Hackathons embody the pinnacle of human evolution. This past weekend I volunteered at AngelHack‘s 24-hour coding fest—the largest Hackathon in the world. Hackathons take care of all humanly needs a 21st century homo sapien desires. Hungry? Well, they’ve got a drone mini-airplane that’ll parachute a burrito to you. Sleepy? Grab an eBay-sponsored bean bag couch. Feeling belligerant? Then don’t deny your human need to wage war; fetch a nerf gun and use an innocent AngelHack volunteer as a human meat shield— yes, a coder dragged me through the rooms as he popped foam bullets at his victims. Hackathons provide it all so that the hackers* can focus on their glowing lines of code through the night. In fact, participants at a hackathon face such an environment of abundance—free food, free schwag, etc.—that everyone unites around a culture of giving and collaboration. This collaborative culture makes the Silicon Valley the most successful place in the world.
The brain power at a hackathon overflows so liberally that the urge to share knowledge becomes wrapped into the culture. The participants know that their business ideas won’t “get stolen” if they share it—quite the opposite, actually. They all recognize that innovations emerge as people interact, discuss and refine ideas. Hackathons encourage asking for help and providing advice. Even though coders at a hackathon split up into “teams,” “competition” does not accurately describe the event. In fact, the coders here probably hated gym, and this is their wonderful way of getting back at Coach Phil who always sputtered judgements of “survival of the fittest” to them back in high school.
Team members will more than happily bounce from one team to another offering insight and assistance. In fact, while I worked out a few bugs on this website and blog, a team member from keen.io came over to help this bumbling coding novice. Now you will notice a more seamless mobile version of this blog thanks to collaboration.
The level of trust the leaders of AngelHack instilled in the hackathon had such a profound effect on the participants that everyone felt perfectly comfortable leaving their expensive iPads and laptops as they chowed down on korean bbq for an hour in another room. Hackathons nourish our bellies all while we collaborate and change the world in less than 24 hours. That’s true human achievement.
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*For my non-techie readers, people in the Silicon Valley use the term “hackers” endearingly and proudly. Hackers code the next Pintrest or Google; they’re not the ones sending viruses to your inbox.