5 students from HackSoc took place in Hacked.io over the 20th and 21st of July. A huge event, 500 people at the O2 in London, with great sponsors and prizes. Very friendly and constructive atmosphere built around “Learn, Build, Share” and we were well accommodated for with free food and drink for the entire event.
Unfortunately we didn’t win anything this time, but great fun was had by all, and much learnt! (and of course, enough free tee-shirts to open a shop) Recap of the event after the break!
Jamie, Tosin, Adam, Joe and Simon
The organisers had promised the first 100 attendees prizes. Given that it was starting at 9am, we didn’t anticipate winning anything, convinced people would arrive at ungodly hours or camp overnight. Weirdly enough, the first guy arrived at 8am, leaving HackSoc in second place in the queue at 8.15. Good start to the day, with two Campus Party Europe tickets and a couple of boxes of cheap Meccano rip off to keep us amused.
The “small construction kit” prize
Some misery was anticipated at the “THUNDER” PAT testing station. PAT testing the laptop chargers of 500 people? Not a job I’d want. Fortunately this PAT testing never materialised and cables were only checked for breaks. Incomers were given an ID card and a NFC wristband (which later turned out to have no security on it at all and so became the target of some hacks).
Usually a gig venue, Indig02 had been decked out with long tables and swanky purple and blue lighting. The stage was covered in sofas and beanbags and the tables addorned with mysterious presents warning us not to open them until told to. Snackbar was already open, but “snackbar” doesn’t do it justice as it was essentially an open, always stocked caffeine and suger buffet, completely free. HackSoc snagged a seat in the stalls and was soon joined by TermiSoc Chairman, Simon Cotts (his write up of the event is here).
Venue
Massive buzz as the event started. The organisers have obviously done festivals before or something, because this was a level above presenting at other Hackathons HackSoc has attended. Sponsors came up and introduced themselves, directing us to the their tables; the organisers then set the tone of the event, which was to be very much focused on collaboration and sharing. Business pitches were also firmly banned from the final presentations. We would be presenting our hacks, what we had done and achieved, in 90 seconds. No one cared about the business plan, just the hacks. Big supporter of this approach; learn cool stuff, build cool stuff, no ugly competitive attitudes and empty words.
Mysterious gifts – Later turned out to be a DIY wooden wolf model
Throughout Saturday there were many great talks by the sponsors and even some attendees. Sponsors wandered around and had a lot of interaction with the hackers; they didn’t just sit aloofly at their tables, and seemed to genuinely enjoy seeing what we were doing. One of the Microsoft staff took great enjoyment in one of our toy projects flailing pathetically and completely failing to do the task it was designed to do. Lunch and dinner were provided for free by the event, with half of our group enjoying a spot of Thai at Thai Silk and the other nomming on a burger at GBK.
Overnight we all broke that most sacred of Hackathon oaths and grabbed a bit of sleep, but awoke refreshed in time to watch the teams present their hacks. Presentations were very impressive, with over 70 hacks presented, including hacks by two groups of children! Phillips HUE lights were abused, as were puns on the name; a HUEge success for the Phillips development team, this being their first hackathon.
To finish; amazing event, amazing people, amazing free swag! Very inspiring, and definitely the best we’ve participated in so far. Massive thanks to the organisers (The Lab, Geeks of London) and the sponsors (PayPal, BBC R&D, Microsoft, Nokia Music, Heroku, MailJet, TechSmith, GitHub, Phillips and any others I forget to mention!).
Simon’s blog post here: http://simoncotts.co.uk/
Blog post by organisers here: https://thelab.o2.com/2013/07/eat-drink-and-hack-sleeping-optional/
Much better set of photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/martin_88/sets/72157634714365425/