Hardware Zone

Hackathons are often saturated with purely software hacks. Every hackathon demo day always has a sea of tables filled with only a phone or laptop to represent a project. I find myself constantly passing by those tables in favor for more extravagant hacks. It seems that many other hackers share this viewpoint, since hardware hacks are always surrounded by curious eyes. Software hacks can be, and often are, incredibly interesting and awe inspiring. However, the best-crazy-awesome-super-cool hacks that I have seen have always been hardware hacks.

I only construct hardware hacks. Dat hardware life has its issues though. I have had many problems creating hardware hacks due to lack of materials. At almost every hackathon I attend, I have to bring a huge bag of hardware just to make sure I have enough supplies. The funniest thing ever is seeing the complete awe on someone’s face when you pull out five different boxes of various hardware from your camping bag, and then you start wiring up a circuit. At one hackathon, I plugged the electrodes attached to my face into a circuit, and people were completely astonished and baffled by what I was doing. In reality, I was creating a hack that would take the average hacker barely two hours to understand, implement and improve upon. Yet people freak out at my hacks because it is “hard”ware.

The hardware hackathon community is growing, but a major impedance at every hackathon is the short supply of hardware. To fix this, Bitcamp 2016 will have the Hardware Zone. This will be an awe inspiring hardware hacking area that will provide hardware and mentors to teach attendees how to create an awesome hardware hack. This area will include everything needed for a novice or an expert to create a hack. The list of hardware for this area will include:

  • Soldering Irons and Solder
  • Spools of wire (in multiple colors)
  • Capacitors
  • Resistors
  • Potentiometers
  • Multimeters
  • Wire strippers
  • Bread Boards and Perf Boards
  • And more

(P.S. This is the Hardware Zone. No flexing is allowed in this zone. Also, we help anyone create any hack because I ain’t got no type. Dope hacks is the only thing that I like.)