Awesome! I'll be sure to update the post to reflect the changes and the stipulations! What a great way to encourage more participants. To recap, this prize will only be available for the weeks that have at least 25 participants. This will be considered the 3rd place prize on the weeks that qualify. Otherwise, the 2 Merit prize will take its place.
Thanks so much for doing this, bill gator! It's good to see that I'm not the only one that's so passionate about wanting to reduce the spam around here

Thank you, because you're the one who made the idea into quite the little movement. I had offered this to two separate people, but I hadn't put in the effort to make it into a challenge and spread it further into the forum. I'm sure week 2 and beyond will consistently have 25 participants and the prizes/slots seem to be coming together nicely as well; be it merit or
BTC it's really a good way to get people involved around here in the right way.
I am adding an escrow address that will hold the funds for this challenge:
37ZhBrGgw6BSghMQnPi4ixdmRBLxBTAXCf (
blockchain)
You can view the balance at any given time. If you'd like to make a donation to this challenge, you can do so at that address. It will only ever be used to reward winners of this challenge, and every transaction initiated from that address will be recorded in this thread.
Would you like me to send my sponsorship money to the escrow address? It seems it is well funded already, but I'm wondering if I should save on transaction fees and send it directly or fund the escrow address; your call Joe.
You can use this: (Balance:

)
(Balance: [img alt=Balance loading...]http://btc-priceimg.herokuapp.com/balance/37ZhBrGgw6BSghMQnPi4ixdmRBLxBTAXCf/00f[/img])
I never knew how to do that and I never bothered to check how; thank you LoyceV for answering all of the questions I do not think to ask. The balance is growing at an impressive pace, so it seems like the challenge will be well funded; I haven't even sent mine there yet, but I don't know if Joe would prefer it donated or me to send it directly in order to minimize transaction fees.
In total for Round 1, we have 19 participants. Good luck to all of them, and thank you for taking the initiative to help make the forums a better place for all.
A huge thank you to
all of our sponsors for helping to make this on ongoing challenge. I'm extremely grateful and pleasantly shocked at the overwhelming positive response that this has received.

6 More participants for round 2 should not be a problem to find, haven't checked the recent applications myself, but the rate at which people apply should support it. Good luck to the participants, I'll be checking in on your posts and meriting any that I feel are deserving. I'm hoping to come across some discussions that are thought-provoking, and if I do then I'll even put in a good word for ya. Proud to be a sponsor of this challenge.
A Wild Gleb Gamow Appears