In November, 2007, the German Federal Ministry of Economy and Technology began a competition for young professionals as part of the research program THESEUS. The THESEUS TALENTS 2008 project gives talented young people in Germany the opportunity to collaborate on the future internet. The main goal of the THESEUS competition is to generate ideas and mobilize competencies. Through the use of both specific and open-ended questions, participants have the unique opportunity to contribute to the THESEUS project. The contest provides young scientists, students and developers the chance to play a part in THESEUS through their creative ideas and programming knowledge and skills.
The contest's central question is how the German talents imagine the services and semantic technologies of the future. From concrete technical realizations of image-quality analysis software and ontologies to questions of how the internet communities of web 2.0 can be linked to novel semantic detection technology, THESEUS TALENTS aims to explore which scenarios should form the future of internet services.
Posters and flyers for the contest have been delivered to various universities and technical institutes across Germany to attract attention from students and alumni. Many professors and student government bodies have demonstrated interest and publicized the contest. Partner enterprises have publicized the contest via all available channels to inspire active interest and the submission of extraordinary ideas.
Contest participants can win prizes amounting to 10.000 Euros. In addition, THESEUS TALENTS offers winners support in the implementation of their ideas together with project partners as well as networking opportunities within the German economic and scientific world.
THESEUS TALENTS aims to contribute to the advancement of talent within the German information technology, communications and software industry. At the same time, winners of the THESEUS TALENTS competition are expected to provide a long-term contribution to the creation of new knowledge management, IT, communications products, services and business models.
Application forms and information about entry requirements are available for download on www.theseus-programm.de/talente. Closing date for the contest is April 14, 2008.
