So how do you win every single hackathon you attend?

So how do you win every single hackathon you attend? If you can see right here, I'm pretty stacked. I've been to a couple hackathons. I got this from UC Berkeley, and these are all the hackathons that I won. I'm actually on a three hackathon winning streak, so safe to say I know what I'm talking about. I'm gonna keep it short and sweet so you get the gist. First of all, how do you win a hackathon? Hardware. I'm gonna be honest, you hardware wins overall most of the time. Like, every single hackathon that I've went to, hardware has won number one every single time. The days of just creating software and pushing it out doesn't necessarily win overall, but you can win specific categories with software. So how do you win specifically with software? If you're not trying to do hardware, you need to stop doing basic products, basic ideas. If I can think of the idea in five seconds, it's garbage. So a healthcare app, or a to do app, or an app that does this. It sucks. Language learning app. All these basic things that happen at every hackathon, you need to remove that from your mind. So the way I win my hackathon is I take an idea that's very novel, I take an idea that's basic, and I put them together. That's how you create something new. Stop using the regurgitated hackathon ideas. So the last hackathon I won, I literally put Kaishi for your friends. Basically, you can bet on your friends whether they'll meet their financial goals or not. And that won. That's novel. It's new. It makes you think. It makes you go, okay, that's pretty cool. Next. It doesn't have to actually work. Ideas win hackathons, not the actual functionality. If the idea can carry it, the functionality doesn't necessarily matter. Remember, you're only testing the functionality in that one minute to 30 seconds. You're presenting the demo. Of course the judge is gonna ask you to do this or do that and check different test cases. It just has to work for that demo. Next is gonna be the demo. Remember, the demo is to show the functionality and also your idea. A lot of people don't focus on the idea when they're presenting. They just focus on making it work on the computer and not explaining every single step of the process. You want your judges to think bigger, to think like, man, this is actually pretty cool and novel. So please talk to the judge, see their reaction. Change your pitch. If they don't understand, ask them specific questions. Make them fill in the gaps. They need to be a part of the project. Next is gonna be hosting. One of the biggest things you can do is host your project. This means that the judges can use it in the hackathon. That means when they're judging and they go back in their room, they can quickly pull up your project and use it. That keeps it in their minds. This is not a battle of whether you make a better project than the next person. It's whether the judges like you. And if they can use your tool for long periods of time, throughout the whole judging period, they're probably going to pick you. Every single project I've had was hosted and was able to be used by the judges. If you to put all of that together, you're gonna win. Trust me.