#MozNewsLab week two lectures by @codepo8 @jresig & @jjg now online

The #MozNewsLab is hurtling toward the grand finale on August 5th. We’re past the half-way mark, and it feels like time is compressing each day into a New York minute.

We wrapped up week two of the lab last Friday. Here’s a quick recap:

The first lecture last week was a shot-in-the-arm of open-Web goodness: The Mozilla Foundation’s Executive Director Mark Surman talked about the broader Mozilla + Journalism initiative, touched on Why Mozilla cares about news, and introduced out guest speaker, Christian Heilmann.

From there, Heilmann – a developer ‘evangelist’ at Mozilla – took participants on a whirlwind tour of the State of the Browser in 2011. HTML5, CSS3, new APIs, WebGL – you name it, he covered it. You can find the lecture online here: recording, notes, and slides.

Next up was none other than John Resig. Resig is implicated in more successful open-source software projects that you can shake a stick at. He’s been leading the jQuery project for more than five years now, and has learned a lot about the ‘Open Source Process’: the ins-and-outs of building great software and a great community that supports it. John shared those learnings with the lab – it was an incredibly insightful voyage through the history of jQuery, and John’s tips on creating successful open-source software community.

You can find the lecture online here: recording, notes, and slides.

Jesse James Garrett – the ‘Father of AJAX’ – joined us on Friday to deliver the final lecture of the week. His talk focused on the conceptual model for thinking about successful interactive experiences, what he calls the ‘Elements of User Experience’. I must admit, I was quite excited to hear Jesse speak, as I’ve been a big fan ever since reading his book many, many years ago. Jesse expanded quite a bit on the early models of user experience that he pioneered and ofter many insightful new ideas about how to approach the experience of a software project or product.

You can find the lecture online here: recording, notes, and slides.

We’ve just kicked off week three. Hope you’re following along. There’s still time to send a ‘message in a bottle’ to the lab.

Last but not least, Mozilla’s Media, Freedom and the Web festival is really starting to come together. If you’re interested in the nexus of the open Web and media production, you may want to mark your calendar.