Monthly Archives: September 2013

Why #in50hrs doesn’t declare winners

How-to

Time and time again people ask us who are the winners of In50hrs and what do they get. I stop and ponder for a while and I realize that there are a lot of hackathons where there areprizes and winners being announced.

We had written a post earlier on how In50hrs is an Idea-to-Prototype event and not a hackathon. The difference is that, a prototype becomes a product and a product becomes a startup.  a hack… err, what do they become? Well, We havent quite figured out the answer to that. Most of the times, it doesnt become anything.

We realized after a few editions of In50hrs, that the “winners” we announced were the first to drop off. Teams dispersed and never did anything beyond that. Whereas the ones that built a prototype but didnt win, went off to do something beyond it - sometimes just to prove that they were the better ones.

On analysing this we realized it was a matter of satisfying vs gratifying. One a team has “won”, the mindset is that of a milestone crossed, mission accomplished and it is very hard to rally a team to still stick around. Once goals are met, teams dispurse. But with nothing more than a prototype in hand, you still have the onus of customer development, to go into the market (aka, get the hell out of the building) and talk to people and validate what you started off with. If you don’t follow up with that step, the prototype building process was a weekend getaway, with nothing to show for.

As per our statistics, one third of the teams that come together at In50hrs stay together post the event and ship the product - at the least an alpha launch page. Its a huge gulf crossed, because once people sign up, wanting to test the product the team gains momentum to wanting to launch it.

We try to delay the gratification and are consciously steering clear to give any signs that you have crossed the well. Until you hit customers, launch, and get real users behind your product you haven’t. And when you do that, the market will tell you whether you won or not, or if its time to go back to the drawing board. In any case, none of us - not even the jurors (who are mislabelled at in50hrs) have a say in that.

Ideas Pitched / Prototyped at In50hrs Pune 5

Event Report
1. InstaMe
Digital Business cards that are easy to share via Mobile - aimed at freelance professionals who want to build a following, the less tech-savvy way. They prototyped a way to build and share a passbook file that you can keep on your phone and share.
The app even lets you track how many people have your contact on their phones - and you can update/send a message if you are doing a new dance class batch etc.
2. LetsshareRide
A mobile app that allows anyone - with a car or motorbike to become a carpooler, on the go. Turn on “Carpool mode” and commuters can coordinate with you for a pickup and share a ride.
3. Slambook
Nostalgic about the slambook era where friends wrote about their fond memories of you? Well, now its online in Digital form.
4. Pracly
Pracly allows entrepreneurs, product managers and anyone who is creating value to find the right support they require, by connecting them to mentors and experts. You book a time, pay for it, and you get a fixed timeslot with a mentor/expert to get personal advice for a specific issue. Live at www.pracly.in
5. OfferBol
Allows you to find deals of local stores nearby.
6. Obhiyo
Been in a situation where a friend sold his used book. And you went and bought the same book for new and didnt know someone in your own network had it for sale? Well, Obhiyo aims to solve that.
7. Hackreward
Hackreward is solving the problem of recruitment and talent search by leveraging the github repository, setup by companies, aiding applicants to collaboratively build “systems”, not write modular code or solve mathematical algorithms and use the community to spot the best talent. Live at www.hackreward.com (the final codebase yet to be uploaded)
8. Narad
A Hardware based prototype that is like a portable NAS (Network Attached Storage) that you can use to move files between SD Cards, USB drives, Camera , Mobile Etc. What do they solve - well those times when your camera is running full and you need to dump it into a storage device, but cant do it without a PC nearby.
Next Event - in Chennai on Sept 27th (www.in50hrs.com/chennai)
====================================
The Three Ideas that didn’t move to the Prototype Stage.
1. A Solution for screening Fraudulent Resumes
2. A peer to peer rental platform
3. A Local platform for buyers/sellers
The teams will be announcing when the prototypes go live, via the In50hrs Facebook Group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/in50hrs/ - you can join, if you’d like to be kept updated and want to give feedback to the teams.