“PMC Auction: Software!”

Three days from now I'll be on my bike, riding from the NY/MA line to Sturbridge, MA, for the unofficial Day 0 of the PMC. Yes, it's already that close.

Last year, to help raise donations for the event, I auctioned off a bunch of my time. It worked pretty well, it raised over $1,000, in spite of the fact that the "market" for my time is fairly limited. (Most people don't generally need the services of a software developer, and businesses usually need more than the 5 or 10 hours I was willing to put up for auction.)

This year I'm going to have some more auctions, but not of my time (unless all else fails miserably). This time I'm trying to get other software developers to donate five licenses of their software. One insanely well known Mac developer (Brent Simmons) has already stepped up with five licenses to two different products.

(Update: as have lots of other developers, now! Please see the details page.)

All proceeds will be donated to the Pan-Mass Challenge, and in turn to the Jimmy Fund, for the research and treatment of cancer at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

I'm assembling five Mac Software packs, and five Windows Software packs. If allowed by the donors, I'll burn it all to CDs. (If the donors prefer otherwise, I guess they'll have to ship a box or tell the winner where to download.) The winning bidders will receive the CDs and a printout (and/or email) with their license codes for each application on the CD.

I'm even planning to include Conversant 1.0, with a professional installer, and copies of all of the available documentation, on both the Mac and Windows CDs.

So, to my friends, peers, and heroes in the industry: are you willing to step up and donate some software? Please contact me, ASAP. I'd like to start the auctions in early September, but a lot of orgnaizing needs to happen before then. More details can be found here.