Stupid Shit No One Needs and Terrible Ideas Hackathon

http://stupidhackathon.github.io/

by sinak • 11 years ago

171 60 11 years ago

stupidhackathon.github.io

joshu• 11 years ago

Registering. Thanks

skrebbel• 11 years ago

I love that Peter Thiel is a category

recursify• 11 years ago

"Delighting The Designer" is my favourite I think

raverbashing3• 11 years ago

"Don't you just love Comic Sans!?"

"Maybe we should present an alert() to the user here"

anigbrowl• 11 years ago

Dammit, I am going to be working Los Angeles when this goes on. Wishing the event great success, I was enormously impressed by previous ones and think these hackathons serve an incredibly important social function.

jmzwar6• 11 years ago

Is this not the gratuitous negativity that Hacker News seeks to avoid? Satire is not universally good. Many start-ups in their infancy could be classified using that list. Indeed many of those start-up's founders come here for resources or support.

kennywinker• 11 years ago

Social critique isn't the same as "gratuitous negativity". I got a lot out of reading the projects that came out of last year's hackathon.

jmzwar6• 11 years ago

How can 'Stupid Shit No One Needs' be classified as a social critique by any respectable semantician?

jcoffland• 11 years ago

I find it gratuitously awesome. How's that for positivity?

angersock• 11 years ago

Many start-ups in their infancy could be classified using that list.

And maybe that's something we should be thinking about, yeah?

Indeed many of those start-up's founders come here for resources or support.

And we should be giving them resources to help get perspective on how shallow or first-world-problem their idea is, and support in finding a better way of allocating their time and energies.

pjscott• 11 years ago

I dispute the premise. Very of the things on that list are accurate descriptions of real startups! I haven't heard of anybody working on flesh skeumorphism, for instance, and as far as I know the only person working on monetizing the eschaton is Peter Thiel.

tomjen3• 11 years ago

I guess you have a point, but a: this isn't targeting anything particular and this is done for fun (otherwise they wouldn't be making those silly categories).

peterwwillis2• 11 years ago

This isn't satire at all. This is a real hackathon designed specifically to develop stupid things for fun.

A lot of startups began as stupid ideas and became billion-dollar corporations. What's so negative about doing it on purpose?

jmzwar6• 11 years ago

There isn't anything negative about doing it, just posting a list of stupid ideas peppered with satirised versions of common ideas.

tim333• 11 years ago

From "New Hacker News Guideline by Sam Altman":

"Negativity isn't the problem -- gratuitous negativity is. By that we mean negativity that adds nothing of substance to a comment."

Doesn't say anything about not linking to satire. Though I've noted satire in the actual comments here doesn't seem to go down well.

coldtea2• 11 years ago

Is this not the gratuitous negativity that Hacker News seeks to avoid? Satire is not universally good. Many start-ups in their infancy could be classified using that list.

And many startups are crap because of that, both in their infancy and later development.

There's nothing wrong with criticizing BAD things to snip them in the bud, and satire is not "gratuitous negativity", it's critique + humor.

raverbashing3• 11 years ago

I wonder why there are so many people with absolutely no comprehension of sarcasm (and other similar constructs) on HN.

Probably the same who then complain about their companies favouring bosses who have more communication/social skills.

Or maybe they're just trolling.

I'm all for founding a company which specializes in "Stupid shit no one needs" and is valued at billions of dollars. Sign me up!

crpatino4• 11 years ago

I'm all for founding a company which specializes in "Stupid shit no one needs" and is valued at billions of dollars. Sign me up!

At least in theory, companies "valued at billions" literally cannot specialize in "shit no one needs". That statement comes most likely from an observer that does not belong to your target market and has little capacity for empathy (this shit I don't need, therefore no one ought to need it).

Of course it is possible to sell worthless equity to gullible investors, if you happen to have a knack to find any. Though I don't think that's what you were talking about.

ianstallings2• 11 years ago

They're just trying to have little fun and think outside the cylinder. I wouldn't take it so cynically.

pokoleo• 11 years ago

Previously, at UWaterloo...

http://terriblehack.website

bruceb• 11 years ago

The Stealing Economy. Stealing does need to be disrupted. For too long "Big Pawn" has given thieves pennies on the dollar for hot goods.

krapp• 11 years ago

So... Bitcoin?

pavel_lishin• 11 years ago

Stealing does need to be disrupted. For too long "Big Pawn" has given thieves pennies on the dollar for hot goods

I disagree. Current pawnshop technology is lagging behind nearly every field. Why should I have to shlep my legitimately acquired car stereo, or the television without any cables or remote control down to a physical location?

I should be able to log onto paw.nr, snap a photo of the thing I want to pawn with my iPhone 4 that has "Kimberly & John Forever" engraved on the back, and instantly get bitcoins deposited into my wallet.

If I don't pay that money back in time, Pawnr locates a willing buyer, they use Taskrabbit or Fiverr to send someone to my house to collect the merchandise and deliver it to the buyer.

Disruptive as fuck, bro.

reustle• 11 years ago

I like subtle dig at Vessyl https://www.myvessyl.com/

hyperpallium• 11 years ago

They were inspired by http://www.stupidhackathon.com/ If you can't wait for the results, have a look at that one.

rl32• 11 years ago

Just to note: that site gets very NSFW the further you scroll down.

Also, it is sad that teledildonics is not making a return this year. The best-named category by far, and probably a real thing somewhere in the adult industry.

Presumably, professionals working within this field may then refer to their occupation or specialization as that of a teledildonicist.

icebraining• 11 years ago

It is a real thing, as the Metafetish blog reports: http://www.metafetish.com/tag/teledildonics/

qdot76367• 11 years ago

While it's not in the hackathon (I have /so/ thought about entering though), teledildonics is very much a real thing and there are more products out right now for it than ever. Hell, there's even a pretty big patent war happening that I'm working on writing up.

And teledildonticist has been in my twitter bio for years, yes (I run the metafetish blog listed in the other comment). :)

ianstallings2• 11 years ago

edibleX is the most exciting category imho. I've always wanted to eat my computer after hitting a milestone.

cloudwalking• 11 years ago

This could be really fun. Some quick ideas:

Like React.js But For Cooks - Metered digital MSG dispenser (perhaps in a spray?)

Monetizing The Eschaton - Credit card-reading donation plate / tip jar

Hyperlocal Paranoia - Device with LED/beeper + wifi, indicates whenever a new/unseen MAC address is nearby

Flesh Skeuomorphism - Computer mouse with skin-like texture

Scatological APIs - Device and service which monitor stool movements. Summaries, graphs, alerts.

Targeting The "Hikikomori" Space - Take any/all existing services (Uber, WashIO, food delivery, etc) and guarantee no conversation required.

nl3• 11 years ago

Scatological APIs - Device and service which monitor stool movements. Summaries, graphs, alerts.

A truly shitty big data movement...

Though of course it's actually a pretty good idea. See [1] for example.

[1] http://quantifiedtoilets.com/

barbs• 11 years ago

Adult Swim did a skit on this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJklHwoYgBQ

godzilla82• 11 years ago

This would be very useful device to carry with you if you were to visit the planet Bethselamin.

jarman• 11 years ago

Monetizing The Eschaton - Credit card-reading donation plate / tip jar

Catholics already did it

http://i.imgur.com/e77Sy4t.jpg

spiritplumber• 11 years ago

http://www.aftertherapturepetcare.com/ Then there's these guys.

qbrass• 11 years ago

Flesh Skeuomorphism - Computer mouse with skin-like texture

http://www.instructables.com/id/Mouse-Mouse!/

jesusthatsgreat• 11 years ago

Smart Watches

RankingMember• 11 years ago

Haha, I love the Google Glass rollover image used here.

Rhapso• 11 years ago

maybe I am a bit odd, but a a lot of these seem really viable.

Servitude-As-A-Service seems particularly viable. We are in an economic state where indentured servitude sounds like a decent deal.

Stupid Shit No One Needs and Terrible Ideas Hackathon

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