After nearly choking on my coffee after reading that Mozilla are reducing their efforts on the Thunderbird email client – I spent some time trying to think of the logic behind this and other shifts from client based development. The MD of Thunderbird (the project that Mozilla carry on the development under) says
“However, Thunderbird is one of the very few truly free and open-source multi-platform e-mail applications available today and we want to defend these values. We’re not “stopping” Thunderbird, but proposing we adapt the Thunderbird release and governance model in a way that allows both ongoing security and stability maintenance, as well as community-driven innovation and development for the product. This will mean an eventual shift in how we staff Thunderbird at Mozilla Corporation — we are still working out details, but some people will likely end up on other Mozilla projects.”
But clearly there is something more to this. We NEED alternatives to Outlook/Exchange that seriously challenge the monopoly that Microsoft has. Is it sensible to go rushing to the cloud for everything at this stage ? perhaps it is but comms are not ubiquitous – they are not mission critically reliable (as can be seen from the issues when RIM or AN Other provider goes off the air). ?
We shall see what Mozilla really have planned but for the moment – Thunderbirds are gone