I’m a Judge for My App is Better Challenge
I recently found out that I was chosen to be on the judging panel for the My App is Better Challenge. I must say I’m honored and excited, but I also feel somewhat intimidated. Just look at the rest of the judging panel:
- Mitcho (Michael Yoshitaka) developer of the popular WordPress plugin “Yet Another Related Posts (YARPP)” (more on Mitcho)
- David Strauss Co-founder of Four-Kitchens and known as a Drupal expert in scalability and database optimization (more on David)
- Josh Holmes passionate soul who gets his kicks solving problems with deep fried awesomeness (and works for Microsoft as an Architech Evangelist)
- Krzysztof Kozielczyk passionate about the construction of algorithms he is SQL Server Express Program Manager (and has worked as a software developer for companies small and large, private and public)
- Ashay Chaudhary the Program Manager behind the SQL Server driver for PHP and a gadget geek too.
Hopefully, I’ll be able to bring the same level of critical insight to judging apps that I imagine that group will (and have some fun in the process too!).
If you aren’t familiar with with the My App is Better Challenge, it is a contest to see who can build the best application using PHP and SQL Server or SQL Azure. Here’s how apps will be judged:
- Innovative Use of SQL Server and PHP (35%)
- Most use of SQL Server capabilities (35%); and
- Originality (30%)
The grand prize for the contest is $10,000 + Visual Studio (w/ VS.Php software)! There are other prizes too, worth up to $1000, including Xbox, Kindle, or Netbook bundles. There are also some restrictions that you should be aware of. You can get all the details on prizes and restrictions in the official contest rules: https://microsoft.promo.eprize.com/myappisbetter/public/fulfillment/rules.pdf. It’s not too late to enter, but time is running out. The deadline is August 25th, 2010. You can sign up here: My App is Better Challenge. If you think you’ve got time to build a killer app, or if you already have one underway, take the time to submit it…what have you got to lose?
Happy coding!
-Brian