Three Days on the Startup Bus

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/07/the-secret-lives-of-hackathon-junkies/397895/?single_page=true

by ltnately • 11 years ago

49 10 11 years ago

rhaps0dy• 11 years ago

Nice article. I had a good time.

Here are some pearls from it:

Nothing useful is ever created at a hackathon.
sometimes “entrepreneur” means “runs a successful company” and sometimes it means “more ideas than money.”
Eddie [...] dresses exclusively in free t-shirts from tech events. [...] his job is to go around the country attending hackathons, throwing pizza parties, and handing out t-shirts to developers to convince them to use SendGrid.

Reads exactly like the hackathons I've attended.

jpmoral• 11 years ago

I read somewhere (can't find it now) that hackathons work better when there are specific problems to solve rather than just having a general theme. Makes sense, but I'm curious whether anyone has any experience regarding this. I've only ever attended one, a couple of years ago.

coolsunglasses• 11 years ago

Haskell community has hackathons around the world that end up being 60% conference, 40% hackathon with people jumping between each depending on interests. A lot of infrastructure has been built or improved, tutorials, tooling, etc. at these hackathons.

BayHac and ZuriHac are two of the more prominent ones.

rfrey• 11 years ago

"There’s even a term for the useless software that people make: vaporware. The idea is that it’s created, and then it evaporates because nobody works on the project after the hackathon (despite everyone’s best intentions)."

Has anyone ever heard this definition of vaporware before?

seiji• 11 years ago

Also see the new definition of shareware: an app going viral because so many people are sharing it.

nickpsecurity2• 11 years ago

I hadn't heard the new definitions of either term. Maybe I'm not drinking enough Kool Aid these days haha.

nickpsecurity2• 11 years ago

Really enjoyed the article. Wonder if she sold the Pizza app to Dominos or something. Code it in their stack for easy integration, pitch common use case, and boom. Who knows.

On the overall thing, I've always suspected these were more a giant party than anything useful. The reason is that good things usually take time and quality thought to put together. Sleep can work wonders, too. Wish I was in Nashville for this event as it would've been fun talking to the Startup Bus crowd.

dj-wonk• 11 years ago

If twisty mountain roads work "magic" for the Startup Bus, maybe it is time for the Start Up Vomit Comet. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced_gravity_aircraft)

reustle• 11 years ago

Is that primary image from a gaming event, and not a hackathon?

romanovcode• 11 years ago

Seems like it

Three Days on the Startup Bus

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