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Get ready for Miami Hack Week! Here’s the latest on the top events and initiatives

Riley Kaminer
Riley Kaminer
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Have you banked some extra sleep this week? Are your Red Bulls at the ready? Is your out-of-office message scheduled?

We hope so! The upcoming Miami Hack Week, which kicks off on Sunday afternoon, is on track to be a nonstop marathon of everything #MiamiTech. As of writing, more than 2,000 hackers from over 35 countries are registered to attend.

How does this year’s MHW stack up to last year’s event? “This time around, we’re bringing together even more of the community,” Hack Week’s communications lead, Vanessa Calás, told Refresh Miami. As previously reported, this year’s event includes Hack@Campus, an initiative encouraging Miami-Dade County students to participate in Hack Week. Accepted students will receive a $200 stipend and have access to all events throughout the week.

Vanessa Calás of Miami Hack Week

The Hack Week team recently announced their Hack@High School initiative, bringing younger students into the mix as well. In partnership with Miami EdTech and Riders, the students will program robots and compete to see whose robot completes a racetrack fastest and most efficiently. While this experience will be virtual and open to students from around the world, Calás said that already they have seen significant interest from South Florida high school students.

This year’s Hack Week will also feature talks from local entrepreneurs at CIC. Nicholas Mohnacky of bundleIQ will give a TED-style talk on Augmented Intelligence, the AI that supports humans rather than replacing them. Michelle Bakels of G2i will be presenting on developer health.

“We’re trying not only to attract the right people and companies from around the country,” Calás explained. “We’re also actively bringing together the community and asking them to come be a part of the event however they want.”

Another new Hack Week announcement is the launch of the 13-person Haiti House in Hollywood. Hackers there will focus on building Civic Tech to help solve some of the most difficult challenges found in Haiti and Haitian communities. Miami Hack Week will be bringing in a group of coders from Haiti to participate alongside other hackers.

While the core of Hack Week revolves around the projects in the various hacker houses, interested participants who want to get involved but are not part of a house can take advantage of the Hack City initiative. Hackers can meet up at partnership coffee shops, Puroast and Pasión del Cielo, to roll up their sleeves and wrestle with some code. 

Co-working spaces CIC and the LAB Miami are also opening up their doors to hackers. Anyone with a Miami Hack Week wristband can work 24/7 in either of those two spaces.

All work and no play is certainly not the Miami way. People are going to be building cool stuff, but they’re also going to be meeting at all these different spaces and talking about all sorts of things,” said Calás. 

There is a diverse range of events, from pool parties and barbeques to basketball games and poker tournaments. The best place to stay on top of all the latest events is by scrolling down to the calendar on MiamiHackWeek.com. But here are a few particularly notable events:

  • Sunday 1/23 at 4pm: Official Opening Ceremony at Le Rouge
  • Monday 1/24 at 6pm: Welcome to Miami Party, sponsored by Altada, Upstream, and Ziome
  • Thursday 1/27 at 11am: Women-only open mic event at the Shrimp Society/Solana house. “This is an event for ladies to perform, pitch, say what they’re building, and share your asks,” said Calás.
  • Friday 1/28 at 4pm: Closing Ceremony at Oasis Little Haiti

And this just in! A Hack Week survival guide.

Here are some scenes from last year’s Miami Hack Week:

SCENES FROM INAUGURAL MIAMI HACK WEEK, AUGUST 2021: At top of post, there was a big crowd at Miami Hack Week’s opening ceremoney, but this year with four times the number of participants, they have a bigger venue. Above, Anthony Pompliano gives a talk at the QuickNode’s Hacker House, which is returning this year. And, yes, there was serious hacking going on: see below. Photos provided by Miami Hack Week.

READ MORE ON REFRESH MIAMI:

Riley Kaminer
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