I think the mindset here is that there are Latinos & African Americans who have the talent but not opportunity; or for some reason aren't attending hackathons outside of Oakland. Part of it is rarely seeing a person of color in a computer engineering role.
>>"They think they can become president but they don't think they can get a job at a computer company," he said. "That's because they've actually seen an African American become president. They haven't seen an African American at a computer company."
Not to single out Ycombinator, but just go to http://ycombinator.com/ and let the images do their auto-transitioning. I'm only pointing to YC because it's the handly link at the moment. Well, and this too - http://www.fastcodesign.com/3024388/slideshow-the-tech-indus...
Now, I know I'm about to get the HN vulcan team to tear me & that quote to pieces. Let me preempt them by saying that seeing other Latinos/African-Americans in a role greatly helps enforce the concept that you, if you're of one of those ethnicities, are capable of reaching that role too. Please let's not get pedantic and try to say this isn't the case. It very much is. That's why the efforts to bring women and minorities to tech exists.
Also, I won't be debating[1]. I'm just saying this one comment and I'm ---out--->.
1. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7100307
EDIT: And you're right, charging $99 is crazy. I can understand charging a "token fee" to try and filter for serious people but $99 is way too high. More like $10. Maybe $20 at the max considering the average income of people in the ethnics groups targeted.