May 8, 2018Intimate Strangers ProjectLooking for people to participate in an experimental art project around how we connect deeply in a digital age! What is the project? You’ll be paired with someone you’ve never met before who we think could be a new friend or a fit for a romantic partner, and we’ll bring…Love1 min readLove1 min read
Published inHackerNoon.com·May 8, 2018Creative by DefaultI just got back from a 7-day silent retreat, and one thing that surprised me was how creative I became after cutting out all outside influences for 3–4 days. Ideas were so exciting, because they were the only stimulation I had! …Productivity3 min readProductivity3 min read
Published inHackerNoon.com·Dec 19, 2017Announcing Recess Labs @ GCTWe’re excited to announce the launch of Recess Labs at Grand Central Tech! What Is Recess? You can think of us like a pre-idea incubator or a group EIR program. We bring a group of talented people from the tech world together for three months to spend an extended period…Startup3 min readStartup3 min read
May 24, 2017Doing a startup? Don’t learn to code.I was recently chatting with a friend of mine who was learning to code. A psychology researcher at a major university, he wanted to create an app that would make it easier for researchers to collect patient data. Ultimately, he wanted to turn it into a software product and sell…Entrepreneurship4 min readEntrepreneurship4 min read
Dec 8, 2016Announcing our Open Source FellowshipWant to spend a month in South America, expenses paid, working on Open Source? We’re excited to announce that we’re partnering with Changelog to offer two Open Source Fellowships for our upcoming trip to South America! At Hacker Paradise, we’re big fans of the open source community. When we launched…Open Source4 min readOpen Source4 min read
Published inStartups & Venture Capital·Mar 2, 2016Startups are the new deferred life plan“And then there is the most dangerous risk of all — spending your life not doing what you want on the bet you can buy yourself the freedom to do it later.” — Randy Komisar, partner at VC firm KPCB I was 19 when I read “Are You a Pirate?”…Startup8 min readStartup8 min read
Jan 7, 2016Paypal froze our funds, then offered us a business loanAbout a year ago, we made the decision to use Paypal as the primary payment method for our company, Hacker Paradise. After about a month, they froze all of the money we had in the account — around $30,000. For context, our company runs trips around the world for developers…Small Business3 min readSmall Business3 min read
Published inStories of Cebu·Jan 13, 2015Why You Should Move Your Social Venture to Cebu City, PhilippinesThis serial entrepreneur thinks Cebu could become the next hub for social enterprise Ravi Agarwal is no stranger to the startup game. He started his first Internet company in Boston in 1997, and has since had several successful exits, including an IPO. …7 min read7 min read
Published inHacker Paradise·Dec 7, 2014This is How We Get Ants: Lessons Learned Throwing a Hacker Retreat in Costa RicaIt’s been just over two weeks since Hacker Paradise (our programming retreat in Costa Rica) came to a close, and it was one hell of a ride. Participants came from over 10 different countries and had a ton of fun while working on some really cool projects, ranging from a…6 min read6 min read
Published inHacker Paradise·Aug 10, 201447% of initial applications for our Hacker Retreat came from women. This is how we did it.Unfortunately, if you’ve been in technology for any amount of time, you’ll have noticed that there is a slight gender imbalance. As we laid the groundwork for Hacker Paradise, we wanted to ensure that retreat participants were more diverse than the usual suspects, caucasian males in their twenties. We approached…4 min read4 min read
