I'm torn.
One one hand a competition needs an end, when those that are the best receive awards for their hard work and the competition has been extended once before. The question is will this be the last extension? Or when the end of the competition arrives someone will ask for an extension again.
Extending might be unfair to people who can plan. They planed their time to finish their application as they wanted. Their application is small, because of the time frame, and can't be extended very much. They could have won with the current date, but can loose, because others wrote applications that can be easily extended and by giving them more time they have better chances.

Then again this is programming and deadlines are more of a guidelines not something written in stone.
As my project can be easily extended, and I have plans on working on them after the competition, I vote for extending the competition date. I'll have chance to implement more things in to my app and submit more for the competition.
My only concern is for those that planed to finish a perfect app for the given time frame and can't rely make it more better in the future.

For tl;dr: I vote to extend.

Me too. I also want to say that I would prefer this extension (if it ever happens) to be the last one for current competition.

Okay, in fact we are never able to make this competition fair for everyone. Some will have more time, others have the better idea.

If I had a say I would suggest to exclude all MeeGo Harmattan N950 related stuff. Not everyone will get this device. And we can't extend it until the N9 is released worldwide.

But I haven't made the rules. And MeeGo is not only about Tablets, it includes also handset devices like the N950.
(zehjotkah had perhaps received a device only because of this competition and the possibility to inflame more developers for the N950, so Nokia want to have the N950 included in this competition - and if this assumption is correct we should respect it)

According to this list 103 out of 250 (249?) developers have received their Nokia N950.

If the N950 MeeGo Device was the reason to extend the competition we should, in my opinion, extend it again until all (or the most) have received their N950 and wait from this point at least 2 weeks to give every lucky N950 guy the chance to catch up and release something. (if ever possible during this time)

It wouldn't be still not fair compared to guys, playing with the device since several weeks... but personally I would have a better feeling about this competition.

I am fine with extending the deadline for the competition again... after all, I have some extra work to adapt my entry for the N950. And I am getting new ideas on how to improve it with QML...

However, it does not sem right to extend the deadline too many times...

Let's decide for a date and stick to that this time, OK?

But I cannot really complain too loud, since I *already* "won" a prize I was not expecting at all... :-D

As it's the penultimate weekend of the current deadline, you can't really dwell too long on a decision zehjotkah - the fairest thing for the participants is to make a judement call asap. There seems to be positive feedback for an extension, Im not aware of any negative feedback. It should, ofcourse, be the final extension and in that case it might be better to make it a month rather than 2 weeks just in case anything should popup. That'd take it to the end of August, with voting it'll be into first week of September before winners are announced (I'd expect?). How does that sound?

There's also a slight issue with the "Fun and Strange" category - we really need to get some more entries to give Helex's X-Ray something to run against . So the extension could also help here. Does anyone know how this category could be promoted more?

Edit: By the way, I received an email today that the Intel AppUp Developer challenge has been extended to August 29th so atleast it wouldn't be just our competition!

In fact it is not my decision, but the decision of everyone participating.
Everyone participating in the discussion was in favour of an extension, so let it be.

Yes, to many extentions are not good. The rules of this community driven competition are sometimes a little bit to weak. But it's runned by geeks and not by lawyers. And I still like it even more than company driven competitions.
The conditions in the MeeGo world have changed and this is still a maemo/MeeGo competition. We should be able to adapt it if its needed.
Changing the rules during the competition should be fine as far as the most of the participants are therefor and no one is willful and intentionally handicapped. We should ensure to keep it as fair as possible!

But as I said a fixed date could be hard regarding the reason for our first extention. And we have still the same reason to extend it again. So, what about to tie the extention flexible together using a rule with the N950 community device program. Currently 108 out of 249 Devices are delivered. So they are catching up. But we don't know a date when our reason to extend is settled.

What about this rule: Extend it until the Sunday Night GMT, 2 weeks after 245 devices are delivered and at minimum 4 weeks until the end of August. (as kojacker said)

So the first possible deadline is the end of August. The latest is 2 weeks (+ the days until sunday night arrives) after 245 N950 devices are delivered to the blessed developers.

Should I run a poll or would you, zehjotkah?

Here are my suggestions for the poll:

• don't extend it - stick to "end of July" and finish it now
• extend it until the "end of August"
• extend it flexible - let the most N950 recipient at minimum 2 weeks time with the devices

Mmmh... and perhaps this possibility:

• extend it until all categories have at minimum 3 contributions

Last year we've got a lot more unsortable submissions. Perhaps a sign how the world of maemo changed... And last year I was somtimes unable to catch up the competition discussions. Hmm... this has changed dramatically. I'm not sure if 2011 had fulfilled our expectations.

Anyway, If I run the poll some guys with a broad twitter coverage should ask for voters. Especially at the #N950club, zehjotkah.

Ah, and I don't know how much work is needed to run the final voting, to validate the submissions and all the stuff that is needed around this competiton including sending out the bounty. If zehjotkah is at a buisness trip in asia during September we are scuppered.
So in my opinion he has clearly the final word.
[german tag] Auch wenn er das nicht hören will! [/german tag]

Helmuth, could you please start the poll? (I'll leave work in some minutes and will then start preparing todays MeeGo Freeday)
I'll then send an email with a link to the poll to everyone who submitted something at http://competition.meetmeego.org
Expectations: we broke the donation record from last year and we've already plenty of apps (browse a little bit on the submission site). My expectations were fulfilled.
The first week of August I'll be in vacation, visiting my girl.
In September maybe I'll be a week at the Intel Elements, but no major trip in sight.

edit: twitter coverage: yes, if you are on twitter, please "advertise" the competition a little bit...

I need to meet Berlin sometime...

Okay, I will create a poll. Are everybody fine with the options? (answer within 10 minutes)

What about this option, zehjotkah?

• extend it until all categories have at minimum 3 contributions

This paragraph was more a sort of joke in the first place but perhaps we could end in a serius problem in the end of the day if we will stick with only a single contribution in this category...

Ah, and to be honest, I'm shortly before to add a option to the poll to extend the competition until the end of the maya calendar. But if this is the final voting result I could get killed somehow.

add as much voting options as you think are useable.
the community will decide.