From Scientific American…
Compassionate Coding:
Students Compete in Microsoft Competition to Write Humanitarian Apps
With the understanding that emergency, health care and other services’ reliance on software will only grow over time, Microsoft has for the past eight years hosted a global competition that challenges high school and college students to develop applications that address some of the planet’s most urgent needs.
The event’s popularity has expanded rapidly–about 325,000 students from more than 100 countries registered to compete this year. The company’s Eighth Annual Imagine Cup finals wrapped up Thursday in Warsaw, Poland, with 400 students vying for $240,000 in prize money.
As one might suspect, a prerequisite is that all competitors develop their programs using Microsoft products, including software writing tools, databases and the Windows operating system.
325,000 high-school geeks hard at work for Microsoft, for an average “wage” of $0.75.