Watching David Heinemeier Hansson's Ruby on Rails Movie, I was struck by a number of things as the tutorial proceeded, herewith braindumped for posterity.
Building a blogging application has become the "Hello, World!" of web application and content management systems. This includes all of the pejorative connotations. Next up, del.icio.us knockoffs as "Your Second Application!".
Dennis' Corollary to Greenspun's Tenth Rule of Programming, applies. However, the Rails community has gone the extra mile on design details and marketing, which is not to be scoffed at. And the emphasis on unit testing mitigates the "bug ridden" factor.
Screencasting would be a valuable tool to teach computer science students. Having project oriented classes is great in theory, but a downside is working through the iterations to train students up on presentation skills. Presuming either really accessible tools or reasonable training, screencasts could be a great way to time and place shift demos for busy faculty and TAs. They also are a concrete artifact that students could put in a "portfolio" to convince employers of presentation skill along with design proficiency.
Heck, if I were an employer, I might start asking for screencasts as a highpass filter.