Personally, I'd be interested in some data and reasoning to further understand your point of view. Without elaborating, the points you make come across a bit te

Personally, I'd be interested in some data and reasoning to further understand your point of view. Without elaborating, the points you make come across a bit terse and declarative, whereas this comment makes me think you actually have a deep understanding of the subject and good reasons for stating the points you made. As a standalone developer, I can think of several companies that I feel have built great "developer brand" and goodwill through hackathons, whether running their own, or sponsoring others (e.g. TC Disrupt, Startup Weekend). Twilio is the first one that comes to mind. But whether that translates into actual revenues is where my anecdotal evidence clearly falls short.