Completely Unrelated To The Bakken: Firefox OS Hitting Mainstream

Apple is being challenged -- CNBC is reporting.

More than anything, this year's conference seems to mark the end of Apple's  mobile world dominance and the rise of rival devices that run on more open, developer- and network-friendly operating systems. Case in point: Mozilla's Sunday-night, unofficial conference kick-off event.

The nonprofit whose Firefox browser a decade ago helped dismantle Microsoft's chokehold on web browsers is now similarly looking to upend the mobile device market. The industry at present is "unnaturally controlled by a few parties," Mozilla's chief executive, Gary Kovacs, declared as he unveiled the first generation of Firefox OS devices and partners. 

MillionDollarWay blog is optimized for Firefox. Even on an Apple computer, Firefox seems to load web pages more quickly than Apple's Safari. I don't think "official" tests support that view, but it sure seems true for me. Also, for some reason, I can't load "comments" to the MDW blog via Safari.

And the article continues:

And the two-dozen telecom execs who helped launch Firefox OS reiterated that sentiment.

"We are changing the industry for the better of everyone," Cesar Alienta, the chief executive of Telefonica, the Spanish-based telecom which is one of the worlds largest, said on-stage at Mozilla's event Sunday night. This after lashing out at "closed operating systems" (read:Apple) and warning that "the smartphone world is moving backwards" from the openness of the web-based internet.

Telefonica plans to shortly introduce Firefox OS-based devices to its customers in Spain, Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela.

America Movil, owned by the world's richest man, Carlos Slim, has meanwhile committed to launch Firefox OS phones in Mexico and "all possible markets" as soon as possible.

"I believe this is the beginning of the end of walled gardens," the company's chief marketing officer Marco Quatorze said on Sunday. Deutsche Telekom's outgoing chief executive Rene Obermann, whose company will introduce Firefox OS devices in Poland this summer, called it "an important step on the way to more competition between the different ecosystems."