*Hey, nice rhetoric in that write-up.
*It's a press release.
‘Hackers oust the mayor of Amsterdam’
Apps for Europe’s first Business Lounge opens in Amsterdam
On Saturday, June 29, a day of coding, hacking and creative software development will take place at the Amsterdam City Hall Chamber. Seated in the seats of the mayor and Municipal Council members, around 200 hackers will code, programme and experiment with open datasets presented by various public institutions and governments.
Over the past years many local, regional and national app competitions in Europe have been organized and stimulated developers and companies to build new applications with open data. But it’s time to take it to the next level. And so at this ‘Hack de Overheid Hackathon’ members of the ‘Apps for Europe’ network open their first Business Lounge.
As various open data workshops are taking place next to the main hall, incubators and angel investors meet ground-breaking app developers to turn their digital services into business. The Apps for Europe Business Lounge, organised by Waag Society, Kennisland and Open State Foundation, is to support open data apps to move from concept or prototype into a business start-up.
This meet and great with experts from Rockstart, Google Ventures, Sanoma, Startup Bootcamp and Dialogue Incubator ABN AMRO Bank prepares selected participants to apply for the Apps for Europe competition. Developers get advice in creating and commercialising apps with market potential. They enter their app, including a business model, into an annual pan-European Open Data Competition. The Business Lounge at the Hack de Overheid Hackathon in Amsterdam is the first of a series of local business lounges that are organised in Berlin, Brussels, Ghent, Helsinki, Barcelona, Warsaw and Manchester.
At the end of the day, before the hackers get ousted as mayor of Amsterdam, after developers have pitched their prototypes and app concepts, the local winner of the Apps for Europe competition will be announced.
The Apps for Europe network, established by Neelie Kroes, consists of 19 organisations who have been involved in open data programmes and in supporting promising ideas across ten EU countries. It was established by Neelie Kroes, vice president of the European Commission and leading lady of Europe’s digital agenda.
Next to Waag Society, Kennisland and Open State Foundation, members of the Apps for Europe network include among others Forum Virium (Finland), Open Knowledge Foundation chapters in Belgium, Germany and UK, Ceske Centrum pro Vedu a Spolecnost (Czech Republic), Eurecom (France), Consorzio Top-IX (Italy), Future Everything (UK), PT Comunicacoes (Portugal), Rooter and Esade (Spain), Instituut voor Beeld en Geluid and Europeana (Netherlands).
The Hack de Overheid Hackathon ‘Apps for Europe’ is set to be an intense, productive and exciting collaboration between bright minds in coding and data processing. There are several cash prizes of 500 euro to be won for the best product at the end of the day.
Apps for Europe - http://www.appsforeurope.eu/
The hackathon takes place on Saturday 29 June 9.30am to 7pm. Amsterdam City Hall, Amstel 1, 1011 PN, Amsterdam. The event is free to enter and open to all. Registration is open at http://vote.hackdeoverheid.nl/ – @hackdeoverheid – facebook.com/hackoverheid
