Which is the space of citizens in our IT society? Can we empower standard people with technology?
We think all this technology world belongs to IT corporations and governments alike. But here at Let's Make Robots we see everyday who individuals and teams develop new technology solutions for our needs of just for fun.
Maybe we can go further and get public or our data and share, combine and create new possibilites of informed citizens. Maybe it's sharing sensors data, commanding together shared facilities, and more. It's an exploring and growing movement so Apps4citizens and Hacks/Hackers Barcelona are organizing their first hackathon together today 19th of June at the Antiga Fàbrica d'Estrella Damm in Barcelona. Is an special meeting were not only developers are invited to create a new app for the city. There is room too for journalists, creative people, designers and everyone who has an idea that can help to improve the quality of the city life.
We have been introduced at the start to this two interesting projects:
- iCity: an IT platform to get and share data.
- Gather: a very easy and powerful platform to develop apps.
Later, we heard "the challenge" organization has asked to all participants:
"Using environmental sensor from citizens to evaluate and improve the quality of life (for example) and share through apps as a journalist article."
It's a very interesting challenge which all of us can enjoy in one or other way.
Then we had a speech networking round where different "solo" people share their ideas or habilities, to get into a team or teams looking for new talent.
I've been chating with some teams. I could interview them before their speech in front of judges, and here is a taste of them:
Team 15: Miquel Llobet (@mllobet) and Daniel Torramilans (@towerthousand) creators of Reportr app. (They won the first price): It's an app to turn any smartphone user to journalist. The user can send post proposals to newspapers, and viceversa.
@mllobet @towerthousand creators of reportr app winners of 1st price in this contest, we were discussing about the interest of their app and possible news corporations interested on it
A view on reportr app
@mllobet @towerthousand working on their reportr app winners of 1st price in this contest
Reportr app won because it meets all criteria defined by the contest: getting information from citizens, and sharing with journalists in a very easy and nice way. Reportr creators want to contact with some media to check it feasibility for an integration in journalists information channels.
Team BMA Amaranto (they won the second price): Echoes app is a crowd denuncing via smartphone and geolocating. Only people near to the problem noted by anyone can vote the same problem so problems are finally prioritized. @BMAcat
Pau Tena, Cristian Pinto, David Garcia i Eloi Hernández: Team BMA Amaranto (@BMAcat) they won the second price with Echoes app
Decibelians Team: for Noise measurement and its mapping with smartphones by users @llatpic @josepjc
Decibelians Team
Team 30: app Aachimapp allows anyone to inform and denunciate public infraestructure corruption, also due to illness increase due to bad infraestructures. @arianisha @Clouddia
@arianisha @Clouddia working in their app Aachimapp allows anyone to inform and denunciate public infraestructure corruption
@arianisha @Clouddia giving their speech
Team 9 dBcn: allAIRgy mapp is a collaborative map of paths for people with respiratory allergy. It’s a kind of Google Maps for respiratory allergy people. @carlesmaggi @susalcaide @susana_barona @amt70amt @HelenaPerello
Part of the Team 9 dBcn working on their allAIRgy app
It was a very interesting and productive day, and I meet many interesting developers and journalists willing to improve our lives. Here is the final picture with all winners:
Winners of #hackapp Barcelona 2015
Thanks to the great organization, all sponsors, judges and many people who help to make this day possible. I think the day was so productive that probably this was the first of many hackapp hackathons…
