A while ago Scott Hanselman blogged about Changes in the Microsoft MVP Program - MVPs for Open Source Contributions, which detailed changed to the Microsoft MVP program that would enable Microsoft to award people an MVP solely based on open-source contributions.

Today I am very proud to share with you that I have been awarded the very first open-source based MVP! I have been awarded an MVP in the ASP.NET category, as it is the most appropriate given most of my open-source work has been in web-related technologies.

Just to be clear: there is no pure "open-source MVP" category, instead Microsoft will award MVPs in one of the existing categories, but based on different criteria. However, I feel it is only appropriate to include the OSS moniker in my MVP title, hence I will use ASP.NET OSS MVP to describe my MVP.

For me, the biggest thing here is the recognition from Microsoft that the work that I have been putting into helping out the .NET ecosystem is appreciated. That by far exceeds any other benefits that this might bring.

I know a lot of awesome developers that devote so much time and passion in developing amazing frameworks and projects, all for free, which all help make .NET a better place for everyone. Each and everyone of them deserves this as well and I am happy to also be able to share that starting from the next round of MVP announcements (1st July), Microsoft will start awarding more people an MVP based solely based on open source contributions.

Anyone can Nominate a MVP and if you know someone that you think should get the same kind of recognition, then head over to the nomination form and fill in their details. I know there are a bunch of people that will be getting my nomination!

I would also like to thank Scott Hanselman and everyone else at Microsoft, that have made this change possible and for their hard work to make open-source a first class citizen in their strategy moving forward