Please add a listing to this page if you're working on Distutils (and help us reduce duplication of effort).
Cheese Shop / PyPI -- the central repository of python package metadata and distribution files.
Python Eggs -- an effort to produce single-file distributions of packages similar to Java JARs. See http://peak.telecommunity.com/DevCenter/PythonEggs
PEPs for extending distutils / PyPI -- PEPs 262 "Database of Installed Python Packages" and 345 "Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2" are currently open
Uraga -- an effort to develop a tool for download and installation of packages. See http://www.byteofpython.info/projects/uraga/uraga.html
Other efforts we know about:
Ian Bicking is looking to clean up and extend the use of release_urls in PyPI for use in [http://pythonpaste.org Paste].
Maurice Ling is looking at implementing PEP 262 as an academic project.