Mozillians/Vouching

This document describes the new vouching system for Mozillians.org that is being released in July 2014. For more information on development of these vouching changes, see Vouching Refactor.

Example vouches

Thank you vouch

Should happen within a few days of action being taken and should be for something specific, include what you are thanking them for.

Thank you so much for how you showed up and stayed engaged during our entire Community Building meetup. Your contributions are very valuable.

Lindsey worked nights and weekends to help the Release Engineering team finish the release on time - it went out on time with much higher quality thanks to her extra effort!

Impact vouch

Should happen when you couldn't have done something without that contribution, be specific about what they did.

Stuart is awesome!! He is one of our top contributors on the Firefox support forum, helping hundreds of users every day. I have rarely met a person who has such a calm, professional but also warm way of dealing with users even when they are angry. Go Stuart!

We can always count on Jessica to welcome new contributors and to help them get started. She is an integral part of the MDN community.

Celebration vouch

Should happen when you have a positive interaction with someone that you want to positively reinforce. These are usually more generic.

William is so much fun to work with! I'm always excited when he is on a project.

Dave consistently goes above and beyond, he thinks of new & inventive ways to contribute to the localization team.

FAQ

How do I get vouched?

Contribute! Once you have contributed significantly to any of Mozilla's projects, ask the people you are working with to vouch you on Mozillians.org. They will either do so, or will encourage you to make a few more contributions first.

What does "being vouched" mean?

Vouching is the mechanism we use for giving Mozillians access to special content. Getting vouched as a Mozillian means you have made a meaningful contribution. It allows you to view all profiles for other Mozillians and you get access to special content on other Mozilla sites.

Being vouched means you have been accepted as a contributing member of the Mozilla community and may be given access to data and information that Mozilla only shares with those in the community who have made meaningful contributions. As a vouched Mozillian, you have access to:

• View all profiles and join groups
• Receive email communications sent to vouched Mozillians
• Access special video content on Air Mozilla
• Use other Mozilla apps as a vouched user

What has changed?

Previously, your profile could only be vouched one time by any vouched Mozillian. Your profile can now receive up to 6 vouches. Each vouch requires a comment describing how the person has made a meaningful contribution to Mozilla.

Why are we making these changes?

For the first time we will have a shared definition and understanding of vouching as well as an explanation for each vouch. Read more about the impact of the vouching changes.

Am I still vouched?

Yes, though you may need to get vouched again before December 18.

• If you attended the Mozilla Summit 2013, you have received 3 automatic vouches and can vouch for others.
• If your Mozillians.org profile is associated with a mozilla.org/mozilla.com/mozillafoundation.org email address, you have received 1 automatic vouch.
• If neither of the above apply to you and you were previously vouched, someone will need to vouch for you again and give a reason. You still have a legacy vouch and can use the site normally until December 18. If you do not receive a new vouch by December 18, you will lose your vouched status until someone vouches for you again.

Why do I need to get vouched again? (for those who did not attend Summit 2013)

The new vouches describe what contributions you have made for Mozilla. Since the old vouches did not include a description, we want everyone to have documentation showing how they have contributed.

I went to the 2013 Summit and don't have 3 vouches on my profile. How can I get those 3 vouches?

Sorry we missed you - we used the best data source we had. Please file a Community Tools :: Account Help bug explaining which Summit location you were at and we'll get you those 3 vouches.

Are there different levels of vouched Mozillians?

Any Mozillian who has one vouch can search and view profiles in the directory. Any Mozillian who has at least three vouches can vouch other Mozillians.

Someone asked me to vouch for them. Should I vouch for them?

Only vouch for contributors who have made significant contributions to one of Mozilla's projects. If you cannot verify their contributions and do not know the person, ask them to have someone they have worked with vouch for them instead.

Can I still vouch for others?

You can vouch for others if your profile has received 3 or more vouches.

Who can see the information I add to my profile?

It depends.

• Most fields on your profile have "per-field" privacy settings. You can set a field to "public", which means anyone on the internet can search for and view those fields (and therefore also can view your username). Also, "public" profile fields are shared through the Mozillians.org API with any vouched Mozillian who requests a "vouched" API key.
• You can also set a field to "Mozillians" which means any vouched Mozillian can view it. Also, certain reviewed applications have been given elevated access to the API in order to help Mozilla's platforms inter-operate. These reviewed applications can read fields through the API that you have marked for "Mozillians" only.
• Mozillians.org is maintained by employees of Mozilla, including engineers, system administrators and database administrators. These people have access to the raw data of your profile in a variety of formats, but they only encounter it while doing their jobs.

Is there a limit on vouches?

Yes, a Mozillian can have at most 6 vouches. There is a limit since there's not a need for someone to have 100 vouches and also to the amount of profile content manageable.

Can I edit or remove a vouch?

Vouches cannot be edited or removed in the user interface. If you want to edit or remove a vouch that you created that has errors, file an Account Help bug. Include the URL of the user you vouched for, any corrections and the reason that you want the vouch edited or removed. A Mozillians.org admin will review the bug.

Vouches will only be deleted if they were added accidentally or for a well-justified reason. Vouches are designed to be permanent and will not be removed because someone has stopped contributing.

Why is the vouching system changing?

Mozillians.org has outgrown its simple vouching model. Vouching wasn't well explained and it wasn't clear why someone was vouched. We are adding descriptions to vouches to explain why individuals are vouched.

Mozillians.org has become a mature platform and a valuable source of information about people who contribute to Mozilla’s products and mission, and it is likely to be important to Mozilla's ambitious contributor goals over the next decade. But Mozillians.org has outgrown the authorization paradigms it started with. Therefore, in order to prevent data safety issues and questions about product integrity, we must design and implement an authorization system that accommodates current and future data and users. We are applying this system evenly to both the UI and the API.

Read more about the analysis of the original authorization system.