Register Now: Your Local Big Data Hackathon
Updated June 26, 2015
This is your opportunity to put your data skills to use for a good cause! Come along and meet other data pros as you use big data technologies to solve real-world problems, make a difference in your community, and learn about Microsoft’s big data technologies and cloud services. The Hackathons offer the chance to get hands on with the latest data science technologies and show the world what is possible when Hadoop/HD Insight, Machine Learning, and Power BI tools are used together to find solutions and unlock insights.
How does the Hackathon work? Contestants spend two days at the event, with food, drink, a $250 credit pass on Microsoft Azure, and other goodies & prizes provided. The agenda typically looks like this:
- Day 1: Morning: registration and short presentations from top Microsoft data professionals and partners providing insight and instruction on big data and data science topics such as Hadoop and HDInsight, Power BI, and Machine Learning. (Note: The experts will be available for the duration of the hackathon to assist with questions). Hacking starts around noon, and the contestants self-organize into teams of 3-5 members to use data science tools to design and build an analytical model to solve a specific data science problem or challenge. The hacking will continue well into the evening, and has been known to go all night! (Note: Remember to bring your own lap top, cords and dongles)
- Day 2: The competition continues from early morning to around 4pm, when the winning team will be announced by the Hackathon judging panel based on creativity, collaboration, innovation, and overall brilliance in data modelling and visualization. Cool prizes will be awarded to the winning teams.
Since November, over 800 data scientists and big data developers have participated in these big data Hackathons in London, Moscow, Johannesburg, Istanbul, San Jose, and Toronto. Didn’t make it to one of these events? You have more chances to participate!
Keep an eye out for Hackathons in a city near you! Those being considered right now are: Zurich, Frankfurt or Dusseldorf, Dubai, Chicago, an Israeli city, Auckland, Sao Paulo, Sydney, and possibly Dallas, Singapore, Sydney, Santiago!
Want to learn more about Microsoft’s big data solutions? Visit www.microsoft.com/bigdata.
Photo of the teams in San Jose Feb 2015, hacking in groups of 3-6.
