[open-government] How to make apps contests more sustainable?

Mon Nov 5 09:51:59 UTC 2012

There are a growing number of industry critics in East Africa now turning
up their noses at the idea of apps competitions and hackathons. They have
become a staple of the industry calendar, especially in Kenya, with some
being apps/ideas being repurposed for the next challenge by participants
who are now regulars at these events.

One approach that might work and which was put forward at a data bootcamp
held in Nairobi early this year is to transition the apps to a paid
developer team that builds them out to 'launch-ready' status. For
non-profit projects, I assume most hackathon participants/developers
wouldn't have a problem as long as they get a share of the glory later. The
Code4Kenya (code4kenya.org) program is working on one of the ideas that won
a prize at the data bootcamp and we're scheduled to launch it in
partnership with a local media house later this month.

For commercial projects, a great deal of care needs to be taken with regard
to intellectual property rights. Sometimes, bad press involving products
that come out of these events can be damaging enough to discourage
participation in future events.

Kind regards,

Muchiri Nyaggah | PRINCIPAL PARTNER
@muchiri
Cell: +254 722 506400
Skype: mrmuchiri

On Sun, Nov 4, 2012 at 9:43 PM, Ryan Jendoubi <ryan.jendoubi at gmail.com>wrote:

>  On 03/11/12 21:00, Laura James wrote:
>
> This is a really interesting question.
>
> [...]
>
>
> A fascinating topic - I'll be interested to see what comes out of it!
>
>
> Just saw this on Twitter - I'm sure it's already the talk of the appsforx
> list, but for the benefit of anyone else here who's reached their mailing
> list limit:
>
> http://brigade.codeforamerica.org/pages/race-for-reuse
>
> Bests,
> -r
>
>
> On 1 November 2012 08:29, Antti Jogi Poikola <antti.poikola at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>>  Hello,
>>
>>  By now we’ve seen many apps contests, in many forms, all around world.
>> In a way, this continuous sprawl is a success in itself. On the other hand,
>> critique [1] related to the lack of sustainability of the apps contests is
>> growing. There is a demand and a need to learn from each other and design
>> better and more sustainable models for boosting the innovation around open
>> data.
>>
>>  If you are interested in making better apps contests or have other new
>> ideas on how to boost the innovation around open data – feel free to join
>> the discussion at the appsforx -email list [2]. The list was established
>> after a international Apps Contest Organizers meetup which was organized
>> during the Open Knowledge Festival 2012 in Helsinki (see also the meeting
>> memo [3]).
>>
>>  Right now I am compiling a topic report with working title: “Innovation
>> Contests for Open Data Re-use”. I would appreciate all help in populating
>> the listing of Apps contests [4], you can add missing details directly to
>> the Google spreadsheet or share this email and the blogpost link [5] to
>> relevant forums and people who might know about other apps contests.
>>
>>  Best regards,
>> Antti Poikola (Apps for Finland coordinator 2009)
>>
>>  [1]
>> http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/08/app-contests-sustainability-usability.html
>> [2] http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/appsforx
>> [3] http://okfestival.okfnpad.org/apps
>> [4] http://bit.ly/apps_contests_list
>> [5] http://poikola.fi/apps-contests-everywhere/
>>
>>  --
>> +358 44 337 5439 <%2B358%2044%20337%205439>
>> about.me/apoikola
>>
>>
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>
>
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