I love hackathons and game jams. I also don't run to win, and definitely finishing them is victory. I have to agree with some of the detractors here, though.

I love hackathons and game jams. I also don't run to win, and definitely finishing them is victory. I have to agree with some of the detractors here, though. If a major company sponsors a hackathon or game jam, I immediately get suspicious. Anything offering venture capital or business deals to the winner, I think it will be a "pitch-athon", and I've seen the winners be those with the best pitches, not to those with the best implementations or even best ideas. I've seen hackathons go sour from bad faith in prize money (see https://medium.com/@aliciatweet/the-dirty-secret-behind-the-salesforce-1m-hackathon-b839268fb82d https://medium.com/@aliciatweet/the-dirty-secret-behind-the-... for one example). Having said that, I join the Global Game Jam every year, and partake in several other game jams and hackathons. Dedicating a weekend to a play project, something I plan to never look at again, is an outlet for creativity and fun that I just can't find elsewhere. Sometimes I'm lucky and I'm so impressed with what I've done that I end up submitting to the app store, or otherwise sharing with the world, sometimes it's embarrassing and I never talk of that again. I've worked with a wide variety of people using technologies I've never used before. The easiest way I think to prevent "hustlathon" is to simply not have prizes nor sponsors. Although I don't completely avoid hackathons of that nature (and hackathons without sponsors are rare, someone donated the space if nothing else!), it is far too common that some company wants to dictate what the technologies used are in a hackathon. Prizes that are "we will offer venture capital" also quickly lead to hustlathon. And a lot of times terms and conditions can approach the offensive. Anyway, I think more than just students can learn from and enjoy hackathons. And all the comments focusing on the food? When I hosted game jams I didn't offer food! You aren't required to eat bad food.