Hackathons - Beyond the Technical
Hackathons need to attract more than just the usual technical crowd, or risk their project ideas being "lost in the pack".
In 2014, I attended my first hackathon - NASA's International Space Apps Challenge - in London. I was fortunate enough to be attending with some of my colleagues, one of whom had taken part in the Space Apps Challenge in 2013, who gave some advice to our team - "build just enough to demo".
With time bleeding away, our team built an app, SkySnapper, to monitor air-pollution using crowd-sourced pictures of the sky. In truth, the app did little more than take a photo and upload it to our hastily-created website, but with it we were able to tell a great story about how the app would work, future ideas we could integrate and the impact SkySnapper could have.
Our team went on to be one of the 5 global winners of the Space Apps Challenge that year, out of more than 670 submitted projects. We got to see a rocket launch; it was awesome.
I've since gone on to organise Space Apps London myself and what strikes me is how few teams think about how to present their projects at the end. At a hackathon, presenting your project is often the most important part of the event; you need to be able tell a story about your project, how useful it is and the impact it could have on the world. Yes, the best apps are simple to use, but people only download an app if they believe in what it will do for them. The same is true of winning a hackathon.
As NASA put it in their Space Apps 2015 Mission Report, "without a story [...] a great project can get lost in the pack".
Hackthons attract a technical crowd, often in competition, to create solutions to problems and bring new ideas to the world. However, hackathons need creative, enthusiastic people, regardless of technical knowledge. We might not all be able to build apps, create websites or hack a robot together, but everyone can see potential challenges and give our opinions on how they might be tackled. A good idea can come from anywhere.
Want more? Visit the Space Apps Challenge website, or view our Space Apps London 2015 video summary.
Yes! That would be something important for all hackathon planners to note. The best outcomes are when diverse skill sets are present. Makes for a more well-rounded product/app/idea. One of the coolest things about hackathons, is that everyone has a place to contribute. Thanks for highlighting that!