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Aurora Concept Video

Aurora is a concept video presenting one possible future user experience for the Web, created by Adaptive Path as part of the Mozilla Labs concept browser series. Aurora explores new ways people could interact with the Web in the future based on projected technological trends and real-world scenarios.

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FAQs

What is being released?

Adaptive Path is releasing Aurora, a concept video exploring one possible future user experience for the Web, as part of the Mozilla Labs concept series. Through the development and release of Aurora, Adaptive Path will contribute its design expertise to support Mozilla's efforts to inspire and engage a global community in an open design process.

What is the purpose of Aurora?

Aurora is intended to serve as a springboard for an open discussion about how to evolve the user experience of the Web browser.

Where and when can I get Aurora?

You can download the Aurora concept videos from the Mozilla Labs and Adaptive Path websites, where you will find supporting documentation, learn more about the development and design process, and the Mozilla Labs concept series. The videos and related source materials will be freely distributable and remixable under Creative Commons licenses. The video will be released in four parts with the first part available on Tuesday, Aug 5, 2008.

Why is Aurora being released in parts?

Aurora incorporates many innovative design ideas to inspire reflection and to start discussions about how they might impact the future user experience of web browsers. These concepts are nuanced, and build on each other in complex ways, so we've used each part of the video to show how the concepts work together in specific situations. After all the parts are released, a contiguous version of the video will be made available.

What are the key components of Aurora?

  • Natural interaction: Spatial, visual, and physical engagement with the Web
  • Continuity: Seamless, consistent Web and browser experience across devices
  • Multi-user applications: The Web as a space for collaboration, sharing, and remixing
  • Context awareness: Products that know where you are and what you're doing, both physically and virtually

What is Adaptive Path?

Adaptive Path is an experience strategy and design firm based in San Francisco. Widely considered to be at the forefront of the emerging field of experience design, the company provides consulting services, publishes books, reports, and essays, and hosts conferences dedicated to helping organizations deliver better experiences through their products and services. The company's clients include organizations such as Sony, National Public Radio, Crayola, Google, and the United Nations.

What is Mozilla Labs?

Laboratories are where science and creativity meet to develop, research, and explore new ideas. Mozilla Labs embraces this great tradition — a virtual lab where people come together to create, experiment, and play with new Web innovations and technologies. Anything goes here. Crazy ideas and inspirations are encouraged as we all explore and experiment with brand new ideas in whole new ways. Mozilla Labs is about inspiring and harnessing the collective intelligence, wisdom, and energy of the Mozilla community.

Mozilla is a global community dedicated to building free, open source products and technologies that improve the online experience for people everywhere. We work in the open with a highly disciplined, transparent and cooperative development process, under the umbrella of the non-profit Mozilla Foundation. As a wholly owned subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation organizes the development and marketing of Mozilla products. This unique structure has enabled Mozilla to financially support and cultivate competitive, viable community innovation. For more information, visit www.mozilla.com.

How did Adaptive Path get involved with Mozilla Labs?

Adaptive Path has a research and development practice dedicated to exploring experience design challenges that affect lots of people. The increasing ubiquity and importance of the web browser made it an excellent candidate for an R&D project. Mozilla Labs and its efforts to scale its open design process offered Adaptive Path an opportunity to contribute to the community and help Mozilla reach out to designers as well as developers. Adaptive Path's emphasis on collaboration and openness was a good match for the culture and values of the Mozilla community.

How was the Aurora concept developed?

In early 2007, a small team from Adaptive Path, led by Jesse James Garrett, reached out to Mozilla Labs to contribute its product design expertise to explore one possible future user experience for the Web. Through a series of workshops, Adaptive Path designers, and a group of volunteer outside experts, collaborated with the Mozilla community to define possible features of the browser of the future. The process of designing the browser and producing the concept video took about six months.

Does Mozilla intend to produce Aurora?

The Aurora concept is primarily intended to inspire thinking and conversation about design, rather than to directly influence the design of an existing product.

How is Aurora being licensed?

The Aurora concept videos and related materials are being released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/

When will the concepts shown by Aurora become technologically possible?

While it's impossible to predict the future, Aurora demonstrates concepts that should be possible in the near future.

What is the "Open Design Initiative"?

This is a Mozilla Labs outreach program to engage wide participation in exploring and prototyping future directions for the Web.

What is the "Mozilla Labs Concept Series"?

The Concept Browser Series is a project to grow community around the surfacing of new ideas and concepts through pictures, sketches and/or videos as part of the Open Design Initiative.