May 4, 2006 | Read Time: 1 minute
A new prize will honor public-interest software development. The Florence and Frances Family Fund, a donor-advised fund at the Tides Foundation, in San Francisco, is sponsoring what will be an annual competition to honor software programmers who develop open-source software that helps nonprofit organizations working for social change.
The prize comes with a $10,000 cash award. The winner will be chosen by a panel of three judges: Allison Fine, founder of Innovation Network; Joseph Mouzon, executive director of nonprofit services at Network for Good; and Katrin Verclas, who runs the secretariat of MobileActive, a global network of activists and nonprofit groups that use mobile phones for advocacy.
The Antonio Pizzigati Prize for Software in the Public Interest honors the memory of Tony Pizzigati, an early advocate of open-source computing. Open-source software gives users access to the “source code” of an application, which allows organizations to make changes to fit their needs.
As a teenager, Mr. Pizzigati helped the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador — a Washington group that helped lead opposition to U.S. policy in Central America in the 1980s — organize and maintain its database. A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Mr. Pizzigati died in 1995 at the age of 24 in an automobile accident.
Online applications and nominations are due May 4. The winner of the prize will be announced in June.
For more information: http://www.pizzigatiprize.org.
