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The Finals, Plus Guest Judges

October 25th, 2006 at 2:35pm • Posted in My Dream App • Tagged My Dream App

We’re currently running the My Dream App finals, so if you haven’t voted yet, head on over, pick your favorites, and grab your freebies. (This round, we have a free license for the Apple Design Award recipient PhotoPresenter, as well as the slick launcher, Overflow. Plus $5 off coupons for InsanelyGreatTees!

Of course, the coolest part about this round in my opinion are some of the guest judges that have weighed in with their opinions. There’s the lovely TV and podcast host Amber MacArthur, Finder creator and original Mac team member Bruce Horn, original Mac evangelist and popular book author Guy Kawasaki, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, and zune/Xbox creator J Allard.

It was stressful and intimidating coming up with a list of potential judges for the finals, because for this round, people expected us to go all out. So I ended up in a situation emailing invitations to the most ridiculous people. Phil Schiller gave me a really nice rejection, with a note saying he’s been enjoying the contest so far. Jonathan Ive and Ray Ozzie sent rejections via personal assistants, saying they didn’t have the time, but thanks. Unfortunately, Steve Jobs or Bill Gates still haven’t replied. But I’m still waiting!

Steve Wozniak was extremely receptive to the contest idea from the start, and while his round of judging coincided with an extremely busy book tour, he got in some outrageous, hilarious comments. If you haven’t voted yet, you have to simply to read his comment for Blossom. It’s ridiculously awesome.

And ironically enough, I think J Allard (of Microsoft) gets the crown for the best overall comments for the round. What really impressed me about his comments was how much time he put into them. You can tell when he references forum opinions in one comment, and UI mockup progression in another. And in my opinion he was right on the money with most of his praise and complaints. So don’t discount the zune quite yet. This man has a really good head on his shoulders. (Oh, and he replied to my invite from his home PowerMac G5. Go figure.)

I guess my conclusion is, it was a pleasant surprise how down to earth a lot of these tech “celebrities” were. They’re normal people, just busier than most of us I suppose. To end this, let me share with you guys an extra comment J Allard sent in about the contest as a whole that we didn’t have a place for in the MDA voting page:

great idea. great format. great entries. in these days of crass commercialism, spam, flames, phishing, opportunism and hate common on the internet it was great to see a constructive and fun experience like this spring to life. i was highly impressed by the effort that went into organizing this. the reaction of the community was great and i enjoyed all of the different ideas proposed as well as the community’s support, creativity and enthusism for the different candidates. to phill, the contestants and the community, ‘well done’



Comments

Up until this point, there have been 5 responses to “The Finals, Plus Guest Judges”:

Sastry

October 25th, 2006 at 3:50pm

I had a lot of fun with MDA. Good luck, and hope to continue to see great things from you phill

Derek

October 25th, 2006 at 5:53pm

I’m just waiting for “My Dream App: Season 2!” Guess you’ll have to get the first round of winners built first!

shadownight

October 25th, 2006 at 7:35pm

Ah, so that’s why the Xbox succeeded: it was created by a Mac user!

Step

October 25th, 2006 at 9:05pm

I also thought J Allard’s comments were really good. I was glad there wasn’t much thrashing in the forums over his being a judge – he seems to me to be a really good guy.

Though I still don’t hold much hope for the Zune. :) Competition’s always good, but I haven’t been impressed with what I’ve seen so far about it.

Woz was hilarious – not necessarily relevant, but undoubtably funny.

Overall, a great group and the best comments yet for MDA (IMHO). Too bad the Apple folks couldn’t be involved – maybe they’re busy working on their own surprises. :P

MK

October 28th, 2006 at 1:04pm

Phill,

I just want to commend you for all the hard work that you put into this project. MDA was nicely conceived and superbly implemented. I do very much look forward to many more great things to come from you and your teammates, like http://www.macheist.com/


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