With so many fake screenshots of the upcoming Mac OS 10.5 Leopard leaving their tracks all over the Net, one guy with a lot of time on his hands (and a few stuff he wants to get rid of) woke up one day and said to himself, "Why not make a contest out of it?"  And that's how The Fake Leopard Screenshot Contest was born!

Phil Ryu isn't joking he assures all wanna-bes out there. He even has a tagline to go with the contest: A picture may be worth a thousand words, but a fake one is worth nearly a thousand bucks of software! Not exactly the kind of money Taylor Hicks brought home from AI but it IS something.

First the rules:

• All entries must be ourageously awesome fake screenshots of the MacLeopard.
• Entries can include multiple screenshots (limited to 5), with one entry per person.
• The contest deadline is Saturday, July 22nd, 12 PM EST.
• The winners will be announced on Monday, July 24th.

Entries will be determined by a panel of judges on believability, creativity, and the Â?insanely greatÂ? factor, made-up features and applications. "In other words, just make it really cool."

Now the prizes:

• iPulse ($12.95), IconBuilder ($79), Xscope ($16.95) and a free StockIcon set of your choice ($349) by The Iconfactory
• Delicious Library ($40) by Delicious Monster
• ShapeShifter ($20) & WindowShadeX ($10) by Unsanity
• NewsFire ($17.99) by Dave Watanabe
• AppZapper ($12.95) by Austin Sarner & Brian Ball
• NotePad ($7.95), VoiceNotes ($5.95) & FTP Drop ($4.95) by Widget Machine
• Menuet with bundled Art Collector ($12.95) by Specere
• iClip ($19.95 /w free upgrade to v.4) by Inventive
• Interarchy ($39) by Stairways Software
• Podcast Maker ($29.95) & Voice Candy ($12.95) by Potion Factory
• Soulver ($12.95) & World of Where ($11.95) by World of Worlds
• Picture Framer ($5) and To Do Tracker ($5) by Monkey Business Labs
• MacUpdate 1 Year Membership ($20) by MacUpdate
• Catalog ($20) & PHP Studio ($25) by Neometric Software
• DomainTracker ($24.95) by Icecold Software
• Tag ($19.95) & Site Soap ($12.95) by Talacia
• CSSEdit ($24.99) & DeskShade ($12.99) by MacRabbit
• Awaken ($8.95) by Embraceware

Phil says if you tally up the cost of the prizes it comes to just under $900. But add the trophies (below) for the three winning faux screens and you can make that an even grand. So far, Phil has received 10 entries.

Seems like Apple just lends itself to these "Top Ten" lists. Today's is called "The Ten Most Beautiful OS 10 Applications," courtesy of Phil Ryu. Although whether this is "beautiful" in the aesthetic sense or just "beautiful" in their ease of use and overall utility, we're not sure. It's all in the eye of the beholder.

Decide for yourself... here, then, without further ado, are today's "Top Ten."

#10: TRANSMISSION

A P2P application, the recommended BitTorrent client. An "exercise in simplicity," according to Phil.

That's just the tip of the iceberg!! Read the Full Article for nine more beautiful apps!

Whether you're someone looking into starting a podcasting career or a professional already churning out podcasts left and right, you'll surely love what the Potion Factory has to offer. podcast-maker/4343" id="tag" title="">Podcast Maker makes every podcaster's life easier.

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