Review | Freedom, Music, Vitality: Look into California Blockchain and AI Hackathon
January 2018 20, 21st, the first overseas DoraHacks hackathon in 2018 was successfully held in Silicon Valley, United States. Dora, the best friend of hackers’ in the world, went across the sea to the other end of the world. The first global over-the-counter derivatives Blockchain Fortuna and the decentralized predictive market platform Bodhi provided energy support for hackers’ intellectual adventures. The game was over, but the hackers were still longing for more. What are some of the light spots worth sharing with DoraHackers? What are the differences between California’s hackers and us? Let’s look at the following.
Really Amazing
“High quality and strong collaborate ability” is volunteer team’s most prominent impression of hackers in this California Hackathon. These cool hackers, who live on the warm West Coast, have shown extremely high standards throughout the game. There was even no need to do icebreaking at the start, hackers naturally came to the open kitchen in the venue and chatted about ideas while eating snacks.
In this California Hackathon, a hacker was also not limited by blockchain when choosing the topics. Only one of the seven participating teams had done financial related topics. “Hackers really have a very broad span, which reflects a strong movability for creativity.” Event organizer Jingren said so.
The Down-to-earth Avacado
In this hackathon, half of the participants came from the tech industry and half were still students. For those who are still undergraduate students in North America, although young, they have a lot of experience in the industry. Two out of three top winning teams were student teams. The champion is from Minerva University, the captain is a veteran in the Blockchain industry, with more than two years of experience.
Dr. Cong Li, a senior industry expert in Blockchain industry from Fortuna, was invited to be a judge for the Hackathon. He told Jingren, “the demo of this event is really wonderful.” “Dr. Li was impressed by the award-winning team of the top three. “They fully harness the potential of blockchain technology and AI technology to solve the real pain points that exist in various industries,” he put with one word, ‘down-to-earth’. When it comes to this word, you can’t miss the ‘Avocado’ team that won second place. Their project is to use blockchain and AI technology to build an avocado harvest insurance platform to benefit farmers growing avocado around the world. In addition to presenting the project, a contestant from West Africa in the team also taught some knowledge about avocado.
Picture provided by DoraHacks Beijing Center，You are Welcome California Teams！
California’s Hacker Culture：Enjoy it！
Jingren Wang, the organizer of California Hackathon, is a 19-year-old undergraduate student at Minerva University. When DoraHacks Beijing Center spoke to her on the phone, Jingren had worked at high intensity for several days and was very tired, but she said to us, “I’m proud of myself, proud of the team, proud of the hackers.”
Hackathon is a lifestyle for hackers in California. There is a variety of hacker events in the hacker community, which makes hackers here very closely connected to each other.
Jingren also mentioned, “There was a senior judge in this competition who reached out to us to be involved, and he said he wanted to be inspired and touched as well.” It’s a good reflection of the hacker atmosphere in California. “Hackers in California don’t put the game title in a particularly important position, instead, they value the fun of creating and treat slogan ‘enjoy it’ as the most important thing.”
Dr. Li from Fortuna spoke highly of the event: “From the scene, the organization and operation of the event, it was fantastic.” The Sunday demo and award process was also done in a smooth and orderly manner with an active atmosphere. I think these are inseparable from the hard work and excellent organizational skills of Jingren and the whole team. I was also impressed by the piano live performance. A lot of people, including myself, have the habit of writing code while listening to music with headphones. But I think this kind of live music works a lot better than the music in the headset, and it doesn’t insulate the communication between team members as the headphones do.
During the meal and Hackers’ break, volunteer Yashi Yuan played the piano, the elegant and moving piano music made hackers extremely impressed. At the end of the event, many hackers said, ‘amazing’, the sound of the piano made them joyful and relaxed. Art and beauty, we can see, are also a help to hacker’s productivity.
Hacker’s Mission: Make the World a Better Place
“I think like a hacker, in addition to technology, it is more important to constantly think about what impact their skills can bring to society.” A good hacker must be able to use their own skills to promote the progress of society. As I said earlier, projects of this hackathon are very down-to-earth, but also fully reflect the spirit. “Dr. Li shared his definition of hackers.
Dr. Li also mentioned that it was the first time he had been involved in a hackathon, and he was indeed struck by an open, lively air at the event. This kind of atmosphere is of great benefit to the collaboration within the team and to the mutual learning between the teams.
This Hackathon US is sponsored and supported by the first global over-the-counter derivatives blockchain Fortuna, and Bodhi, which is committing to developing China’s predictive market for the world, allowing the decentralized application to truly accomplished. As China’s largest youth hacker organization, DoraHacks will continue to address important and pressing social issues, work with Dora’s friends to make the world a more beautiful place.
