Webmakerstory

Webmaker Story

1. What is Webmaker and why does it matter?
Webmaker is a collection of innovative tools and curricula for a global community that is teaching the web.

2. How will it shape the world by 2016?
Webmaker will continue growing as a vibrant community dedicated to fostering web literacy. We are distinct from the learn-to-code market and by 2016, our nuanced and multi-disciplinary approach to teaching digital skills — one that emphasizes creativity and empowerment while resting on the foundations of the Web Literacy Framework — will put us in a unique class. Across the world, people will naturally reach for our tools when they want to learn and create on the web, and especially when they want to teach others. An ecosystem of Webmaker badges will support learners, allowing them to chart their progress. Events, mentorship programs and the global Hive Learning Network will offer robust pathways to contribution, empowering hundreds of thousands of makers and mentors to build, learn and teach the web.

3. Why will people get involved in what we're doing?
Webmaker offers value to diverse audiences. Growing numbers of educators will use our tools because they help students internalize learning about privacy, collaboration, mixed media authoring and code. Many teachers and mentors want to broaden their own understanding of the web in a social environment that increases their reach, and Webmaker provides a community for such professional development to occur. Learners will engage with our curriculum because it is relevant and fun. We are continually working to make our tools more social and our resources more discoverable to serve learners from all over the world. Tool developers will increasingly use Webmaker because our free and open Make API allows them to target their tools to a growing audience of educators.

4. Why will lead users or partners get involved?
We are a powerful and diverse community of schoolteachers, parents, hackers, informal educators, librarians, media artists, community activists and people energized by fostering a better understanding of the web. By advancing the notion that being a contributor to the web involves harnessing the creativity and culture of the medium, we embrace a broad set of skills and talents. This results in more varied partnerships than platforms that focus solely on code. Many diverse communities care about design, privacy and education. By partnering with leaders in these communities, Webmaker will access greater distribution channels, global audiences and expertise in curriculum. In return, we offer platform that effectively connects a vibrant and global community of people passionate about teaching the web.

5. What we're doing in 2014 to move towards this:
--- We will bring our products to market. We will clarify our lead user market of teachers, segmenting them by geography, demographics and psychographics into actionable users. We will localize and invest in community-building efforts in emerging areas such as Brazil, India and China.

--- We will maintain our existing tools. As Popcorn Maker, Thimble and the X-Ray Goggles become more stable, we will focus on maintaining them rather than developing major new features.

--- We will expand the Hive Learning Project. We will define and cultivate Hive Learning Networks, and promote cross-Hive collaboration with a Hive pop-up event guide and a "Hive in your City" guide.

--- We will introduce Appmaker. Working with our colleagues in Mozilla Labs, we will launch Appmaker as another excellent tool to teach the web. Appmaker will form the first test of our Make API, a federated method for 3rd party apps outside of Webmaker to publish into our ecosystem. The thrill of creating an app will help us reach the broad market relevance we are striving for.

--- We will build world-class curriculum. Using a combination of internal resourcing and community outreach, we will create a curriculum that is both indexable and discoverable. Increasingly, this will be the primary method by which users experience webmaker.org and we will focus our UX efforts in clarifying the learning journey we want our users to take. We will create pathways through this curriculum based on the Web Literacy Framework that we can assess and accredit via Open Badges.

--- We'll help Firefox become a tool to teach the web. We'll provide low-touch yet smart ways, like Dev Tools publishing to Webmaker, to onboard makers through Firefox. We'll also integrate accounts, allowing anyone who signs up to Firefox to automatically sign up to Webmaker as well.

--- We'll bake webmaking into the Million Mozillians effort. Mozilla is putting renewed energy into community building across the project. Through collaborations with teams such as MDN, Reps, SUMO, and Firefox Student Ambassadors, we'll develop contribution pathways from those programs into Webmaker and vice versa.

--- We'll make Webmaker more social. Using a combination of our events platform, self-curated profiles and simple tools that allow users to chat and message, we'll establish Webmaker as a place to collaboratively teach the web.

6. Possible revenue opportunities: As the locus of an emerging web literacy movement, distinct from the saturated learn-to-code community, we are in a unique position to attract funding partners. The UK Big Lottery Fund, the European Digital Education Fund, Telefonica's Think Big program and Brazil's Omidyar have recognized the differentiated offering we provide and our unique ability to deliver it. We will also explore opportunities to attract funding based on the different strands of the Web Literacy Framework, beginning with privacy and collaboration.

7. Why the Webmaker community will succeed:
--- Because Webmaker has clarity on its audience and is primed to go to market.
--- Because we are confidently integrated into a wider Mozilla strategy and will be able to leverage channels, expertise and shared goals.
--- Because our engineering process has matured to the point where we can quickly move from user insight to shipped feature.
--- Because we are localized and can work globally through our own channels and those of our partners.
--- Because we have expertise in events and community organizing: Mozfest, the Hive Network and Mozilla Reps are all primed to onboard users to webmaker.org.
--- Because we have helped build and shape a pedagogy for teaching the web.