Gathering the wisdom of geeks to solve cutting-edge problems, the geek organization "DoraHacks" will hold a "decentralized" global hackathon

Hackathon, also known as Hacker Festival, is an event that convenes a global team of geeks to use programming to solve technical problems in the industry within a limited time.I have recently come into contact withDoraHacks, as a geek community with a large number of active people in China, has held more than a hundred events.

Let’s first introduce some interesting things that teams that have participated in DoraHacks activities have done:

• In the earliest youth field held, students used programming to deal with issues such as space debris and Beijing smog.

• The competing team in Beijing combined the sharing economy and smart contracts to create a "decentralized" smart door lock, allowing paying guests to check in directly across the platform, challenging Airbnb's "centralized" status; another team "invented" Virtual diamond rings that cannot be tampered with and are passed down among relatives are said to be very popular among girls.

• At Tsinghua University, a team used AI voice to recognize the heroes in "Honor of Kings" and gave game suggestions; a team helped a Canadian medical school determine whether a patient had epilepsy.

• At the Shenzhen site, a team designed a virtual card game similar to "Water Margin Cards"; some teams used neural networks to improve the recognition accuracy of complex chemical structural formulas and solve practical problems in the industry; another team crawled Huabei Credit limit and Alipay orders are used to draw a user's consumption portrait and predict consumption and repayment trends in the next month within 2 minutes.

• In Xi'an, a team created a diary APP that combines the weather and mood colors of the day. The UI is exquisite and has attracted the attention of investment institutions.

• A team from the US market integrated blockchain, financial technology and life scenarios to establish an insurance model for avocado harvests...

Song Ting, the head of brand and public relations, introduced to me DoraHacks’ original intention and future plans for hosting the hackathon.

At the end of 2014, DoraHacks started from Tsinghua University's "Owl Laboratory"; in 2015, it was positioned as a geek media, joining forces with Oxford University to spread scientific knowledge; from 2016 to 2017, DoraHacks held nearly a hundred events, including hackathons in five major cities in China , becoming the earliest pure charity hackathon organizer in China; in January 2018, DoraHacks integrated the brand,The global hackathon has been officially launched. In the spring, it will be launched in Berkeley, MIT, Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and Seoul, South Korea; in the summer, blockchain competitions will be held in Singapore and the United States; in the second half of the year, it will return to Beijing to launch a hackathon with more than 1,000 people, and it will be open to the audience. It plans to land in more than ten countries throughout the year to connect more geeks around the world.

In the process of holding high-frequency events, DoraHacks has accumulated standardized brand operations and event execution plans. There is a clear division of labor between the headquarters and "sub-rudders". While improving the details, it also cares about the experience and growth of the contestants.

Song Ting said that geeks who come to hackathons usually focus on their own fields and may not be good at socializing online. But offline, there is no strong commercial purpose, the atmosphere is friendly, you can make new friends, ignite mutual inspiration and broaden your horizons, "it is a spiritual enjoyment." Some players form teams on the spot and focus on one topic 24 hours a day without being disturbed by "side tasks". They can fully communicate with the team, eat and live together, which deepens team cohesion.

The rewards don’t stop there. Some players who formed a temporary team later joined forces to start a business, or they were favored by capital, or their results were purchased by sponsors, leading to commercialization and patenting. DoraHacks will also connect with investors in a friendly manner and provide financial support to high-quality blockchain projects.

DoraHacks provides dinner (usually pizza), midnight snacks, breakfast, sleeping bags, arranges musical performances, relieves tension, encourages communication between teams, and reimburses travel, food and accommodation. also,Hundreds of scientific companies settled in DoraHacks (such asFlash silver,Paper is expensiveetc.) open databases and tools to contestants and initiate propositions.Solving practical problems in the industry is the best alchemy stone for the mind and helps enhance the creativity of geeks.

Before the activity starts, the team takes the initiative to pick up the topics or brings their own topics. Within 24 hours, the team divided the work according to their respective expertise, arranged shifts and stayed up late to write the demo. Hackathons are more "hardcore" than roadshows. They don't pay attention to ppt and just "run the code and see the results." The awarding rules are "decentralized", with each team receiving 3 votes, which must be voted to at least two other teams to prevent "vote reversion". The final winner receives a bonus.

Although DoraHacks does not recommend continuous participation due to player fatigue, there are also teams that are "addicted" to registration. Nearly 20,000 geeks have participated in DoraHacks activities, including 45% from Internet and technology companies, 37% from universities and research institutions, and "genius teenagers" who have established blockchain investment funds in Silicon Valley.

In addition to DoraHacks, there are also many organizations and companies at home and abroad holding hackathons. Resources Beyond, DorahacksThe barriers lie in starting early, having many events, deep relationships with participants, and standardized operating models.. With the advancement of its "Thousand Schools Settlement Plan", DoraHacks hopes that the hosting of hackathon can also be "decentralized". As long as it can convey the spirit of geeks, all places are welcome to participate in the hosting.

Song Ting said that DoraHacks will adhere to its positioning as a social enterprise and its public welfare nature. The costs will be covered by sponsors and will not hold a hackathon for a single company. It is understood that the team itself is developing a crowdsourcing DAPP that uses tokens to motivate the open source community, similar to an online hackathon.

The DoraHacks team has about 20 people, mainly from Tsinghua University and Oxford University, and are currently located in Beijing and Silicon Valley (responsible for North American affairs). Event execution teams in Shanghai, Hangzhou, Xi'an, Wuhan and other places are responsible for recruiting volunteers. Based on past experience, volunteers have high human efficiency and quality. Many employees of large technology companies and university teachers undertake volunteer work and gain new inspiration.

The five people at the decision-making level are mainly responsible for brand building, including operating social media, and creating around the independent IP "Brainhole Cat" to attract the pan-tech circle. Zhang Jiannan is a former researcher at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) and a former partner of the American citizen science platform SciStarter. Song Ting, former partner of Tsinghua University's "Innovation + Incubator", director of Tsinghua University Student Network TV Station, served as a speaker at the China-Korea Science and Technology Innovation Forum, and was invited to give a speech at UNESCO. Wang Peiying has in-depth consulting experience in real estate, precision medicine, security big data and other fields. Lang Sailing, formerly worked at Deloitte's London office and Pacific Alliance Investment Fund, and is a member of the Chang'an Club. Yue Hanchao, Overseas Vice Chairman of Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management, served as the special guest host of the first Sino-US Bankruptcy Law Roundtable.

I am Hao Fangzhou. If you want to report on high-quality blockchain projects, please add nooxika on WeChat and note the company + name + reason.

[The pictures in this article are all provided by DoraHacks]