Mozilla Festival 2025: "Unlearning: Changing the Future of Technology"

Big ideas and bolder debates, headlined by Dr. Ruha Benjamin and other transformative thinkers

Poble Espanyol Museum, Barcelona, Spain, November 7 - 9

Early bird badge sales are open at a discounted 20% rate until June 1

BARCELONA, Spain, April 8, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Mozilla Festival returns to its original home in Barcelona, Spain, gathering innovators and changemakers around the theme of Unlearning – breaking free from outdated systems, questioning biases in technology, and driving a more inclusive and equitable digital future.

Unlearning is an essential theme for the moment, in the technology ecosystem and beyond. Default settings, both in the design of technology and our social beliefs, can limit our perception of what is achievable. The default settings surrounding our daily lives can be easy to ignore. We often trade privacy for low prices or convenience. We forget to revisit a default subscription, or a life path set on a conveyor belt by conventions.

Mozilla Festival 2025 will challenge these normalised standards and invite participants to discover and to rewrite them in the field of emerging technologies from messaging apps to creative media platforms.

The Festival is Mozilla's global convening for bold ideas, impactful conversations, and diverse communities. It has showcased changemakers and disruptors including Internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee, Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, and data illustrator Mona Chalabi, and been a critical gathering point for digital rights activists. After post-COVID years of virtual and rotating regional events, this year it will return to its live, large scale format at Poble Espanyol Museum, Barcelona, Spain, November 7 - 9th.

The Festival will feature Dr. Ruha Benjamin, award-winning author of Imagination: A Manifesto, professor of African American Studies at Princeton University and a leader on the relationship between innovation and inequity. Benjamin will be in conversation with Nabiha Syed, Mozilla Foundation Executive Director, examining how unlearning is a radical act of exploring new possibilities.

Their conversation will challenge the biases baked into our digital worlds and the myths that shape our laws and institutions. Together, they will question the stories we inherit — and how breaking free from set narratives can unlock new ways of thinking, building, and belonging. What have we been taught about technology, governance, and justice that no longer serves us, and what futures become possible when we build and connect differently?

"This is the moment to ignite and support unconventional ideas that connect the dots between what's aspirational and attainable," says Nabiha Syed, Mozilla Foundation Executive Director. She adds, "By blending creativity with ethical thinking, we can build technology that genuinely serves people and enables them to meaningfully contribute to a competitive and diverse tech ecosystem.  Mozilla is betting on people to control their technological futures. We're excited to welcome technologists, artists, activists, and innovators to join us in Barcelona as we partner with the local community to create a better digital future."

Mozilla's mission is to imagine, then deliver a radically different future for how technology impacts our lives. Registration is now open with early bird badges available at a 20% discount price until June 1.

• Festival Badge: €319 (Standard: €399)
• Non-Profit Badge: €239 (Standard: €299)
• Academia & Student Badge: €120 (Standard: €150)

Click here to register and sign up here for the latest updates on Mozilla Festival schedule, speakers, and sessions, leading up to the event.

Contact: 
Tracy Kariuki 
tracy@mozillafoundation.org