A couple of weeks ago we wrote about the emerging phenomenon of weekend code-a-thons in which programmers and designers get together over a short period of time to try to build web apps really fast. We went over some of the different approaches to the weekend code-a-thon and interviewed a participant in the Rails Rumble in an attempt to try and figure out why these get togethers are so attractive. An upcoming event in Santa Clara, California called Weekend Apps is taking a slightly different approach and not just focusing on app building, but also about building a sound business.
The approach that Weekend Apps is taking feels not unlike an attempt to condense the spirit of the 3-month Y Combinator mentorship program into a single weekend. In fact, the organizers of the event refer to it as “a weekend incubator on steroids.” In addition to building web apps, participants in the free Weekend Apps program will also be treated to a number of seminars and panels by seasoned developers.
Because Weekend Apps is focusing on Facebook applications, the program includes a presentation by Dave Morin, the Senior Platform Manager at Facebook, as well as presentations by a number of developers of popular apps on the social network’s platform. The weekend will also play host to a panel discussion entitled “Micropayments in Facebook.”
In addition to creating applications, the weekend’s focus will also be on getting entrepreneurs and developers up and running with legitimate businesses. There will be an attorney on site to help people incorporate their new businesses and an ad exchange to help new apps get eyeballs. Unlike other weekend code-a-thons, Weekend Apps isn’t hung up on developers using prior work. The goal is to get apps launched, not to get apps built quickly.
“The goal is to launch as many startups as possible in a short period of time, and to create a network of entrepreneurs that cooperate and help each other to increase everyone’s chances of success,” Waleed Abdulla, one of the event’s organizers, told us. The organizers of Weekend Apps met at a Startup Weekend (another weekend app building event) and after discussing a class that Stanford University ran last year about building Facebook platform applications, they decided to try their hand at creating something similar on a more condensed scale.
“As we see it, the class owes it success to many types of learning: experts were brought in to talk to the students for short times, great application designers were available full time to the students who had questions, and there was a layer of oversight that was able to spread to the entire class a lesson learned by one group,” they write on the Weekend Apps web site. “The biggest problem with the class, is that not many people attend Stanford. This awesome teaching method wasnt really available to others who wanted to use it.”
Weekend Apps will take place February 22nd – 24th, 2008 at The Enterprise Network‘s Santa Clara Venture Accelerator building. The event has a group on Facebook with over 200 members.
