Unfortunately, DuraSpace was not accepted into the Google Summer of Code program for 2012. A follow up discussion with Carol Smith from Google via IRC, we learned that this was primarily because of Google's interest in accepting new organizations over known organizations for the 2012 year, not because of a significant lack in either the DuraSpace GSoC application or DuraSpace GSoC ideas pages. Below is a capture of the (very short) IRC conversation:
[15:13] <@carols> hi duraspace folks
[15:13] == mode/#gsoc [+vv duraspace|cwilpe duraspace|bbrana] by kblin
[15:13] <+duraspace|bbrana> hello Carol
[15:13] == mode/#gsoc [-v comunes|s_a_m] by kblin
[15:13] <+duraspace|cwilpe> hi carols
[15:14] <@carols> aw man. another unsatisfying answer.
[15:14] <@carols> we really like your application and your ideas page
[15:14] <@carols> and we really wanted to give new orgs a chance to participate this year.
[15:15] <+duraspace|cwilpe> anything you noticed that we could improve on for next year?
[15:15] <@carols> i'll take a more in depth look, but my notes say this was basically just for space.
[15:15] <@carols> but let me see.
[15:16] <@carols> i do wish the fedora commons ideas page had a few more mentor possibilities, and i would like the duracloud page to have more ideas overall.
[15:16] <@carols> so you could improve that for next year.
[15:16] <@carols> but the decision we made this year was primarily because of space.
[15:17] <+duraspace|cwilpe> thanks carols, we'll be back next year :)
[15:17] <@carols> awesome
[15:17] <@carols> please do apply again next year
[15:17] <+duraspace|bbrana> should we consider combining the ideas pages for the projects, or is it acceptable to have them split apart
[15:17] <@carols> it's acceptable to split them apart, although it does make less work for me if its all on one page :-)
[15:17] <+duraspace|bbrana> sure
[15:17] <@carols> just a nice thing, not required :-)
[15:18] <@carols> thanks for your participation in the past!
[15:18] <+duraspace|bbrana> we have enjoyed our past summers, thanks for hosting the program
[15:18] <@carols> i hope you have a good summer.
If you are interested in seeing a complete log of conversations with other organizations who were rejected:
A few notes from the feedback given to other organizations:
  • For orgs that have applied in the past, Google looks most closely at the ideas page
  • The ideas page should include, for each idea:
    • A solid description of the task that would be performed
    • Technical skills needed to perform the task (especially programming languages required)
    • Difficulty level of the task, or skill level required to complete the task
    • A list of possible mentors for each idea
  • Google is looking for a variety options for students in the ideas we present
  • An example A+ ideas page: http://community.kde.org/GSoC/2011/Ideas
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