Goal onboard the Zephyr: Create Hackerland. A world different then our own where imaginations can be big, projects are started (sometimes finished), ambitious & imaginative. People are learning from each other. Attendees are humble. It’s paradise for hackers.
Hackerland...
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Is Kind
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Makes no assumptions & doesn’t treat people
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Doesn’t care about status, credentials, degrees
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Wins are celebrated (no matter how small)
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Encourages independence
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Is not reductive & encourages romanticism
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Already exists… it’s a place all hackers have been to, whether at 3am working on OSS, working at a company with an innovative idea, or a state of mind while working on a project. It’s all around us in the real world, and the goal of the zephyr is to create hackerland for the participants
Structure / rituals
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Rituals provide structure to the day
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Standups with your crew in morning
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Feed yourself is a ritual
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Dinner & Demos is a ritual
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Contributing an artifact to the zephyr/zephyrnet is a ritual
Standups in morning start in NYC. Your goal for NYC should be a physical contribution to the Zephyrnet. You physically touch the Atlantic ocean to start the event & have all of today to do it. Bring an artifact to dinner. The theme is “biggest apple”. You present your artifact at dinner demos.
Public & private artifacts allowed (separate public & private contribution bags)
New theme ideas are generated at dinner & put into conductor hat, to be announced the next day at breakfast. Every day has a new theme & contributes to the zephyrnet.
Story time at night. Ex: 10 minute monologue from shakespeare in battery park.
Multi-day projects are fine, but discouraged.
Theme changes on every logical stop (NYC -> Chicago, Chicago -> SF, etc.)