MSDN Subscription Giveaway #1

As many people know or have heard MVPs have come into possession of three Visual Studio Ultimate MSDN subscriptions (minus the support and magazine offer).  These subscriptions are provided to us to distribute and help drive adoption of the tools.  These subscriptions are the top of the line valued at approximately $12K and it is good for 12 months.  All of the software that is included in the subscription is for development and test purposes only and they must be activated within 180 days.  The winner of Giveaway #1 will receive the subscription activation key along with the URL that is required to activate it.  Typically upon activation it will take a few weeks possibly to activate, could possibly be different with these, can’t say for sure though.

So, what am I requiring people that are interested to do for the first giveaway?  Good question.  For people that know a tad bit about me, I am big on community support.  I like to see people come together to try and solve and help others with issues.  So for anyone that is interested in receiving a full blown Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate MSDN Subscription here is what I am asking and a few guidelines:

1. Reply and answer threads that are posted in the MSDN and/or TechNet Microsoft forums.  I am expecting valid and honest replies that are helpful and bring value to the thread.  I will be spot checking to verify this, so if I see meaningless replies you will be removed from the contest.
2. A Live account is required in order to participate and reply to threads in the forums, so you will have to create one if you don’t already have one
3. Send me an email with the subject ‘MSDN Subscription Giveaway #1’ to denglishbi@gmail.com and include in the email your forum Display Name that you are using, I should be able to search and find your account when I use the browse forum users functionality (so test and make sure you show up before sending me the email, I will not validate this until contest deadline has been reached).  Subject line must be exact or you will not be included in the drawing and you must provide your forum display name or I will delete your email
4. For each 10 points you earn in the forums you will receive one entry into the drawing for the subscription – 2 pts for a reply, 10 pts for a reply marked as answer, 5 pts for a reply marked as helpful
5. When does this start? July 7 at 12:00 a.m. (I am on CST time if that matters for anything)
6. When does it end? July 31 at 11:59 p.m.
7. How will the winner be chosen? I will go through and create the entries to place in a hat.  Based on this I will pick a name and that person once I double verify their information in the forums will be the winner of the subscription.
8. When will the winner be announced? Well that depends on the number of entries I receive, but I would like to announce the winner within 2 to 3 days of contest end date, so hopefully no later than July 16.  I will also update this posting with the winner of the contest with a link to their Profile in the forums.
9. Who is eligible? Well lets keep this to people that are not partners, Microsoft employees, and MVPs.  I want to make this available to people that do not have access to the software currently and really need this for development purposes that would actually benefit from having this subscription. So please only send me the email if you are truly going to participate in the forums and do not currently have access to an MSDN subscription
10. How soon will you received the subscription information? As soon as you reply that you received my email congratulation email.  Once I receive confirmation I can email you the subscription code and/or send the NOT FOR RESALE voucher in the mail

So how does that sound?  I want to try and get more people involved in the community support area and give the forums more exposure to people that might not typically use this area.  I am a big fan of the forums and in helping others and this is actually a big step to help you out on your MVP journey.  Community support is extremely important and valued very high and I would like to reward and commend others that help out.  So what are you waiting for?  If you are not registered yet, take the time now to do so and starting tomorrow start helping out in the forums.

And just because I only have this setup for a week does not mean that you need to stop utilizing the forums area…of course that is completely up to you.  I find it very rewarding to be able to offer some advice to people, so hopefully you will as well.

Good luck!

Update (7/7/2010): I modified the points needed to earn an entry from 50 to 10. I originally was going to have this contest go for a longer time frame and switched it to a week. Based on people marking replies as an answer or helpful I felt that 50 points was a bit aggressive. With the entry level set at 10 that is less than 1 reply per day and you can reply more than once per thread.  Don’t be afraid to offer your assistance in the thread, your advice and direction could very well be the solution or input that another person needs to solve their issue or answer their question.

Update (7/13/2010): Since I only had two inquiries about the giveaway and they were both Microsoft partners (which are not eligible) I have decided to extend this giveaway out through the end of the month.  You only need to reply to 5 threads to earn 10 points for an entry. Answer someones thread and you get an entry.  Come on, how easy can that be.  From the activity so far your odds of winning are going to be very high.  What are you waiting for, get in on your chance to win a $12K MSDN Subscription!