Patent ID: 8137172

Claim:
A method for conducting a computer programming tournament, comprising: registering a contestant with a server by receiving from the contestant an alias for the contestant; and conducting a computer programming tournament having multiple rounds wherein the winners of each round except a last round are invited to participate in a next round, and wherein one or more early rounds are conducted over the Internet, and a later round is conducted in person with multiple participants in the same location, each round comprising: communicating via a network a computer programming problem to each of the contestants invited to participate in the round; receiving submissions via the network from the invited contestants, each being associated with a contestant and comprising computer programming problem solutions; evaluating the submissions using a competition server computer to determine whether the submission demonstrates a solution to the computer programming problem; awarding points to the contestants using a competition server computer based on the evaluation of their respective submissions; and designating as round winner(s) contestant(s) who submitted the submission(s) resulting in the greatest number of points.