Meet Eleanor Eich is the wife of Brendan Eich, the co-founder of mozilla.org who served as CEO for Mozilla. He is widely known for his contributions to the evolution of the Web, including inventing JavaScript and spearheading its ongoing standardization and evolution.
Her very bright husband created JavaScript in 1995, internet’s most widely used programming language. Eich became the god of programming for all those back in the day.
He also co-founded the mozilla.org project in 1998, serving as chief architect. Eich helped launch the award winning Firefox web browser back in November 2004 and Thunderbird e-mail client the following month. He holds a bachelor of science in math and computer science from Santa Clara University and a master of science in computer science from the University of Illinois.
But we where shocked to learn reports of her husband, Brendan Eich has stepped down as CEO of Firefox-maker Mozilla Corporation – after it emerged he controversially backed a ballot measure that outlawed same-sex marriage in California. Eleanor’s husband not only not only decided to step down as CEO, he has quit Mozilla outright.
Eich’s appointment as Mozilla’s chief exec spurred outrage among gay rights supporters after public records revealed that he contributed $1,000 to the campaign in support of Proposition 8, a divisive 2008 California ballot initiative that enshrined “one man, one woman” as the standard for marriage in the state’s constitution.
Although the bill was eventually struck down as unconstitutional under federal law, Eich’s support for it was seen as antithetical to Mozilla’s progressive public ethos, leading to calls for a boycott of the group’s Firefox web browser.
In an interview with the Guardian newspaper on Wednesday, Eich, a Mozilla cofounder, said his political beliefs were “personal” and that he had “kept them out of Mozilla all these 15 years we’ve been going.”
Mozilla cofounder and executive chairwoman Mitchell Baker wrote that Eich’s decision was voluntary and that he made it “for Mozilla and our community.” But on her March 29 blog, she clearly appears to clash with the views of Eleanor’s hubby
“Mozilla supports equality for all, explicitly including LGBT equality and marriage equality.” She wrote.
Eleanor and Brendan have an under-the-radar lifestyle. Although her husband is widely recognized for his enduring contributions to the internet revolution, not much information is found about her, what we do know is that she is in her early 60’s and she has lived in Santa Clara, CA and Los Gatos, CA. Eleanor is also the mother of the couple’s five children.
You can read Eich’s statement here, we are sure Eleanor will be happy to hear he is planning to spend more time with his family.
Do you think Eleanor’s husband, Brendan Eich made the right decision for Mozilla?
You can find her on Facebook here.