A high-profile competition

...for a very good cause.

Microsoft has generously donated advertising on the home page of MSN to promote The Big Moo.

This is one of the five most visited webpages on Earth, and it's quite a thing for them to donate us an ad.

As you know, the Big Moo is a book written by 33 people, with 100% of the royalties going to charity. You can find out more about the book and charities here.

THE CHALLENGE: If you can create the best ad (according the the specs, available in this PDF: Download MSNadspec.pdf) we'll run your ad and promote you as the designer.

I'll also point to three runners-up from my blog and will encourage my co-authors to do so as well.

SO, you do an ad on spec, and if it's great, you get publicity far and wide, leading, perhaps to not just good feelings around holiday time but plenty of new business, and maybe a shot at being on Oprah, if that's your business. Amateurs are welcome to apply.

The objectives:
1. To generate clickthrough to the Amazon page for the Big Moo (this Amazon link).
2. To generate sales of the book at that page.
3. There is no number 3.

The deadline for the contest is a week from today, so if you're going to do it, do it right now so you can submit your entry on time. (12/12 at noon EST. Send a link to your hosted ad to: seth@sethgodin.com)

Every penny we earn goes to charity. You get all the kudos. Microsoft does the right thing. We sell a lot of books. Happy holidays! And thanks.