Following the success of RIM’s first ever BBM Hackathon event which was held in NYC not too long ago, RIM decided to keep going by hosting more Hackathon events. The upcoming events will be hosted across different parts of the country and even overseas. Continue reading for details.
The Research In Motion® (RIM®) Developer Relations team recently hosted a BBM™ Hackathon event in NYC. Developers were invited to apply for a chance to participate in the event, getting one-on-one time with BlackBerry® platform experts and network with other developers while working on integrating social elements into apps using the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM) APIs.
Attendees told us that they found the direct contact with our social platform experts to be invaluable – and we liked hearing that so much that we’ve decided to host more of these hackathon events across the globe in the coming weeks.
The first of these events happened yesterday in our company hometown of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, with the second event happening today, September 29th. Following this, we’ll be hosting BBM Apps Hackathons in Toronto, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Jakarta, Amsterdam, London and more. Here are the scheduled dates:
- Toronto: October 6th and 7th
- Chicago: October 10th and 11th
- San Francisco: October 16th and 17th (just in time for BlackBerry DevCon Americas 2011!)
- Boston: November 3rd and 4th
- Jakarta: November 14th and 15th
- Bangkok: November 17th and 18th
- London, England: November 19th and 20th
- Amsterdam: November 23rd and 24th
To enter for your chance to attend one of the BBM Apps Hackathon events, follow this simple process to apply: Visit the site bbmappshackathon.com and fill out an application, outlining among other things (i) why you feel social platform integration adds value to mobile applications; and (ii) give an example of previous mobile apps you have developed.
Developers who are selected to attend a BBM Apps Hackathon event will also receive a BlackBerry gift bag, which includes a BlackBerry® 7 OS device. In addition, those selected to attend the Toronto, Chicago and San Francisco Hackathon events will also receive a pass to attend BlackBerry DevCon Americas 2011 and three night accommodation at the San Francisco Marriott Marquis for the duration of the conference.
We definitely recommend that developers of any level apply to attend these collaborative events. TheBlackBerry Social Platform gives developers a way to tie existing apps to BBM, or to build social apps from the ground up. One of the benefits to these social aspects is the added viral buzz that an app can gain from integrating with BBM. At these hackathons, developers will discover valuable strategies that will help them add social aspects to their apps.
Would you be interested in this type of event? Let us know which hackathons you’ll be applying to attend!
Via RIM