
How Michigan took hackathons by storm. - CEWendel
https://medium.com/hackers-and-hacking/e6439754078
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jamespitts
I am an outsider, but I've seen the inside of this machine.

I came to Ann Arbor from LA in 2009 in order to build stuff in a hacker-
friendly and foodie town that is a financially rational place to live.

But I didn't expect to find this community of startupy freaks at UM. They are
gung-ho in a lets-go-to-the-football-game sort of way. They are often innocent
to technological limits, and at times godawfully ruthless. I also notice a
particular affinity for building things quickly and then moving on. But they
are doing amazing work at MPowered and have roped in a lot of people who would
have otherwise marched into corporate oblivion.

UMich hackathon culture is what germinated my current startup, rapt.fm, in
January, 2012. A lot of folks involved in MPowered helped the demo get built
on that weekend and put in a lot of hours throughout the buildup since then,
(including David, the writer of the article).

As great as it is for Michigan, I do think that most of these folks will head
out to the Bay Area. But enough will stick around here where the woods run
deep and the people are happy.

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hammerzeit
My initial instinct was to criticize this. I think that's some combination of
feeling like hackathons are often a coarse method of exploitation and the
feeling that this kind of boosterism may be overstated or unnecessary.

But the truth of the matter IMO is that this deserved to be recognized and
celebrated. It's really exciting to see environments that expose people to the
joy of making things and the realities of making things happen. This kind of
culture was foreign at the major liberal arts universities I saw when I was an
undergrad 5-10 years ago, and I think it's a positive change. Congrats!

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igul222
There's a big difference between corporate hackathons and collegiate
hackathons, I think. The former are exploitative and weird; the latter are
inspiring and awesome.

(I organize HackMIT, our big hackathon)

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manglav
I'll throw in my experience. I went to PennApps Jan 2013 after I learned some
HTML, CSS, and javascript with some new friends I made. While we didn't
associate with Michigan Hackers, we saw the rise of the facebook group, and
their "recruiting efforts". They killed it. Fun stuff on the diag(the quad),
awesome hack nights. It was sort of a focal point - a bright light to hacker
moths, who were always around, but didn't have a community. Mhacks is
definitely a force to be reckoned with, and a large part of my first steps
towards software development.

Also, MPowered is our university entrepreneurship club. In my experience with
them, it is mostly filled with business people trying to find software guys to
build their stuff for them. However, apparently there is an incubator that has
most of the people that actually build, but I never saw them too much.

Go Blue! Can't wait to see what they will do next year.

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jsinghdreams
I think this post serves as a wonderful blueprint as to how one can create a
passionate community of individuals with a single goal in mind.

I would love to see another post, detailing the other side of UM's success;
the long hours students spent training, and preparing for a hackathon.
Everyone loves to make the claim that they showed up at a hackathon, learned
how to program some new language, and take top 3 at a hackathon. What many
posts fail to address are what was done to rally the students around such
causes and get them both mentally and technically prepared for a hackathon.

Great job David et al, can't wait to see what's next!

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octopi
Given most of the post is about the quantity of Michigan students at
hackathons or other events, I think it's worthwhile to mention how the school
is also unique because it has the advantage of size: there are just so many
students there.

I find Penn's breakout achievements far more impressive given their much
smaller student body, as well as what Columbia/NYU have done with hackNY.

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chriwend
There are many state schools as large as Michigan, such as Penn State, Ohio
State, University of Illinois. Illinois in particular actually has a larger CS
department but their hackers don't come anywhere close to the turnout Michigan
gets. None of the other large schools do. That being said, this shows how
impressive of a feat this is for Penn and other small private schools.

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Kinnard
There's no place to hack like Michigan. Can't wait to see what happens when
people start realizing they can hack anything. Not just photo apps, but
civilization itself.

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rjvir
"A year ago, the University of Michigan’s hacker community lay dormant. Today,
it is a force to be reckoned with." - says who?

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rmason
It is a bit of an overstatement to say Ann Arbor's hacker community has been
dormant. It's the liveliest in the state and Ann Arbor has also long been the
startup capital though it is starting to be challenged by Detroit.

However I was there opening night at MHacks and what that crew pulled off was
nothing short of amazing. There was incredible energy in the building that
night.

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gailees
What do you think about me changing the title to "How hackathons took Michigan
by storm?"

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rjvir
A bit sensationalist, but gets the point across I guess

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gailees
sensationalist as opposed to the current title? Any other recommendations?

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sparkygoblue
University of Michigan grad here. Keep up the good work gentlemen. Go Blue!

