Day 2 

And the winners are….

And that’s a wrap! The presentations have been made, the winners have been crowned and we are bidding a fond farewell to Build the News 3. For the Interhacktives it has been our last opportunity to compete in the event as students. So how did we do?

Out of the three Interhacktives teams who took part in the contest, two succeeded in placing in some fashion. Team Magnificent Seven (the Team Formerly Known as Formula) received an honourable mention for their product SitRep, a service that enables journalists to get emergency help quickly in a dangerous situation. The team spoke to a foreign desk editors and correspondents about the services that exist already, and designed an inexpensive solution to work in areas of low connectivity. You can read more about the project in Ben Jackson’s blog post.

.@Hamza_M_Ali presenting SitRep – a reporting service for journos in danger. Second #interhacktives at #buildthenews pic.twitter.com/oOWwLwNSmJ

— Ashley Kirk (@Ashley_J_Kirk) March 29, 2015

 

Meanwhile, Team Break the News, who were each competing in their first ever Build the News, took home the runner-up prize with SoundOff, a platform for embedding audio comments on news articles. The platform limits commenters to fifteen seconds of audio in place of a text character limit, and aims to make the comment section “a less toxic place” by putting commenters’ real voices behind their words.

Team Cyborg didn’t manage to place with Amplify, but as usual we all had a fantastic time, learned loads and were delighted to have taken part.

Thanks to The Times for working so hard to make the event a reality (and for funding Saturday night’s drunken revelry!) and to everyone who tuned in to our liveblog to see what we were up to. More exciting Interhacktives projects to come…

15.29

In the brief calm before the storm, I (Bex) interviewed a member of each team to find out how they’re feeling ahead of the big present-off…

Nicole of Team Break the News is quietly confident:

Emily of Team Cyborg is psyching herself up to speak for the team:

And Team Formerly Known as Formula‘s Ben can hardly stop rubbing his hands together:

 

 

14.18

Less than an hour until showtime, and all three City teams have taken up residence in posh glass rooms to finalise and rehearse their presentations:

 

11.23

Day 2 of Build the News, and Team Cyborg are cracking on with the design of their idea, while developer James has had some breakthroughs with the back end (the nuts and bolts of code that make it a working – well, semi-working – product). Here’s a screenshot of what I (Bex) am currently doing in Photoshop:

 

10.55

We stopped live blogging last night to make the most of the free bar and dinner. Here we are again on day 2, and fragile and sleepy Interhacktives are waking themselves up with coffee and the Lion King.

Day 1

17.17

The irony in the fact that it was Team Formerly Known as Formula who put up that last post.

The competition is heating up. Meanwhile Team Cyborg has actual evidence that they are working.

 

17:02

The Team Formerly Known as Formula is quietly working away while the other teams maintain this live blog.

16.42

Team Break the News’s Edie Hancock working hard on our presentation. Our wonderful developer Rishi is doing computer stuff. Build, Rishi, build!

16.14

Popping out for some fresh air, we caught some of the #OccupyRupertMurdoch protest outside News UK. Security has been beefed up especially for Build the News today.

15.42

We at Team Cyborg are creating the logo for our project and totally winning at photoshop at the moment… really we are…

 

14.32

Interhacktives have completely demolished the pizza. What can we say, building makes us hungry.

14.15

THE PIZZA HAS LANDED.

13.29

Things are getting pretty crazy here in Team CYBORG (new name!). In the background, Ashley gives up on Photoshop and returns to traditional pen and paper, which doesn’t hate him, to design our idea. We’re coining a new term: UGMC (User-Generated Multimedia Content). You heard it here first, folks.

Also, there have been sandwiches, and later there will be pizza. Because, in the words of Paul Bradshaw: “It’s not a hackday unless there’s pizza.”

 

11.58

Sam is in the zone. It’s great, because Team Break the News has got two BRILLIANT ideas on the boil.

11.40

Idea generation time. Team Formula has taken their discussion to the floor.

10.21

We’re in The Times building. Stunning views and free tea – what more could you ask for?

9:01

The first Interhacktives have arrived at the arranged meeting point, a Pret on the corner of London Bridge Street. We’re tired. We’re excited. We’re ready to build some news.

 

The teams

Team Formula The Team Formerly Known as Formula

Krystina Shveda
Ben Jackson
Hamza Ali
Doug Bolton
Ed Ive
James Smith
Ross McKay

Team Bobo Cyborg

Emily Shackleton
Clara Guibourg
Bex Sentance
Ashley Kirk
James Phillips

Team Break the News

Nicole Chang
Sam Walsh
Edie Hancock
Rishi Chavda