Framing Mozilla as the “steward of the language” is one reason why we’re making this move. Don’t get me wrong, Mozilla is important to Rust, but (in all things other than the trademark, which is a nuclear option they’ve given no indication of ever using) the relationship is much more of a “large supporter of” then “in control of” one. Having a foundation would make this much more clear to folks who aren’t deeply involved in Rust.

Didn't you sort of have a falling-out type of experience with Mozilla? Does that have any effect on this move?

From the very beginning, the folks sponsoring the Rust effort from within Mozilla made sure that Mozilla couldn't directly control things. And Mozilla also just isn't that kind of organization to begin with, honestly.

These conversations have been going on a long time. This particular iteration of this conversation started before I left Mozilla. It has nothing to do with me personally, regardless of that relationship.

I have long (before, during, and after my employment at Mozilla) have thought that an independent foundation would be excellent for Rust, but am worried about the details. Foundations require active administration, which is even more work. And it's unclear who does that work. I think that we've grown to the point where it very well make sense now, though.

There are some rust core team members who work at Mozilla (https://www.rust-lang.org/governance/teams/core) but I imagine they don't work exclusively on Rust.

There are people inside Mozilla paid to work on the project full time. Not all of them are on the core team though.