Ask HN: Hackathons feel fake now

Hacker News Discussion ↗

Perception of Fakeness and Exploitation

  • Many describe hackathons—especially corporate ones—as fake, performative, and primarily vehicles for free or cheap labor, marketing, or recruiting.
  • Internal hackathons are often seen as unpaid overtime or “doing your actual job but off the clock,” sometimes even subtly tied to loyalty signaling.
  • Some recount rigged judging, preselected winners, and projects started long before the event.

Corporate vs Grassroots / Historical Shift

  • Several claim hackathons felt exploitative from the start; others remember a brief “organic” phase in the early–mid 2010s before heavy sponsorship and careerism took over.
  • Grassroots “hacking weekends” among friends or small communities (e.g., open source projects, CS labs, LAN-party-style gatherings) are remembered fondly as the true predecessors.
  • Some note specific traditions (e.g., long-running project-specific hackathons) that predate the current corporate branding.

What Hackathons Are Really For

  • Many frame them as networking events for students and early-career developers more than venues for real innovation.
  • Winning is often compared to a “participation trophy”; the real value is meeting people, pairing/“peering,” and getting exposure.

Quality of Projects & Time Constraints

  • 24–48 hours is widely seen as insufficient for meaningful work in most modern domains, leading to:
    • Oversold prototypes, mockups, or stitched-together screenshots.
    • Prebuilt projects polished for demo during the event.
    • Superficial “AI/LLM wrapper” apps and template-based SaaS chatbots.
  • Some note health and burnout issues from all-nighters; as people age, the appeal of sleep-depriving marathons drops sharply.

Sponsorship, Marketing, and IP Concerns

  • Heavy sponsor influence (prizes for “best use of X API”) is seen as distorting incentives toward box-checking and contrived use of tools.
  • Some events claim broad IP rights over all output, which is a major deterrent.
  • A minority argue sponsorship is fine if it’s low-pressure and mainly covers food/venue.

Alternatives and Formats People Still Like

  • Game jams, CTFs, specialized technical hackathons (e.g., healthcare, open data, XR, quantum, OpenBSD-style) and nonprofit/mission-driven events are cited as more authentic.
  • Internal hackathons can work when:
    • Held during work hours and clearly treated as paid work.
    • Focused on fixing long-standing technical debt or exploring data in employee-driven ways.
  • Some newer youth-focused hackathons emphasize shipping real, open-source projects and peer judging to reduce fakery.