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Comment by davidw | Hacker News Reader

> the knowledge, soft skills, and connections

To me that kind of points to something I don't like about hackathons: if I want to really dig deep and hack on something, I don't want to be terribly social. On the other hand, I have a lot of fun meeting people and talking, and so on, but at that point, having to go code something is kind of distracting from the social part.

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We have a monthly hackathon locally and I always get so incredibly frustrated when there are only a few groups hacking and a bunch of people standing around bullshitting. It's even more frustrating when one of those groups win with something they brought from home. :(

author here - totally get where you're coming from, but there's huge value in the social part as well. It's not to say I didn't do any coding at the hackathons I went to. But if I was going to immerse myself with other, smarter human beings I might as well talk to them!

Finding the balance is tough, but that's why going to these sorts of things was so important to me. Helps you learn how to filter out noise, talk to the right people, etc. If you know what you're looking you can be quite efficient when talking to people.

The "actual work part" provides the filtering that leaves you with relevant people so you don't end up in a hackathon with lots of wantrepreneurs.

I do actual work in an office during the day, or evenings/weekends at home. If I want to get actual work done, it's going to be working on something of my own, not some thing with a random-ish goal, with prizes.

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