The Mozilla Blog

Did you miss the buzz about the Firefox Screencast Contest? Don’t worry! There are still plenty of chances to win some prizes, but there’s one catch: you have to submit your screencast before 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time today!

Participating only takes a few minutes, and doesn’t require any particular computer or Firefox skills — you just have to pick one of the top 100 knowledge base articles and follow the instructions while recording it with e.g. Jing.

1. Pick an article from the top 100 list
2. Create a screencast for the article
3. Submit your screencast

If you’re one of the 100 winners, your screencast will be used in a Knowledge Base article read by thousands and thousands of Firefox users. Not only will you be rewarded with a prize, you will really make a difference to provide invaluable help for all those users.

Get ready to participate in the Firefox Screencast contest! This is your chance to use your talents and passion for Firefox to create support screencasts for the Firefox Support (SUMO) knowledge base on support.mozilla.com.

We have prepared a list of the top 100 most popular support articles from the SUMO knowledge base and ask YOU to create screencasts for one, two, three, or all of them!  You can enter as many screencasts as you like.  With 100 different articles, anyone can choose whatever article for which they would like to create a screencast.

Mozilla will not be hosting the videos during this contest, so please use a third-party application like Jing to record your screencast and send us the link so we can view it. Ever used Jing?  Here’s a great online demo.  Click “Video Tour” on the front page to see how to use it…it couldn’t be easier!  Just download and begin recording!

All entries will be judged by a team who will look at the submissions and pick the best one for each of the 100 articles. That’s 100 winners!!

What are you waiting for? Go to the Firefox Screencast Contest and start sharing your knowledge!

Any questions? We’ve got the answers.

This Friday, May 23, will be a special day for Mozilla as we’ll be hosting the very first Support Firefox Day*. You’ll get a chance to learn more about Mozilla, Firefox 3, and Firefox Support (SUMO) — and have your voice heard. We’ve got lots of things planned! In particular, we’ve lined up a prestigious group of Mozilla celebrities who will be taking YOUR questions and feedback about a variety of subjects. We’ll also have workshops where we’ll be focusing on user-to-user support, and some of the upcoming goodies in Firefox 3.

Here is the action-packed schedule:

• 8:00 AM PDT - 10:00: Support session #1
• 10:00 – 10:45: Workshop: Supporting Firefox 3 users with Live Chat. In this workshop, you’ll learn all you need to know about the cool user-to-user support solution on SUMO to start helping others. Host: Lucy Connor
• 11:00 - 11:30: Chat with Mike Connor, Developer Lead of Firefox 3. Mike will be taking your questions about the upcoming release of Firefox 3 and all its new features, including the all-new product help (yes, SUMO!)
• 11:30 - 12:30: Support Session #2
• 12:30 - 1:15: Workshop: Learn all about the new bookmark system in Firefox 3 (tags, smart location bar, keywords) to better help others. Host: Dietrich Ayala
• 1:30 – 2:00: Chat with Mike Beltzner, Phenomenologist & Usability Design Expert. This is your chance to get your questions about the Mozilla way of designing software answered straight from the source. You’ll learn, among other things, how user feedback and support continuously loops back into product.
• 2:00 - 3:00: Support Session #3
• 3:00 - 3:45: Workshop: Learn how to troubleshoot Firefox 3 like a pro. You’ll find out more about how Firefox works, and at the same time you’ll become an expert of user-to-user troubleshooting. Host: Matthew Middleton
• 4:00 - 4:30: Chat with John Lilly, CEO of Mozilla Corporation. John will be available to answer your questions about Mozilla, including how it was started, where it’s going, and any other things you can think of.
• 4:30 - 5:00: Chat with Asa Dotzler, Spokesmodel and Storyteller. Asa has been a part of Mozilla since the very early days and is the perfect person to ask your questions — any questions — about… anything!

Of course, the big highlight of the day will be the best new Firefox 3 feature of all: Firefox’s new user-based support system. All throughout the day, we’ll be showcasing the various aspects to the support system: from the collaboratively written knowledge base to the forums and chat-based support and inviting you to take part. We’ll be around all day in #sumo to answer questions and help you get started helping your fellow users and Firefox enthusiasts.

Hope to see you on Friday! If you’re coming, please let us know so we can better plan the events.

*) OK, we did host something similar that we called SUMO Day last month, but with the new name, we think this is a fresh start.

The Firefox Support team (support.mozilla.com, or SUMO for short) would like to invite you to our first SUMO day! This Friday, starting at 7 AM PDT, we’ll be hosting a day all about getting to know SUMO and learning how to use our site to help other Firefox users enjoy their favorite browser.

If you haven’t already, this is a great opportunity for you to get involved with Mozilla, regardless of your interests or expertise. We need people to write articles, create screenshots, correct spelling and grammar, answer people’s questions in the forum, or interact directly with Firefox users in live chat — just to name a few of the many ways you could help us out. Even if you’re just curious to learn more about the project and don’t really plan on participating, we’d be really excited to have you joining us on Friday.

Of course, we’d be even more thrilled if you stayed with us throughout the Firefox 3 launch, which is going to be an exciting event for the SUMO project. Have a look at the SUMO Day home page for more information and please pop by on Friday!