On Friday March 7th I participated in a Hack-Day sponsored by NetSquared. Approximately 15 non-profit groups attended, and were joined in discussions by about the same number of developers with specific technology skills. The event was sponsored by, and held at, Google's Mt. View offices.
The discussions ranged from "I have an idea, but I'm not sure where to go with it..."; to "I have an idea but don't know where to find a data set to make it work"; to "I have an idea and a data set, but can't figure out the api to make it work"
It was very cool. The energy was high, and the efforts sincere. It was great to see technology experts offering their skills to support non-profits.
It always strikes me when I attend these types of events how important it is to have opportunities for face-to-face interactions to fuel and maintain a community's momentum. (During my three year tenure as Co-Chair of the Schools Interoperability Framework Association (SIFA) we held code-a-thons 3-4 times a year).
The Global Citizenship Team at Sun has promoted Netsquared's Mash-up Challenge to our employees. We are looking forward to seeing what contributions our fellow employees may make to non-profits in this arena.
I am curious if readers of this blog have participated in similar hack-a-thons / mash-ups. What were your experiences?