Updated Channel 9 MSDN Subscription Competition

I want to thank Microsoft for generously donating another MSDN subscription for this C9 competition. This added subscription will allow 2 individuals to receive an MSDN subscription. Having listened to much of the feedback about how to run this competition below are the official guidelines, rules, and dates.

Overview:

This competition is designed for the overall benefit of the C9 community. The primary goal is to have C9 members compete to create a must have prototype of an application/service/or web site which 1) allows C9 users to do something they couldn't have done or experienced before; 2) allows C9 users the ability to do a activity quicker or simpler; or 3) allows C9 users to have a richer experience interacting with C9 content. 

Contest Prizes:

A team consisting of 2 people who receive the most votes for their application submission will receive 2 MVPINVITE codes (1 for each team member) for access to a 1 year Team Suite MSDN subscription. Example below:

 

Official Rules:

By entering this Contest, you are agreeing to abide by the official rules written below. If you do not agree to abide by these rules, please do not enter this contest.

Application Required Elements

1. Designed on .NET Framework 2.0

2. Use of Visual Studio family (Express, Standard, Professional, or Team System) for development

3. Integration with Channel 9 content/website. [Edit] Your prototype doesn't have to use live data...ie be fully functional with Channel9....your supposed to build a "prototype of an application/service/or web site" which means that you have to show functionality that could potentially work with channel 9's content/website. Remember that channel 9 has videos, podcasts, wikis, forums, screen casts, photos, and rss feeds[/Edit],

Optional Elements

Mobile device application using the .NET Compact Framework

ASP .NET

SQL Server

Deliverables

1. 100 word project description and prototype concept ideas i.e. design concept images

2. Application executables and readme files or live website demonstrating functionality

3. Blog with bi-weekly posts pertaining to the project developments

Entry deadlines and other important dates*

Registration opens: January 20, 2006

March 1st 2006	Teams (consisting of 2 members) must be chosen and submitted to channel9competition@hotmail.com
March 1st 2006	Blog created and published starting March 1st 2006. URL submitted to channel9competition@hotmail.com
March 15th 2006	100 word project description and prototype concept ideas (i.e. design concept graphics) submitted by March 15th 2006 to channel9competition@hotmail.com
September 1st, 2006	Submission of application or live website URL to channel9competition@hotmail.com by September 1st, 2006.

 

* Please Note: The dates in these rules are subject to change at the sole discretion of Ian Ceicys. Therefore, the contestants must have a flexible schedule(for example a CTP submission date of July 1st may be added).

Judging

A complete list of all teams, team blog URLs, and project descriptions will be appended to this coffee house forum posting on March 1st, 2006.

An updated list of teams who have submitted the 100 word description and concept ideas will be appended to this coffee house forum posting on March 15th, 2006.

On September 1st 2006 a list of teams who have met the submission criteria (submitted a project or live website URL, and maintained a bi-weekly blog) will be appended to this coffee house forum posting.

On September 2nd a poll will be created on Channel 9 where Community members will vote for which team should be awarded the 2 MSDN subscriptions. All votes will be counted and a Team with the most votes will be awarded the subscription on September 15th, 2006.

In the event of a tie, Ian Ceicys will choose the winning team.

Team Guidelines:

The maximum team size is 2 individuals. Teammates do not need to be from the same country.

How many entries can you submit?
Each Channel9 team may submit only one entry. If a Channel9 team submits multiple entries, the first entry received will be considered official, and the subsequent entries disqualified.

General standards for entries
The actual entry may be localized in any language, however, the verbal presentations and supporting entry materials must be presented in english.

Teams/individuals must have created the entries themselves, and the right to submit it must not be restricted in any way. The entry cannot defame or invade publicity rights or privacy of any person, living or deceased, or otherwise infringe upon any person’s personal or proprietary rights.

The content must be acceptable for all viewing audiences; any material containing text, sound or images that the judges, in their sole opinion, find vulgar, offensive, or inappropriate for public viewing for any reason will be automatically disqualified.

If an entry includes elements not owned by yourself or the team, you must be able to provide, if requested, a legal release for the use.

Legal disclaimer

Microsoft Corporation and its respective subsidiaries, affiliates, advertising and promotions agencies, and all of their employees, officers, directors, and agents are in no way involved in this contest. This contest aims to solely identify and award the contributions of a Channel9 member. All awards will be awarded; no substitution or transfer of an award is permitted. Taxes, if any, are the sole responsibility of the winner and judges. The decision of the poll vote is final and binding in all matters related to this contest. By entering, you agree to abide by the terms of these Official Rules and understand that the laws of the United States govern this contest. All federal, provincial, state, and local laws and regulations apply. By entering, you agree, where legally permitted, to release and hold harmless Ian Ceicys from any and all liability or any injuries, loss or damage of any kind arising from or in connection with this contest, the use of any entry, or the acceptance or use of any awarded award, except where prohibited by law. Ian Ceicys assume no responsibility for lost, late, illegible, garbled or misdirected entries, or for any computer, online, telephone, human, or other error or for any technical or other malfunctions that may occur including any injury or damage to your or any other person's computer relating to or resulting from participation in this Contest. Ian Ceicys reserves the right, to disqualify an individual it finds to be tampering with the type, process or the operation of the contest or web site, to be acting in violation of these Official Rules or in an disruptive manner or with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten or harass any other person.

The following people are ineligible to enter: (a.) If you are an employee of Microsoft Corporation, or an employee of a Microsoft subsidiary, advertising or promotion agency, you are not allowed to enter. Microsoft interns and campus representatives (such as Student Ambassadors, Student Champs) are prohibited from using Microsoft property or resources in the creation or execution of their entry. This would include, but is not limited to, Microsoft networks, Microsoft hardware tools and technology resources, or the counsel of Microsoft employees. (b.) If you are an immediate family member of (parent, sibling, spouse, child) or living in the same household as any person described in group 1 above at the time of entry, you are not allowed to enter or be awarded. (c.) If you are a resident of any of the following countries you are ineligible to participate or win prizes: Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Sudan and Syria.

Questions: Please feel free to contact me via e-mail or telephone at Zeo-AT-hotmail.com or (216)235-8866.

Edited on January 20th added the following:
[Edit] Your prototype doesn't have to use live data...ie be fully functional with the real Channel9 site....your supposed to build a "prototype of an application/service/or web site" which means that you have to show functionality that could potentially work with channel 9's content/website. Remember that channel 9 has videos, podcasts, wikis, forums, screen casts, photos, and rss videos [/Edit],

March 3rd Official team list added

Here’s the official list of competing teams and the blogs that have been sent to channel9competition@hotmail.com on or before the deadline of March 1st, 2006. If your team is not listed here and you believe that you sent in an entry, please resend your entry to channel9competition@hotmail.com (I’ve spoken to several individuals and their interest in the competition but have not received an entry and therefore they are not listed here)

Team 1:
Team members:
1. Corry Haines
2. Adam Harwell

Competition Entry Blog: http://www.tabletcorry.com/Nachrichten

Team 2:
Team members:
1. royer_alain
2. fneuch

Competition Entry Blog: http://ocinine.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">http://ocinine.blogspot.com

Team 3:
Team members:
1. W3bbo (David)
2. Dahat (Brendan)

Competition Entry Blog: http://oiyaic.ghorkov.com/" target="_blank">http://oiyaic.ghorkov.com

Team 4:
Team members:
1. BenZilla. Benjamin Davison
2. ?
Competition Entry Blog: http://codeadventure.blogspot.com/

Team 5:
Team members:
1. AdityaG
2. zetafunction (Daniel Cheng)
Competition Entry Blog: http://team-c9ffeine.blogspot.com/

Team 6:
Team members:
1. Travis Howle
2. ?
Competition Entry Blog: www.elwoh.com/project

Team 7:
Team members:
1. Dave Henerson
2. Jeremy Lartel

Competition Entry Blog: www.x-team.com/c9competition

So this is an ASP.net competition, using ISS and developed on VS.net 2005 team, standard or express... That integrates with the C9 web-site somehow, but without any source code or exposed web-services... And somehow includes blogging....

WOW! So I'm already out... Good luck to the two people that:

1. Own a copy of Visual Studio 2005 (Team, Standard or Express -- Not Pro)
2. Is already a IIS web developer
3. Knows a great amount of detail about the C9 site (internal operations etc)
4. And has a blog

Heck why wait, I name Adam Kinney and W3bbo as the winners.

Manip wrote:

1. Own a copy of Visual Studio 2005 (Team, Standard or Express -- Not Pro)

I own Pro

Manip wrote:

2. Is already a IIS web developer

I'm not really, I'm more of an ASP.NET guy, I haven't dabbled much with ISAPI development.

Manip wrote:

3. Knows a great amount of detail about the C9 site (internal operations etc)

Well, this is slightly true... to an extent.

Manip wrote:

4. And has a blog

Which hasn't been updated since I put my "Wait for me to get an engine" post a good few months ago

Manip wrote:

Heck why wait, I name Adam Kinney and W3bbo as the winners.

Well, since Adam Kinney is an MSFT employee, I think that somewhat disqualifies him.

While I hate to try and out-curmudgeon C9's biggest killjoy (that'll be you manip!)  I do think, Zeo, that you're going to be disappointed with the response to this, given the small number of people who are regulars here on the forums and the amount of time and effort people would need to invest to have a serious go at this competition.

After all, it's not as if previous competitions have been seriously over-subscribed, and it was noticeable that even when the prize was really generous (like the PDC trip) the winner wasn't really a C9'er in that he's not really been seen on here since he won.

If you want to "benefit the community" then you need to persuade everyone you know to blog about this prize and persuade Channel 9 to put a big "Win $10,000 in Microsoft bling" ad on the Home Page to attract more of an audience in. Personally I think the prize on offer is overhyped in terms of value - it's a one year MSDN Team System license and that can be got for signifcantly less than USD 10,000) If you do that you may get students or those out of work or "between jobs" on board giving it a serious go - the rest of us are too busy with real work that pays real bills to give it any kind of attempt, no matter how worthy we think the competition, or how generous the prize from a C9 community member.

The "C9 community" will benefit if the end product is something we can all use, even if the winner takes the prize and then effectively disappears from C9, as I suspect will be the case, but you need to widen out the entrants for such a competition to far more than the few souls who hang out here on a regular basis and have the time to even consider doing something.

Manip wrote:

1. Own a copy of Visual Studio 2005 (Team, Standard or Express -- Not Pro)
2. Is already a IIS web developer
3. Knows a great amount of detail about the C9 site (internal operations etc)
4. And has a blog

1. Express is free for crying out loud, how much of an excuse is that?
2. No, an application world be fine, no IIS necessary
3. Or can manage to decode an RSS feed (see sample screensaver in Express products)
4. Set up a Spaces account and post a few words about your project every couple of weeks. Not exactly hard if you're keen enough to want to win.

Ian's points are rather more valid, but the idea of encouraging students is a good one. If someone with on artistic bent can knock up a neat poster, I'll certainly stick a few up around at work.

AndyC wrote:

Ian's points are rather more valid, but the idea of encouraging students is a good one. If someone with on artistic bent can knock up a neat poster, I'll certainly stick a few up around at work.

Can we all just agree that I'd win if we all entered and pass me the prize now to save time later?

dahat wrote:

W3bbo wrote:Can we all just agree that I'd win if we all entered and pass me the prize now to save time later?

HA! Over my dead and carpal tunnel ridden body! I have this thing you see... I’m a cheap (I need to watch my language). Because of it, I rather like free stuff, especially free stuff that I want and cannot afford which is why I entered the Code’n Your Way to the PDC and Halloween Costume contests... just as I will enter this one with every ability and time I can muster... after all, I need I need to improve my 50% victory ratio and show I’m not a sissy who can win by sewing but not by coding.

Wanna team up then?

AndyC wrote:

1. Express is free for crying out loud, how much of an excuse is that?

But you can't have express and pro installed at the same time, and Pro isn't allowed.

AndyC wrote:

2. No, an application world be fine, no IIS necessary

Yes, you REALLY do... Look at this:

Zeo wrote:

Optional Elements
Mobile device application using the .NET Compact Framework
ASP .NET
SQL Server

Let me start off with a little story. I just handed in an assignment written in java. On the assignment sheet it says "Write your own feature" and then after it says - "Optionally use polymorphism and inheritance." But if you look at the mark scheme it clearly says that for top marks you must implement both in your feature.

Same thing here. If it was truly optional then why list it at all, I mean why pick THOSE things to list as optional and not the infinite other 'optional' things you could do? That clearly should read "Optional but preferred"

AndyC wrote:

4. Set up a Spaces account and post a few words about your project every couple of weeks. Not exactly hard if you're keen enough to want to win.

Uhh but what does that have to do with programming, or even documentation?

Manip wrote:

But you can't have express and pro installed at the same time, and Pro isn't allowed.

Um, yes you can. They happily install side by side. I have them both installed and running in front of me right now.

Plus I suspect the omission of Pro is rather more accidental than intentional.

Manip wrote:

I just handed in an assignment written in java. On the assignment sheet it says "Write your own feature" and then after it says - "Optionally use polymorphism and inheritance." But if you look at the mark scheme it clearly says that for top marks you must implement both in your feature

Don't confuse academia with the real world. In academia that means "This will get you a pass, but you have to do these to get a distinction", in the real world it means "here are a few suggestions of other things that might be cool." Plus there is quite a lot of time if you're a student - what better opportunity to learn a new skill like ASP.NET or SQL?

- How can we integrate with C9 when we don't know anything about the C9 web api (not talking about RSS)?
- There are too many deadlines: why do we need to register our participation first? Just give us 1 deadline: September 1th 2006 - Upload your application with a description. Maybe I'll start coding in July of August when I have the time.
- Remove the blog requirement: we are developers, not Scobles. I'm sure the judges are not going to read all the blogs from the contestants. My application should stay secret so nobody else can steal my ideas.
- Remove the 2 team members requirement, I want to work on my own.

AndyC wrote:

Plus there is quite a lot of time if you're a student - what better opportunity to learn a new skill like ASP.NET or SQL?

When people ask me to teach them ASP.NET I tell them to ditch all those "ASP.NET Tutorial" websites out there.

WebControls == Devilspawn (except Literal and PlaceHolder)
In-page coding == Confusing
ASP.NET2.0 compilation model == Whuteff

I usually start with an overview of OOP and how each page is a class that inherits from the Page class, then (conventionally) the ASP.NET ISAPI compiles each page to a temporary assembly that OOP-inherits from the "codebehind" class; once this "clicks" in my friend's mind then they understand.

...but when you do it the "ASP101" way it's all just learning technical details without understanding how it really works.

Lol @ W3bbo, if you just waited with releasing Insecticide for just a couple of months you could have won this contest. But that's too late now and you have to code something else...

ZippyV wrote:

Lol @ W3bbo, if you just waited with releasing Insecticide for just a couple of months you could have won this contest. But that's too late now and you have to code something else...

I couldn't have won with it, it's written in 1.1/VS2003.