Back in July, Microsoft thought they had a pretty solid compromise to put before EU regulators with their web browser ballot screen. Concerns were raised throughout the process -- first by Opera and later by Mozilla's brass -- but it looks as though the EU is giving Microsoft the go-ahead.

According to Nelie Kroes, European Commissioner for Competition Policy, the ballot screen will include the twelve most popular browsers in the EU. To make the cut, a browser must be among the top dozen in usage share in the EU territory.

Kroes' spoke favorably of Microsoft's efforts:

The Commission's preliminary view is that Microsoft's commitments would indeed address our competition concerns.

Microsoft's proposal in particular recognises the principle that consumers should be given a free and effective choice of web browser. It would empower all current and future users of Windows in Europe to choose which browser they wished to use. It would therefore have a direct and immediate impact on the market.

Does this mean we won't be hearing any more about this issue? Likely not. First and foremost, the deployment is being considered "market testing" at this point. On top of that, not much has changed since Opera first complained about the ballot screen and the install process also isn't as simple as Mozilla wanted it to be.

The approved screen will include "more information" buttons for each browser and download links, but that seems to have been enough to satisfy the EU. Microsoft has indeed enabled users to make a choice - figuring out how to get another browser completely installed is going to be up to the end user.

At least for now. The EU has included a review clause so the commission can ensure the ballot screen is "working properly" over the next five years.

If you compete in anything - sports, fantasy sports, online games - you might someday find yourself organizing a tournament. Konkuri is a web service that can help you do that with relatively little fuss, whether you're starting a just-for-fun league with some friends or doing something a bit more serious. It has both round-robin and bracket modes, and you can either manually pair up competitors or have the site make a random schedule.

Konkuri has a lot of features that are designed to make it not only easy to set up, but easy for people following or playing in your tournament to use. Dates, times and venues for matches are easy to enter and the results page does a lot of your work for you. When you enter results, Konkuri uses them to calculate standings. Depending on which sport you're playing, you can also enter scores from multiple sets in the same match (helpful for tennis, and the like). Each match also gets a comments page – what's a tournament site without the ability to talk trash?

What if computers could play video games? Well, technically they can. Whenever you play a game that has other beings that can move independently (for example a hockey or football simulator, or a first-person shooter), AI (artificial intelligence) is employed. Basically, the better the AI, the better and less predictable your computerized opponents will be.

AI can also be used to control a player of a regular platform game, like Mario Brothers. And a competition has started for just that purpose. The goal of the Mario AI Competition is to have developers send in their artificial intelligence code, and have it control Mario through an infinite number of random levels. The competition is to see who's AI can get Mario through the highest number of levels.

So, why have a competition like this?

From the site:

One of the main purposes of this competition is to be able to compare different controller development methodologies against each other, both those based on learning techniques such as artificial evolution and those that are completely hand-coded. So we hope to get submissions based on evolutionary neural networks, genetic programming, fuzzy logic, temporal difference learning, human ingenuity, hybrids of the above, etc. The more the merrier! (And better for science.)

This seems like a great way to get programmers and other scientists that are interested in artificial intelligence involved in a fun but useful exploration of the craft.

Tumblr's new stats page, Tumblarity, draws from a couple of major web trends. First, there's been a big demand for stats for everything, with people getting excited about new ways to visualize the numbers in your life. Nicholas "Feltron" Felton's Daytum is the most elegant example of this. Secondly, social networks are getting more competitive. From Twitter follower counts and Favrd to becoming the mayor of your city on FourSquare, networks are trending toward more public competition (or "popularity contests," depending on who you ask).

People have responded with overwhelming positivity to the stats aspect of Tumblarity, which shows your follower count, how many posts you've made, your numbers of likes and reblogs, and the kinds of posts you make. The competition aspect, which uses a Tumblarity score derived from some private algorithm involving a combination of these numbers, rubbed some people the wrong way. To be fair, Tumblr never said Tumblarity was a competition, but they did introduce global and local leader boards.

What do you think, Download Squad readers? Does competition on the social web make things more fun, or does it encourage some kinds of "popular" content and drown out others?

Web 2.0 is all about mashups, and Microsoft wants to get in on the action. They have set up a new competition where winners can walk away with up to $25,000. The competition, announced at the 3GSM World Congress, is asking developers to create mashups that merge telecommunications features with Web 2.0 applications. So, basically, calling for some applications that weave voice and text with mapping and search features. The winner doesn't only get their share of the prize money, from $2,500 to $25,000 in cash, but if their mashup gets scooped up and released by a telecommunications company the developer could see a chance to share in revenue that it generates.

The first stage of the competition set for March 6th will see developers creating storyboards with written or graphic ideas of their ideas to show to a panel of judges. The winners from this round will move to the second phase which is to build a prototype with winners being announced for June.

Google's Code Jam finals are here. The world's best coders will be hosted in Manhattan, at Google's second largest development center.

If you're up for the challenge Google is presenting, make sure you are brushed up on accurately and swiftly solving challenging problems with your computer, and sign up now! Google is flying out the best 100 coders to New York, with all expenses paid.

First prize for the competition is $10,000, and all 99 other finalists are guaranteed a prize of $750 minimum. Registration just got off the ground today, so sign up, and drop us a line when you do! We'll be rooting for you!

It could be a simple answer. A few months ago I inquired about the disappearance of the domain the5k.org. Someone from the previous team emailed me back saying something about their domain getting hijacked, and they were getting it back. The domain was then briefly a Godaddy parking space, and now it's just blank. Odd. This just a couple of years after SIGGRAPH supposedly absorbed the 5k competition...

What is the 5k competition? You can read the full story thanks to the Web Archive here, but this was the stated purpose:
"The idea behind the contest is that the rigid constraints of designing for the web are what force us to get truly creative. Between servers and bandwidth, clients and users, HTML and the DOM, browsers and platforms, our conscience and our ego, we're left in a very small space to find highly optimal solutions. Since the space we have to explore is so small, we have to look harder, get more creative; and that's what makes it all interesting. Just celebrating that is all."In other words, you can enter any program you like, as long as it's under 5 kilobytes. Which is very cool, and the winners of each year's competition have been quite impressive, but maybe I should have said, what was the 5k competition, because there appears to be no signs of life on the site or elsewhere... Anyone have an answer to this riddle?