New Zealand Open Source Awards judges announced

Seven open source experts, chosen for their eminence in or championship of open source technology, will form the judging panel of the 2010 Open Source Awards, which will be announced at a gala ceremony in Wellington on Tuesday 9th November.

The panel includes two New Zealand Open Source Society (NZOSS) Presidents, current President Rachel Hamilton-Williams and past-President Don Christie; Foo Camp founder & author Nat Torkington; WebFund Chairman and tohunga rorohiko, Dave Moskovitz; Richard Wyles, Director of Flexible Learning Network Mahara project leader; and Telecom Mobile Engineer and gadgets and geeks evangelist Amber Craig.

Four of the panel are councillors for InternetNZ, while David Farrar is an active supporter of the organisation.

Farrar says: “I think we take for granted the many great open source developments made by Kiwis, and the Awards play a significant role in recognising those achievements and promoting the overall profile of open source software.

“I'm a big believer in choice, and specifically informed choice. Too many people make software decisions based on their familiarity with relatively few products and solutions. Raising the profile of open source software helps consumers make more informed decisions.”

This year the Open Source Awards will focus on projects and developments of the last two years, and two new categories have been launched to reflect the trends visible in open source communities in New Zealand. With eight categories in total, the two new awards are: ‘Open Source Use in The Arts’ and ‘Open Source People's Choice Award’.

Awards judge and Director of Catalyst IT, the Awards organiser, Don Christie says: "We wanted to keep the awards current and there has been a surge in use of open source and free software and tools in an array of arts in the last two years.

“It’s also important that the Awards mirror the philosophy of open source software, so we chose to launch a ‘People's Choice Award’ this year. The whole open source community, and anyone else who is interested, can vote for the people and projects they think are most worthy from a shortlist of nominations compiled by the judges.”

Nominations are now open and will close on 15 September, 2010.

For more information see https://nzosa.org.nz/