Coding da Vinci Nord – Our Culture Hackathon in Hamburg
By Wiebke Hauschildt (Online Editor)
Since 2014 the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek, together with its partners Servicestelle Digitalisierung Berlin, Open Knowledge Foundation Deutschland and Wikimedia Deutschland, has hosted the first German culture hackathon. Under the title “Coding da Vinci” programmers, designers and artists are developing digital applications on the basis of cultural data together with cultural institutions – museums, libraries and archives. There has been a very positive response both from participants and cultural institutions, the results are many and varied and the conclusion each time is “Encore!”
Nevertheless there is going to be a change this year – following the feedback from the programmers and designers as well from the staff of the cultural institutions. The nationwide organisation of the hackathon has indeed produced great results to date, yet at the same time there have been loud calls for sustainability and durability of the relationships between creative people and cultural institutions. Although participants and persons from all parts of the republic who were interested in the hackathon had travelled to Berlin up to now, the creative minds dispersed again fairly quickly at the end of the event. This time, therefore, it is intended to organise a regional version of the cultural hackathon, Coding da Vinci Nord, with the aim to promote above all closer and, when possible, long-lasting relationships between developers and cultural institutions locally.
But why in the far north?
Focusing on Northern Germany emerged due to the fact that many museums and cultural institutions in Hamburg are already well-advanced in digitisation. At the very forefront the Hamburger Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe ,(Hamburg Museum of Arts and Crafts), the Archäologische Museum Hamburg (Hamburg Archaeological Museum), the Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Hamburg Carl von Ossietzky (Hamburg State and University Library Carl von Ossietzky) and the Museum der Arbeit (Museum of Work).
Whereas the most diverse thematic focuses evolved during the culture hackathons of 2014 and 2015 – such as, for example, in 2014 projects on books banned by the Nazi regime and in 2015 piano rolls for self-playing pianos in the 19th century by the Deutsches Museum (German Museum) in Munich – the regional connection could enable developers and designers to deal with Nordic and Hanseatic history in their projects and, in this way, create new approaches to Hamburg as a city.
This year’s hackathon will be organised by a local event-organising team including, among others, different institutions and organisations in Hamburg. The founders of the event will provide advice and support to the team in the process.
The kick-off event will take place in “Mindspace Hamburg” in September, followed by six weeks of project development – and then we are eagerly looking forward to seeing what the far north will present us with in November.
The dates
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Kick off and hack
Saturday and Sunday, 17th/18th September 2016,start of the event 10.00 am in Mindspace Hamburg, Rödingsmarkt 9 -
Sprint:
6 weeks time to realise cooperative projects -
Presentation of prizes:
Sunday, 6th November 2016, venue to be announced
Click here to register for the event via Eventbrite
Further information under https://codingdavinci.de/nord
Links
Coding da Vinci Nord on Twitter
Hashtags: #codingdavinci #cdvnord