In its third consecutive year, the Hacks/Hackers Media Party, a three day event held in Buenos Aires in August, brought together more than 1,200 participants from diverse backgrounds all rethinking the future of news. Leaders from around the world gathered to connect, share and build.
The event, free for all attendees, was held at the Konex Cultural Center and helped make the Hacks/Hackers Buenos Aires chapter the largest in the world. The Hacks/Hackers network prides itself on building solutions outside the box and there was something magical about connecting and collaborating with new friends in a warehouse space cloaked in graffiti and art. Language differences were no barrier as the keynotes and more than 40 workshops had Spanish-English interpreters to facilitate communication. And the hackathon on the closing day had 26 ideas submitted to the hackdash.
I wasn't the only one blown away by the Media Party experience. Here's Douglas Arellenas of Sourcefabric (and leader of Hacks/Hackers Prague) explaining what makes this event so special in his post, "If life were only like Media Party".
While there I ran a workshop on strategy for building online communities. You can read about it in English and Spanish thanks to coverage by ICFJ. On the second night I gave a keynote presentation on my vision for the work I'll do with Hacks/Hackers. Livestream from the entire evening's talks are here and my speech starts at 22:00.
It was inspiring to experience the power and excitement of the media party and be connected to so many innovators in the journalism space from around the world. Stay tuned for recaps from interviews with Hacks/Hackers leaders from Mendoza, Rosario, Bogotá, the African contingent and more.
