Supplyframe‘s DIY community, Hackaday, has been gaining a huge amount of traction and growing along with the flourishing Maker movement. And their 2015 Hackaday Prize demonstrates just how big the community has gotten. This year, the winner of the prize can choose between a trip to space or $196,883.
What warrants such an impressive prize, worthy of a reality game show winner? This year, the theme of the Hackaday Prize is “Build Something That Matters”. After receiving hundreds of submissions from 55 countries and giving away $350k in prizes with the 2014 contest, Hackaday has seen the true force that is their community of hackers, designers, and engineers and they want to channel that energy into improving existence for us lonely humans. As SupplyFrame’s CEO, Steve Flagg, says, “The world has some big problems that still need solving. This year’s Hackaday Prize is all about inspiring people to tap into their hacker spirit and to build something that could make a real difference for humanity.”
On the Prize website, Hackaday outlines three broad categories representing the many problems facing the collective at present: pollution, food, and energy. If you can find a method for helping the species deal with any of these issues (or any other major world problems), such as cleaning up pollutants, growing food, or storing energy, you have a shot at the grand prize of a trip to space or $196,883. And, even if you can’t get the top spot, the site has plenty of other prizes for people who can craft awesome solutions to local problems.
Runner up prizes include: a 90-Watt Full Spectrum Laser Cutter, Builder Kit (pcb mill, 3d printer, cnc router, bench lathe), a tour of CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, and a chance to explore Shenzhen, China. Applicants can also choose to compete for the $100K Best Product Prize, which will give the winner a chunk of cash and a six month residency at the Pasadena HackASpace, as well as support towards getting a product onto the market. And, by incorporating products manufactured by the Prize’s sponsors into your project, you’ll have a chance to win some of their goods, as well. The sponsors for this year’s prize are: Atmel Corporation, Freescale Semiconductor, Microchip Technology, Mouser Electronics, and Texas Instruments.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say that Hackaday really wants to help out the world and they’re willing to put out the resources to help people do it. The site is even going to reward worthy early entries with product development help. They write, “To help with your prototyping we will be recognizing early entries on ‘Hot Lists’ with things like help getting PCBs produced and getting parts ordered.”
To enter, just start building up your project on Hackaday.io. Begin with the rough sketch of your idea and, as the community chimes in, your project will develop further and, ultimately, be entered into the contest. Sounds simple enough!
The prizes are so enticing that it’s hard not to want to enter, even without any manufacturing or engineering skills! And the cause is so all-encompassing and well-intentioned that I’m already brainstorming! What about a bumble-bee powered water purifier? No, that’s dumb. Um… a thing that converts poop water into drinkable water + electric power! Dang. They have those. A machine that creates physical objects from computer models layer by layer. Nah, that’s impossible…
Oh! Here’s the making of the 2015 Hackaday Prize promo video!
