Imagine a world where smart technology makes everyday life easier...
http://www.imaginecup.com/US

The IIT .NET User's Group and ACM-IIT are proud to present you an opportunity to display your creativity on the world's biggest stage: Microsoft's Imagine Cup competition! With participants from around the world, and prizes up to $25,000, this is your opportunity to shine! IIT is proud to be one of the institutions selected nation-wide to host a first-round competition (tentative date: March 4 or 5), whose winners will compete in the regional competition that feeds into the international Imagine Cup competition.

Our challenge to you is to design a mobile device application using .NET that improves some aspect of everyday life. Need ideas? Have you ever wanted a real digital wallet? A phone with better speech recognition? Have you ever thought that a PDA might be good for more than just storing contacts, playing video games in class, or taking notes you won't ever look at again? Come up with a concept, and show us! Projects will be judged on their innovativeness, usefulness, and how 'smart' they are.

For the first-round competition, participants will be required to present a short document that explains their vision and describes the potential market. They will also need to provide a prototype application (don't worry -- it doesn't need to be fully functional! Just a mockup...). The first-round competition is just about a month away, so get started ASAP! You can form teams with other IIT members, or even with friends from other universities, and can submit more than one entry. If you need help getting started with programming with .NET, you can contact the .NET User's Group for both software and guidance. Note that you must register through IIT (or another participating institution)

Note that submitting teams own all rights to their application and content submitted as part of the entry requirements.

For more information or help in getting started, contact Syed Aqeel at uaqeel@iit.edu, or visit the Imagine Cup website (http://www.imaginecup.com/US).