On the day before nominations ended, I posted my ten choices of the time. Little did I know that 50 projects would come in on the last day. Also, I've been reading the arguments advanced in the various slate posts and been influenced thereby.

In an email, Siegfried Woldhek of Nabuur just wrote to me:

"What an interesting experiment this is turning out to be. Implicitly at least three new criteria were added to the official, sensible list.
- The size of the mailing list
- The activism of the inner circle
- The 2.0 savvy"

And, he is clearly correct in stating that. So we are observing a very dynamic process with thousands of votes being cast in what is clearly not an apples:apples fashion. Well, it's a great fruit salad. We will do our best to make this process beneficial to many more projects than the 20 who get the most votes. And we will try to develop subcategories next year that will enable easier comparison and voting.

I'm going to vote for these ten. Since I could easily 'support' about 40, let me make transparent the criteria I decided to base my voting upon:

1. I ranked social impact, sustainability and technology, in that order, as my decision-drivers.

2. I tried to vote for projects that didn't have a large installed user base they could rally for support. I figured that since I only have ten votes, I'll spend them they are most needed and figure the projects that have a web-savvy posse to draw on will do well in this vote without me (and some of the best projects are in that group, for sure.)

My votes go to:

China Digital Times

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/china-digital-times

Information may want to be free but a lot of entrenched interests would prefer it otherwise. China is on the forefront of digital censorship issues, and this seems like an important project in that context.

The CTC Vista Project

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/ctc-vista-project

Voluntarism takes many forms. The government's VISTA program is a tremendous potential resource for social justice organizations. This project links the resource to the web in ways that can be built upon.

The Nata Village Blog: A unique opportunity to witness the battle to control the spread of HIV/AIDs in an African Village

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/nata-village-blog-unique-op...

It is hard to compare this project to many of the other, more techically sophisticated ones. But given the context, the need and the potential for replicating, it gets my vote.

The REAL hot 100

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/real-hot-100

This project seems to me to have a great plan/methodology for tweaking the zeitgeist in an effective way.

Maps 2.0 - Geospatial Tools for Nonprofits and Humanitarian Relief

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/maps-2-0-geospatial-tools-n...

Really impressive vision, use of tools and existing collaboration

Open Source, Open Standards Video

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/open-source-open-standards-...

I want this to work so badly I'll vote for it. The planning is impressive.

And these from my original post stay on the list:

Building a Community of Modern Abolitionists

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/building-a-community-of-mod...

Not your U.S. Civil War genre John Brown. This is a remarkable melding of a sustainability model with a fierce social vision.

moulin wiki offline wikipedia

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/moulin-wiki-offline-wikiped...

This is the most counter-intuitive, spot-on project. Brilliant.

Reversed Rural Electrification

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/reversed-rural-electrificat...

This is a huge idea with a lot of thought behind it.

Social web-tools for developing countries: Yankana.org

http://www.netsquared.org/projects/proposals/social-web-tools-developing...

A very smart project based on recognizing that the social web has a different entrace ramp in different cultures.