It's probably worth noting that the New York Times has, since 1912, run a fund called The Neediest Cases, which raises money for social welfare agencies throughout New York City. Though it seems like this particular article isn't part of the series, the paper runs pieces daily that tell similar stories of those in need throughout the months of November, December, and January.
The time limit is only “brutally restrictive” if you assume that people spent only 9 hours the day of working on their projects. We had a week of access to the API documentation as well as access to the API developers to ask questions.
And I can't speak for anyone else who participated, but my project is going to live on and continue to improve. Maybe one day you'll even find it interesting. I suspect others who participated will do the same with theirs.
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/newyorkandregion/neediest...