In a bid to put Singapore on the world digital technology map, the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) and Fusionopolis have offered good money for teams to develop technologies for a search engine that is smart enough to find content.
Form a team of no more than 10 members, register at www.thestarchallenge.sg, create a search engine, and win US$100,000!
From the website: “This competition comprises Search-Tasks hat (sic) must be solved using new or customized software tools with possibly some human in tervention. The teams must create suitable algorithms to search different types of media (voice, video) for specific characteristics, objects, events etc. Depending on the task, the team will create and use corresponding software and return the result.”
Yeah, right.
Money is the only thing Singapore has abundance of, so might as well pay someone to come up with some killer app that will bring us international fame. Reminds me of our “national” football team, half of which are foreigners, or as they call it, naturalised Singaporeans. Money makes the world go round, especially around here!
US$100,000!!! That’s a lot of money, no? Not if you contextualise and put it in perspective. Is Google’s search engine worth only a hundred grand? Or the technology of Facebook? Perhaps Friendster? Not in this lifetime, mister. US$100,000 is peanuts to pay for a killer application. And we’re not even talking about NKF peanuts.
Oh well, it’s still money, especially with all the rising costs in Singapore.
So ya, there you go, join the contest and let us know when you win!