On May 9 I received an email from the organization of the #WorldInnovationDay Hack 2023 confirming that they had appointed me as a mentor for the Hackathon to be held from May 12 to 15. I mean, that same week.
But, what is a Hackathon?
It is a kind of technological marathon organized in this case by the United Nations. Anyone can participate and either propose their own project and create a team, or join an existing team.
In addition, the projects carried out by the different teams must propose a benefit for the planet. The idea is that they follow at least one (or several) of the 17 points of the UN sustainable development goals.
Since Oracle was a sponsor of the event, extra points were given if the proposed solution is implemented with APEX. Oracle also provided educational resources so that teams could use both APEX and OCI without major issues. In addition, they also sponsored @AI4Diveristy, @polygon and @Filecoin, and the unvaluable @Hackmakers collaboration!.
The mentors helped the different teams so that their developments come to fruition.
Ah, the winners can win up to $7,000 in prizes, so don’t miss it for motivation.
The first day I took a look at the equipment and I saw that there was power! You could guess what certain projects were about (others were kept secret by the teams), and in the Slack of the hackathon the competition began to heat up. The participants who were without a team tried to convince other participants without a project to join forces, and during the first day and the second.
There is also something very interesting in this type of event, and it is the possibility of meeting new people with whom to collaborate professionally. It’s like a weekend camp and since the event is worldwide, I could see how many teams even had participants in different time zones on the planet. Which is a challenge, but it also contributes a lot culturally to the development of such a project.
Of course, it allows you to test your skills and, very rewarding, participate in trying to make a significant impact on the world.
In the hackathon there were two challenges:
🌟 Tech For Good
🌟 Blockchain for Good
The first, Tech For Good, is all about open data, partnerships, and creating resources that bridge the gap between public and private organizations. This is where the use of Oracle technology is rewarded with +2 points for all participants who use APEX in their solution.
In the second, Blockchain for Good, it is about generating innovative and positive solutions focused on transparency, decentralization and security. Here you were awarded +1 for using Buzzy and +1 for using Wand.
Buzzy is an app that allows you to turn a design or prototype made in Figma into an app. Wand is an AI oriented to solving business problems, allowing input sources and generating conclusions.
So to kick off the Hackathon, Oracle launched those two brilliant workshops:
- Building from scratch with Oracle and Open AI
- Deploy a GPT model on OCI Oracle Cloud Infrastructure
With this, the UN World Innovation Day hackathon began on Friday, May 12, with 69 teams, of which I was able to officially mentor three of them, although I personally assisted several others.
I can say this was one of the most exciting collaborations I’ve participated, and the final hours really got me near to a hearth attack.