Silicon Beach Fest Hackathon Redux
The 2nd annual Silicon Beach Fest officially kicked-off yesterday. However, events have been going on for several days starting with the Hackathon which went from Friday through Sunday, Pasadena Day was on Monday and Hollywood Day was on Tuesday.
The Silicon Beach Fest Hackathon (sponsored by AT&T) started right on time at 6pm on Friday evening to a packed house at ROC as over 200 people attended. Alex Donn, Developer Evangelist at AT&T, was the MC and official cat-herder. There were several sponsors which had tables at the event on Friday- Peak Hosting, Scopely and ESRI. I had attended the National Civic Day of Hacking, one of over 100 nationwide events of its kind held simultaneously on June 1-2, event in Boyle Heights and ESRI had a table there as well so it was nice chatting again with the good folks (Myles, Kurt, Josh & Jen) from the worldwide leader and provider of mapping data. Before any of the lightning talks began, we were fed quite well and were stocked up with beverages and snacks to last us the entire weekend. Alex started off by informing the participants of the schedule for the weekend, laying down the rules and showing off his orange tie headband. This was very important since there were $22,000 in cash and prizes to be had.
The lightning talks were numerous but very short and informative.
Speakers included: Alex Donn (AT&T); Myles Sutherland & Kurt Daradics (Esri), Shai Leib (Ask Ziggy), Eytan Elbaz (Scopely), Sameer Maggon (Productsy), Andy Bartley (Algorithms.io), and Thor Clark (Sign Now).
Next up were the idea pitches & match-making. Those with an idea for the weekend could briefly explain what they wanted to accomplish and then recruit folks to assemble/complete their teams. Most of the folks getting up to share were “idea folks” but there were also a few developers, designers and UI/UX folks interspersed.
After all of the formalities, it was time to assemble teams and get to work! Initially, I thought that doors would be closing at midnight (as per the schedule) but ROC was cool enough to let folks spend the night and keep hacking away at their idea. I left a little after 11pm so am not sure how many “crashed” there but I know a few who were planning on it. They were in good hands. By this time, there were less than 48 hours left until the teams had to “put their pencils down” and pitch their hopefully completed project.
On Sunday evening, the team presentations began and the judges started weighing all of their options. Congrats to the winners: #1 It’s A Date, #2 Kind Kall, #3 GeoPrint (which also won the ESRI & Productsy challenges!). The judges included Ilya Pozin (Ciplex), Nathan Chandra (WeLink) and Reed Shaffner (Scopely).
As not just an attendee but also someone who has co-organized both hackathons & other, large tech conferences, I know, first-hand, how much work and collaboration it takes to pull off an event like this. So a big shout out and HUGE thanks to all the organizers and sponsors: AT&T, Digital LA, Scopely, WeLink, PageWoo, Ask Ziggy, Sign Now, Peak Hosting, Nokia, Productsy and more.
So how about you, TZ readers, did any of you attend the Hackathon? Share with us what you thought. If you didn’t & would’ve liked to, stay tuned, there’s more where this came from.
