how would one go about contributing to such a project?

The exact details depend on the project, but in general:

(1) Visit the project's website.
(2) Download the source code. There should be links on the site for this.
(3) Study the code, start tinkering with it, learn how it works.
(4) Possibly subscribe to the developer's mailing list. Find out what the hot topics are for the project.
(5) Also, study the issue tracker to find out what bugs need fixing.
(6) When you feel comfortable with the workings of the code, start thinking about how you can improve it. Think small to start with. See if you can fix a few bugs.
(7) Submit your fixes using the instructions on the site. This will usually be via a code repository system like SVN.
(8) Hopefully your fixes will be accepted by the project leadership. If not, don't panic -- maybe you missed something? Maybe you didn't stick to their coding style? Whatever, talk it through with them, find out the problem, and try again. (and if you do get accepted first time, don't let it go to your head!)
(9) Congratulations you have now contributed to an OSS project.

You've hit the nail on the head with the question about relevant experience -- it's the first thing people look for when hiring; it's way more important than qualifications.

I see two ways to get in:

(a) Contribute to some OSS projects that are relevant to the sort of coding you want to get into. Bear in mind that it will take you some time to build up enough experience doing this for it to really count for anything.

(b) Look for coding jobs in the industry you were previously in -- ie a cross-over job. For example, if you were previously a sales person for widgets, and you know loads about the various types of widgets and how they work, etc, you might find that a widget manufacturer or sales company might be willing to hire you as a coder based on your expertise in widgets rather than in coding. You'll still need to know how to write code of course, but I'm guessing you know enough already to be able to get through an interview once you've managed to get one.

This whole market thingy seems to work.

You say that, but it took five years of market stagnation after MS cornered the market for anyone else to rise to challenge them.

So yes, the competition is good, and it does seem to have stung MS back into life developing new code, but it's hardly a ringing endorsement of the free market.

It's one thing to block your callerID from being presented to the end user - in that case, the intermediary telcos will still be able to see the callerID; they pass it between themselves, but just don't pass it to the final end user. That's how this system works -- because they're a telco, they get to see the callerID, but unlike other telcos, they've decided to pass the information on regardless.

But what about spoofed callerIDs? They're the ones that I feel would be genuinely useful to unmask. But sadly, this system won't work in these cases. If the callerID is tampered with at source, that tampered value is what gets passed between the telcos, so there's nothing useful that can be unmasked.

Try asking this same question in a more newbie friendly environment, such as www.linuxquestions.org.

The folk on slashdot are generally very clued up, but if this gets onto the main /. site you'll get all sorts of discussion about why Gimp is good afterall, and the actual useful answers to your question will get lost in the fuzz.

I know that there are programs that do exactly what you need because I've seen them, but I don't know them by name, nor well enough to make a recommendation.

Anyway, just a suggestion. I hope you get your question answered, but I do feel that /. is probably the wrong place to ask. :-)

All the best!

I'll give 10:1 odds that Futuremark simply compiled their benchmark with Intel's C++ compiler.

I wrote a detailed explanation back in 2005 about how the Intel C++ compiler generates separate code paths for memory operations to make AMD processors appear significantly slower, and how you can trick the compiled code into believing your AMD processor is an Intel one to see incredibly increased performance. See this article for additional details.