Jul
The writing contest that I announced June 2nd has grown in some very exciting ways. Several of us who are involved in the planning of the contest wanted to create an event that would have tremendous impact for the career of the top prize winner so we’ve changed some key details of the contest to accommodate its expansion.
The first change, really an addition, is that we got the planners of the Computers In Libraries Conference to schedule time during their 2009 Conference (March 30-April 1) to have the top prize winner present his or her essay and share thoughts about their vision. That by itself can bring one’s career to the next level or be that powerful first break that a new graduate can greatly benefit from. And, contest sponsor Deep Web Technologies will pick up the winner’s travel and lodging expenses. Plus, the $500 grand prize is a nice bonus on top of that.
A second important addition to the glory for the winner is that their essay will be published in Computer in Libraries Magazine. This is another outstanding career advancement opportunity.
In our desire to positively impact the career of one visionary writer, the contest organizers are contacting library schools to encourage faculty to use the contest as a writing assignment for their students. I personally would like to see fresh voices participate in the growth of the federated search industry and I’d like to see the contest be a vehicle for identifying young visionaries. This is not to say that we don’t welcome submissions from people with lots of experience in federated search, librarians, faculty, and others. We welcome all voices.
Since the Computers in Libraries Conference is quite a few months away and since we’d like to make it easy for college students to enter the contest, we’ve moved the entry date to the end of October. This will allow students (and everyone who’s been vacationing during the summer) to enter the contest in the fall.
Essays will be judged by a panel of noted industry experts including Marshall Breeding, Roy Tennant, Miriam Drake, Carl Grant, Judy Luther, and Peter Noerr. They will evaluate essays based on writing quality, originality, and vision. You can read about these six experts here.
I have updated the contest rules in the original contest blog article.
The judges, planners, and I all look forward to your brilliant submissions.
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Tags: federated search
