This article was published on April 14, 2012

London Real-time hack weekend gets going to inspire new projects on the fly


London Real-time hack weekend gets going to inspire new projects on the fly

GoSquared is partnering with TwilioPusherGeckoboard,RabbitMQ, and Amazon Web Services to kick off London Real-Time this weekend. It’s taking place right now at White Bear Yard.

Talented coders, developers and designers are snapping at the APIs in a competition that will see many of them pulling all-nighters in the space provided by General Assembly.

The focus on this event is to create something from scratch over the weekend, so no long projects or pre-prepared work, all fresh ideas that begin today and hopefully come to fruition by Sunday.

London Real-time opened with some encouraging introductions from the companies supplying the APIs. They are also providing prizes for the winning projects that use their interfaces to come up with something cool. The winners will get either an iPad or Android tablet and there’s a truckload of the usual neat t-shirts and even some socks up for grabs.

Chris Leydon is an evangelist for GoSquared and he is very enthusiastically leading the weekender,

“The best thing about an event like this is the buzz that you get from the people who are coming here and building stuff with the things you love. Personally, all I want is to inspire people with great technology. That’s what London Real-time is all about, its for getting people to build great things.”

To follow the event, keep an eye out for the #ldnrealtime tag on Twitter. Interestingly, as a reminder to participants to spread the word, the hashtag has been stamped onto wristbands (the wristbands also act as ID to get in and out of the event and the participants can use them to get free coffee).

As I left the coders to their computers and networking around a rooftop BBQ, the atmosphere was buzzing with what they might build together. There was some mention of the Olympics and talk about image solutions. The start of any hack weekend is always hard to leave, it’s an exciting time when new connections are made and ideas start to form.

I’ll be heading back on Sunday evening, when the pitching process beings to find out what was created over what is likely to be a sleepless but fun weekend for everyone involved. Check back to find out what happens.

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