A Hackathon for Everyone

By this point I’ve participated in quite a few hackathons, app competitions, coding days and data camps, and have even helped throw one. From the outset, the first installment in the Gray Area Foundation for the Arts (GAFFTA) Summer of Smart hackathon had a different feel. Billed as a “hackathon for everyone”, the fine folks at the GAFFTA proved their mettle by attracting a broad cross-section of civic-minded coders, artists and organizers, most of whom had never attended a hackathon before, and convinced them to devote the better part of their weekend to making. With SoS, they not only got the ingredients right, but definitely added their own panache.

I’ve witnessed the power of mixing people with diverse skillsets and experiences, and this was once again reinforced, both within my particular SoS team, and at the hackathon as a whole. Check out the projects, covered by GAFFTA:

    * Public Art Spaces – Facilitating open and found spaces for creative culture.
    * Public Art Mapper – Finding and cataloging San Francisco’s public art from the street.
    * Between the Stops – Exploring the hidden stories on San Francisco bus lines.
    * Get Volunteered – Making volunteering as simple as going to the movies.
    * The Post – Bridging the online and street community with a “Bulletin Board 3.0″ for democratized expression.
    * Yay Taxes! – Making taxpaying fun by visualizing connections between government finance and public services.
    * iArt San Francisco – Curating citizen-sourced personal tours of public art around the city.

Also, checkout what my teammates have already said (much of it better than I will).