to make an exit.  Upon some reflection, I came to realize, perhaps self-servingly, that being indispensable is not always the reflection of a person’s true value- because it means that responsibility, vision, and leadership are not being shared in any meaningful way.  Fligtar, Myk, and Jorge all know their own jobs better than I do and are more than capable of writing the future of add-ons for Mozilla.

So, we know how this story ends.  I did an Ione Skye to Joshua’s John Cusack, and now I’m the VP of Product at a joint called Tasty Labs, with Joshua and Paul Rademacher, who invented Web 2.0 and will be inventing the next version of the web with us, which we plan on calling “Web 6.” Right now, my days are unpredictable and exciting, and I’ll try my best to talk more to you, all twelve of you, about my startup adventure.  TTFN!

I’ve had the good fortune of meeting fellow nerds from all over the world, and I’ve noticed the ones who don’t come from Silicon Valley remain enchanted by technology and its promise to make the world better.  They’re the ones hacking away on Twitter and Firefox and really pushing the envelope on the future for those products.  Many of  top Firefox add-on developers come from Europe and Asia, and Brazil’s wholesale adoption of open source and social software is a phenomenon to behold.  Korea’s obsession with Starcraft shows no signs of waning eleven years after that game’s release.

While our short attention spans compel us to keep creating and trying new things, does our eagerness to invent prevent us from honing our craft?  Does great software evolve through people who lose their otaku sense of wonder?  Seesmic relocated to San Francisco in an attempt to secure respect in the startup world, but I wonder if Silicon Valley, with its populace of short-attention-span inhabitants, will continue to be the epicenter of technology moving forward.

I’m not terribly worried about America- I still see that twinkle in the eyes of my friends and colleagues from other parts of the country, but I do think that we should get over ourselves and try to remember that technology that makes the lives of people better is something that we want in the hands of as many folks as possible.

Today was my first day at Mozilla, where I start my dream job as the new lead for Add-ons.  I’m a huge fan of browser extensions and I’m honored to be one of many at Mozilla who help make the web a better place by promoting openness and innovation on the internet.

Highlights of my day- raiding the kitchen for different kinds of iced tea and riding a rickety electric tricycle at ludicrous speeds after sunset on slippery and cold corporate sidewalks.  Oh- and thinking about the future of Add-ons for my favorite browser, Mozilla Firefox!  I think I’m going to like the new job.

I’m also going to miss the folks at Raptr an awful lot.  I liked the product and loved the people there, and Thresh was a capable and demanding boss who pushed me to do my best in both product management and Starcraft.  He was gracious enough to invite me to the holiday party last week and I’ll always wear my Raptr hoodie with pride.  Most importantly, I know that I’m moving on to new things having left Raptr in better shape than it was in when I arrived there.

From my outsider’s perspective, Mullally strikes me as a solid leader who isn’t afraid to make tough decisions. The next generation euro focus is coming to the states, as is the Fiesta. I would not be surprised to see clean TDCi technology come to the states as a viable and cost effective alternative to hybrids. The only problem is that now that gas prices are low and dropping even further, making a business case for efficient cars is a risky proposition right now.

There are lots of reasons for cutting fuel consumption, global warming being one of the big ones. However, supply isn’t one of them. Supply is tightly controlled by a cartel of oil producers, and conservative estimates show that we have decades if not a century of oil remaining. That’s a lot of time for pricing fluctuations to affect demand for fuel sipping cars.

So while Washington wants the automakers to make more efficient cars, demand for them will always be very tightly pegged to the cost of fuel. So there are tough decisions for automakers to make.

As for union labor- I’m not anti-union by any means but my time at Ford left me with the impression that the UAW is comprised largely of honest, hardworking folks whose biggest enemy are the people within their ranks who abuse their benefits.

I’m talking about the people who take sick time instead of leave to go deer hunting (thus mandating a company holiday invented to address the rampant absenteeism on the first day of hunting season), or the people who belabor our health care system because of their generous that causes them to go to a doctor for a cold rather than a Walgreens for some nyquil, or an 80 year old retiree who undergoes a risky and expensive shoulder operation against the advice of her doctor because her plan paid for 100% of it.

As a salaried worker at Ford, our general feeling towards the UAW was one of helplessness as we went through endless training on how not to offend a plant worker who was earning an equal or higher wage, even when ‘laid off’. In certain cases, we could not carry our laptops across a plant floor because of union rules around the transport of computer equipment. On the other side, factory workers viewed all ‘blue badge’ (salaried) employees as ‘management’ who was out to get them.

So there was some poison and vitriol there, but I don’t view the UAW as the source of the automakers’ problems. The problem really is that Detroit can no longer attract the most talented minds because Detroit is not a meritocracy. Managers at Ford (and I imagine the same at GM and Chrysler) are there because of loyalty and politics. Employees aren’t encouraged to interact with anyone more than 1 level above them, so the people at the top have a very filtered and manipulated view of the state of the union.  It’s not a good environment for a young new employee, regardless of how ambitious and talented they might be.

The road ahead is going to be a tough one for the auto industry.  I only hope that they can weather this storm and make the cultural and operational changes to thrive and once again attract the best and brightest minds to Detroit.