FAQ
Your 48h experience at the #hackthecrisisAT Hackathon
The hackathon is already over. However, feel free to check out our FAQ section here to get an impression of what we have been doing or have a look at the amazing projects that were developed during the hackathon.
Overall
Learn more about the overall Hack the Crisis Austria hackathon, and what it could mean to you.
Who’s behind the Hack The Crisis Hackathon?
“HACK THE CRISIS” Austria is a virtual hackathon organised by volunteers of the AustrianStartups Community, with support of the corporate- and public sector. Inspired by a Global Community of Hack-the-Crisis organisers around the world.
When will the ‘Hack the Crisis’ Hackathon take place?
The Hackathon will take place this weekend from March 27-29, CET time zone. You have 48 hours to build a solution together with a team that will help us in this crisis. We start with a Kick-Off Call on Friday at 4pm and end the hackathon on Sunday around 9pm with the final pitching ceremony. The winners will be announced on Monday afternoon.
How does a virtual Hackathon work?
A hackathon is a an event (usually over a couple of days) where problem solvers get together to work on solutions for concrete problems. Our Hackathon takes place exclusively online and is focused on tackling the challenges society is currently facing due to the spread of COVID-19.
We provide the appropriate tools so that participants can jointly develop solutions online. We have a Slack workspace as a communication platform for the teams and use Zoom for Checkpoint Calls, Webinars and Mentor Calls.
How can I join the virtual Hackathon?
We are looking for out-of-the-box, bold and innovative ideas that will help society to develop solutions in response to the current crisis, and to even emerge stronger from the current difficult situation caused by Covid-19. For this to work, the Hack the Crisis Austria Hackathon needs a strong community. We need you!
You can get involved in four different ways:
- Participant: Do you want to actively work on solving a challenge within a project team? Are you available for the whole 48-hour Hackathon and eager to join a motivated team? Sign up here!
- Challenge Host: Do you have a proposal for a challenge that the teams should work on during the hackathon? We are focusing on the areas of health, emergency response, education and business. However, if you have a meaningful challenge in another area, feel free to submit as well! As a challenge host, you are committing to supporting the teams of your challenge throughout the whole weekend. Sign up here with your challenge.
- Mentor: We’re looking for super-hero mentors to help the problem solvers! If you’re an expert in any field and want to share your know-how with our teams, sign-up as a mentor under this link. We’ll help you coordinate all the processes and use your valuable time as efficiently as possible.
- Sponsor: If you would like to sponsor a prize for the most promising ideas, support the organisational team with financial funds or provide technological infrastructures that teams could use during the hackathon, please sign up here.
PARTICIPANTS
We are inviting all problem solvers to participate and show us how you would tackle various challenges!
Are there prerequisites for participation?
We are inviting all the creators, IT specialists, companies, project managers & everyone to participate and show us how you would solve various challenges through creative production and application of technology.
There are generally no requirements to participate in the virtual Hack the Crisis Austria Hackathon. Use your interdisciplinary team and be creative together to develop solutions that help us in the crisis and afterwards.
Do you have internet access and an email address? Then nothing stands in your way to participate in the Hack the Crisis Hackathon Austria.
How can I register as a participant?
We invite everyone, not just developers, but experts, entrepreneurs, and professionals in every field to contribute their time and skills to tackle the crisis together.
STEP 1: Register as a participant through this form, Friday 6pm the latest.
STEP 2: Join the Kick-off Call on Friday 4pm
STEP 3: You’ll be granted access to the Hackathon’s Slack Channel, straight after our Kick-Off Call on Friday afternoon
#HacktheCrisisAT is on and we want to rock it with you!
How many can participate?
There is no limit to the number of participants. Simply register here, join our Slack and find yourself in a team. Happy hacking! Registrations will close Friday, 18:00 PM.
Can I join the Hackathon as a team?
No, but you can coordinate with friends to form a team. Simply register separately as participant, find yourself a challenge in your interest area, and off you go.
The aim of the Hackathon is to bring people from a great variety of backgrounds and expertise together to develop solutions to the current challenges faced, together. If you consider to signup with friends/team, we highly recommend you to still find yourself additional team members to your existing team, up to 8 members. You’ll be surprised by the outcomes you find yourself with by the end of the weekend.
Do we get support during the Hackathon?
Our mentors are at your side throughout the Hackathon. They are experts in several subject areas ( e.g. med-tech, legal, data, security, etc.) and will support you with their feedback and knowledge in several check-ins over the 48 hours.
During the Hackathon you’ll have access to the following means to support your development:
(1) Workshop sessions: on subject-specific topics with experts
(2) Mentorship sessions: with mentors that will be allocated to your private team slack channel
(3) Checkpoint Calls: there will be 3 checkpoint calls with the core team and mentors to talk through your project’s development
(4) Pitching Ceremony: it is not mandatory to join, but highly recommended.
The hackathon will finish with a final pitching ceremony, starting from Sunday, March 29, 6 pm on.
We truly believe in the wisdom of the people and our community. Therefore, we aim to foster and utilise the wisdom of the crowd by promoting peer to peer support mechanisms where possible. Do you wish to host an input session yourself? Please, notify our team on slack.
Where and how can I find a challenge to work on?
From Friday morning on you can find all the challenges on our website. Take a first look and see which challenge interests you and where you can contribute your expertise.
After our Kick-Off Call on Friday 4pm you will get access to the Hack The Crisis Austria Slack Channel, where you can find individual Slack channels for each challenge. Select your challenge of interest to discuss with others about solutions and to form a team with which you will enter the Hackathon.
What happens from the moment I found a challenge I want to work on?
Within the respective Challenge Slack Channels you can discuss your ideas to solve the challenge together with other participants. Agree on a solution you want to move forward with and form + register your team (find out more under “team formation”).
As soon as your team is registered and you received access to your Team Slack Channel and you are ready to rumble!
Please keep yourself updated upon our agenda, in the agenda section on the home page*.
What are the rules for final team formations?
Do you have a project idea you would like to lead, or did you find a project idea on you’d like to lead – then look for team members to get ready to rumble! You can either look for members within your challenge discussion or post an open-call on our #team-formation slack channel to look for others who want to join you.
Team Size:
Our experience proves that the most efficient team has about 4 to 8 people. Set up the team to cover all required roles like necessary developers, DevOps, designers, a project manager, team lead or visionary. Consider involving a sociologist, healthcare consultant, psychologist, UX researcher in order to get the product or service ready in 3 days!
Team Submission:
Do you have your final team in place? Please register your team through TBD before Friday 8pm.
Are you missing team members? Please feel free to reach out to any of our organisators (all members with ORG_ in their name).
The final deadline is Friday 8pm to have the teams registered.
Team Channel:
Do you have your team submitted, registered and are you ready to move development forward? After you’ve submitted your team proposal, we’ll create a private project channel group on our slack for you. We’ll notify you when the real hacking can start!
Can you not find your team members?
From the experience, you can definitely kickstart your hackathon experience with a team of 2 people, but you can’t finish if you are missing team members. You will just have too much work to do.
In case you are a team of only 1 – 3 people or your team only exists out of one type of expertise (e.g. designers) you can do the following:
- — go to the #team-formation channel and get more people with missing skills;
- — Look for a similar idea and join forces;
- — Each of you joins 2nd best option based on your interests, as there are many other amazing ideas looking for a teamforce!
What can be submitted as a final result on Sunday?
The solutions developed can be both digital and analogue. We are dependent on everything that helps us to face the crisis.
What happens to the results afterwards?
To ensure that your prototypes become viable solutions after the hackathon, we are looking to build a network of supporters and contributors who could provide supportive means for you to continue your development. More information will follow over the course of the weekend.
CHALLENGE HOST
Challenge Host are individuals or organisations that have submitted challenges related to the COVID-19 crisis.
Challenge Submission is closed since 26th of March, 8pm.
What challenges can I submit?
Our aim is to develop community-driven solutions for community-sourced challenges. We do this by focusing on sourcing challenges from individuals and organisations, government and health institutions. Challenges that are concrete, and for which in 48h an MVP or prototype can be developed.
The final aim of the hackathon, is to facilitate the opportunity for a great variety of disciplines/expertise to develop solutions to these challenges, and to facilitate a stable foundation through which these solutions can accelerate in their development.
Do you have a suggestion for a challenge that the teams should work on during the hackathon? Please submit your challenge proposal through this form.
What are the requirements for challenges?
Challenge requirements:
- Challenges can come from the areas of health, emergency response, education, economy or anything else.
- It is important that the challenge can be implemented as a prototype within 48 hours.
- Only one challenge per person/organisation can be submitted.
What criteria are used to select challenges?
We select the challenges submitted, based on the following criteria:
- Impact
- quality
- practicability
- Existing solution
What if there are two similar challenges submitted?
Our first main goal is to source as many challenge cases as possible, to facilitate groupwork on challenge projects in alignment with interests and skill-sets from various backgrounds.
Do you see a challenge submission that is similar to yours? Join the Hackathon as a participant and send a message to the challenge host to see where you can bundle and bridge expertise together with other people!
What if I don’t have any challenge ideas, but I want to contribute?
We are happy to have you here with us. You can sign up as a participant, and contribute with all your thinking and blinking through this form.
Can I participate in the hackathon with my existing project from another Hackathon?
Over the past few weeks, everyone has been giving their all to develop digital approaches and infrastructures for the corona crisis. We love your work, and are happy to see where our hackathon can be of support to you and collect your projects in our challenge list.
Feel free to register as a challenge host with your existing ideas, formulated for these challenges e.g. scaling challenges for your beta versions and look for the support in the network that you need for the next steps. We are always available for networking
If my challenge is not taken, should I still register as a participant?
YES, we are happy to have you with us. Participant sign-ups are open until Friday 18:00PM through this form.
MENTOR
We’re looking for mentors who can coach the participants during the hackathon and experts who can answer questions along the way. Find more information on how this could look like, below.
How can I become a Mentor?
We’re looking for super-hero mentors to help the problem solvers! If you’re an expert in any field and want to share your know-how with our teams, sign-up as a mentor. We’ll help you coordinate all the processes and use your valuable time as efficiently as possible.
We’re looking for mentors in all areas, including software, hardware, legal, business, security, design, soft skills, data, and social sciences.
Our participants need your skills, knowledge, and experience to create life-changing solutions and fight COVID-19.
Do you consider yourself a bearer of knowledge and experiences, do you want to contribute by providing your expertise for free? Do not hesitate and send us your application!.
Please register through this link: Mentor Application Form
Let’s #HackTheCrisis together!
How much time will it take me?
We are looking for “hands-on Mentors” who can participate in the hackathon for the entire 48 hours and support the teams with their project development, through knowledge and experience sharing within several check-ins. There will be a morning and evening Checkpoint on Friday, Saturday and Sunday morning. You can find more detailed information in the schedule on the homepage.
Moreover, we are looking for “On-the-Call Mentors” available for specific expertise call-requests.
How many teams will I support?
Depending on your expertise and availability, you will support one or more teams. You can find out exactly which teams you’ll support on Saturday early morning, March 27
SPONSORS
The hackaton is a volunteer effort to help solve some of the challenges we as a community and as a country are facing today. Let us know if your company is interested in receiving more information about sponsor opportunities.
How can I contribute as a sponsor for the Hackathon?
There are several ways how you become a sponsor. We ask everyone to join in as much as they can – whether donating their time as mentors, participating as teams or providing financial support. How it could look like:
Funding & financial sources :
Hack the Crisis Austria is a volunteer effort to help solve some of the biggest challenges we as a community and as a country are facing today. However, funds are needed in order to support the teams after the hackathon to push their service live as quickly as possible and to cover costs that occur in order create this event as soon as possible.
Prizes:
Support can also be in the form of material prizes in support of moving the teams forward on lightning speed (Software/IT, Telecom, Insurance, etc.). This could be in other forms such as mentoring during as well as after the event, in the form of acceleration/incubation programs or any other form of workshop that can support the teams with their ideas.
Technological infrastructure:
We are looking for companies who are willing to provide their services to the participants during the Hackathon in order to set up the infrastructure to work remotely.
Mentors:
We are also still looking for mentors who can donate their time as super-advisors. Further information you can find in the mentor section and under this link.
Challenge
Do you have a suggestion for a challenge that our teams should work on during the hackathon? We are happy to hear from you through this form. You can submit (almost) any challenge you’ve identified, for which solutions are needed to help us to face the crisis together, give people security, orientation, and strengthen us for the aftermath.
You would like to get in touch? Please register as a sponsor through this link.
How can I get in contact to become a sponsor?
Please register through the link and let us know in which way you could support us. Once we have your registration we will get in contact with you and provide you with more information.
As a sponsor, will my company’s logo be published?
Yes, we will publish the logo of your company/organisation on our website. For any specific enquiries or needs, we are happy to talk.
MEDIA & PRESS
Want to spread the word about Hack the Crisis Austria? Or interest in covering our event in your blog, magazine, podcast, etc. ? Feel free reach out to us!
With who can I get in contact?
Press inquiries for interviews and statements in advance or afterwards can be shared with Johanna Einsiedler through email: Johanna.Einsiedler@austrianstartups.com with subject RE_Hackathon.