Frequently Asked Questions
The following FAQ is a very rough draft... please suggest updates and pose new/different questions and/or better answers here.
You have to register for this event to participate. To registration is free and relatively painless thanks to our handy form, here: http://futurecommerce.civics.com/enroll.html
This is an online and in-person event. The online event will happen through http://futurecommerce.civics.com.
The experience of online participation is being carefully designed so as to be as good or better than the experience of in-person participation. This event is structured and organized so to make good use of web-based and mobile collaboration and communications technology. Whether you participate in-person or solely online, most important functions will happen online, through the event site (like signing up for sessions, posing questions, voting for topics or activities you prefer, etc). Even if you plan to join us in person, to fully participate you must use a laptop, tablet or smartphone. If this is an issue, please notify the organizers to explore whether special arrangements can be made. We hope online participation does not suck, but in the event you are bored or frustrated due to online participation, you will get your ticket money back!
Yes, that is almost universally true. And totally unacceptable. Online participants is every bit as important as the people who are present in person and we believe everybody loses when people who participate online are ignored, isolated, forgotten and functionally invisible. We intend to structure the sessions formats, topics and projects, collaboration tools, social and learning opportunities and other activities to favor and reward online participants with deeply engaging and rich experiences. Online participation is being designed to afford frequent and effective opportunities to access and contribute to the event, more capabilities to form, maintain and extend professional and social connections with other people, and overall to provide to more and better ways to have a fun time. These benefits of online participation are intended to be equally available to people who join remotely as well as those who join in-person.
In keeping with the "unconference" approach of this event, any registered participant can propose a session. To propose a hacking session or a discussion session, just use the FutureCommerce Hackathon Project Proposal Form at: http://futurecommerce.civics.com/propose.html
A hacking session is for two or more registered participants to collaborate on a project to built something. Hacking sessions are intended to produce some output, whether a prototype app, a publishable draft article or other artifact. The product that results from a hacking session will be added to the event gallery and presented at the closing session for general discussion and feedback. Every team collaborating on projects will have opportunities to make a project presentation to a panel of judges and all registered participants for feedback and a chance to win prizes and to become a contender to be elected as King or Queen of the 2016 Second Annual CodeProm and Mayoral Jubilee
We know something you don't know, DOO-DAH, DOO-DAH, We know something you don't know, all the DOO-DAH DAY! (to the tune of "Camptown Races". And you don't ASK how to hack something. You gotta dodah hack.
A discussion sessions is for two or more registered participants to talk about a topic related to the event and of mutual interest. Discussion sessions are intended to shed light and may also create heat, whether due to competing ideas, enthusiastically harmonious ideas, or just from a bout of fun banter. One or more participants in every discussion session will have opportunities to report out for broader feedback throughout the event.
The organizers will schedule one or more hangout based "pitch" sessions with QnA for registered participants in the week before this event when you can describe your proposed hacking project or discussion session and address any questions or comments. Archives of these Hangout sessions are be automatically archived on YouTube and will be available on our playlists as well as curated on our event site to assist people in choosing sessions throughout the event and as part of the resource collection for each project.
Check back for updates on this, and share your views on how it should be done. At this point, the concept is that when a proposed session garners two or more registered participants it will change state to "active" instead of "proposed". By default, the participant that originally proposed an active session is expected to select one or more time slots when the session will take place.
Some sessions may be intended to occur over several or every available time slot, such as a project-focused series of hacking sessions conducted by the same team for the purpose of winning a prize and/or solving a problem. Some sessions are intended to be one time events, such as a tutorial or question and answer style discussion session. Participants in some discussion sessions may choose to schedule multiple time slots to continue or advance the conversation.