How to make money on porn, winning hackathons. Winner tips, interview with Artem Kupriyanov

Good day, dear Geektimes!

Most likely, many of you have heard about hackathons. Recently, quite a lot of similar events such as Whateverhack , AI.Hack or Hack.Moscow take place in Russia. I managed, thanks to the Russian Hackers community of hackatons, to interview Artem Kupriyanov , who managed to achieve serious success in performing on hackathons. Our hero lives in Moscow, studies at the 3rd year of the FIPT MIPT, works as a Middle Data Scientist in Sticker.Place. He told how he prepares for hackathons and how they helped him in life.

This is Artem

And he won 8 hackathons

Here is a short list of Artem’s victories:

Q: How did it all start? At what point did you start programming?

* Laughs *
A: Good question. I started programming in the first year in PhysTech, machine learning from the second semester. I was very attracted by this topic, but artificial intelligence would take over the world, and I decided to try. At this moment, the specialization of MIPT from Yandex, called “Introduction to machine learning”, appeared, I began to study it, went through the first 3-4 courses, and somehow it started. Then there were all sorts of designs, for example, related to basketball betting, and various ideas began to be born that I wanted to bring to life somewhere, and then I met hackathons. The first time I wrote a music bot that the jury did not appreciate very well, it was my very first experience.

Q: What was this hackathon called?

Mind round. PhysTekhovsky hakaton.

Q: After the first hackathon you won nothing or something did not work? At what point did you understand how to act the next time you went bankrupt?

A: It was from there that I learned a lot of different chips, talked to the guys who were conducting this hackathon, and somehow understood what to do. Well, for example, that the presentation for the hackathon should be done not in 15 minutes on the knee, but in 4 hours and thought through everything correctly. Of course, the experience of presenting came a little later, we began to prescribe monetization. At the same time, he made for himself that teamwork is very important, so it is very important to choose the right guys with whom you will work and generate ideas together. After all, you need to start programming when the idea is already thought out, it seems to me.

Q: Describe your dream team (dreamtime). Do you always go with the same guys or do you have some kind of rotation?

A: Last time I like the story when a person just takes and attracts other people. This is practiced in kaggle competitions , when some “grand masters” take inexperienced dudes into their team and work with them, and they are very motivated. And so, even in the first year, the guys still participated, and we had a backbone, 5-6 people initially, who wanted to do something, and we participated with them 6-7 times.

These are two teams of Artyom, they both won a prize on the hackathon Birth Hack

Q: What size of hackathon do you think is optimal for hackathon or is it not so important?

A: I think that 3-4 people is enough. If a person is more, then there are difficulties with the separation of tasks. Suppose one person is working on a design, another is working on a front-end, and the rest is working on an idea.

Q: What do you mean by "working on design"? Is the person engaged in drawing or something more programming related?

A: Rather, some kind of drawing. That is, how it will look, how to submit it, where we will take the data, why people should like it. There are a lot of questions, but I think one person should deal with this, who first generates ideas and then discusses this with the team.

Q: What is your usual role in the team?

A: Last time I’m being a team lead if it doesn’t sound too bright. I am distributing tasks, leading the guys, doing data science myself. The manager also plays a big role, because you need to submit your opinion and make sure that everyone has the same understanding of the project.

Q: Describe how you prepare for the hackathon.

A: We gather about a week before the hackathon 2-3 times and generate ideas. We think about how we can win, what products we can use. We have a person in the team, conditionally speaking, an oracle who listens to the idea completely, and then can say: “No, we don’t win with such an idea,” we drop it and discuss further. He never let us down, all the ideas that passed his meat grinder turned out to be good.

Q: Advise newbies how to generate ideas for hackathons, what not to do?

A: I think you need to watch various news sources, like Rusbase and TJournal or foreign ones, for example, TechCrunch, monitor startups and observe how the world lives. That is, it is obvious that there is no need to repeat ready-made solutions, it is better to improve ready-made solutions or to come up with something new. Now it is fashionable to Uberize everything, why not?

Q: Usually hackathons last 36 or 48 hours. How do you spend time on the team?

A: I think if a hackathon lasts 2 days, then on the first night you need to sleep well, so that on the second day the team will have maximum strength and enthusiasm, and with the next night - how will it go. And then you need to correctly assess the stage of development of the project, and if you have time, then you can sleep, and if not, then it is better to concentrate on work, and only then to sleep. In our team, everyone goes to bed and wakes up together. I don’t like it when someone is sleeping, and someone isn’t, because the worker’s motivation is lost, the interaction between the team is lost.

Q: If you could, what would you change on your past hackathons?

A: Well, I will say this, if your name is to the hackathon, then it is better not to refuse. I had a story, a team with which we had already won, called me to the hackathon from Kaspersky. I decided to give up because of my studies, although in reality I was rather afraid. As a result, the guys won, but I did not even participate. That is, it is always better to fight for something, than to regret not having tried.

Q: What project on the hackathon did you like the most?

A: Probably the last, FapAdvisor. He hated very much, everyone liked, and now many of us ask him to test it, saying "this is not for me, but for my friend." A teammate works for ABBYY and says that at work he often hears about this project. Personally, I am very warm soul.

Q: Tell me briefly what this project is about.

A: The project consists of 2 parts. The first is a recommendation system for the selection of actresses. We select on 4 most important, in our understanding, aspects: breast size, volume of groans, skin color and experience - our killer feature. The second part is the service. For example, you have a friend by whom you sighed at school and would like to see something hot with her. Our service solves this problem: you send the Instagram account of the victim and receive the video. We are still developing this project, we hope everything will be fine.

New technology projects are born on hackathons

Q: When you go to a hackathon, do you always work for the result? Or sometimes just have fun?

A: I think you always have to go all the way, to success. Of course, you should not forget about networking, lectures and all sorts of other things on the hackathons. I really remember the lecture from Uber on VisionHack. That is, do not sit in the same room and constantly code, there are always a lot of things to do.

Q: How did the hackathons affect you? Especially in terms of career and education.

A: I found the first job just after the hackathon. I think this is a very good line in the resume and there is something to say in the interview. That is, I have already decided a lot of cases in various areas of machine learning, there is something to brag about.

Q: What do you like most about hackathons? What do you think people go there for?

A: I like chatting with the same enthusiastic guys at the hackathon. In addition, a huge boost in knowledge over the weekend, which in normal circumstances, you are unlikely to gain. And besides, the competitive spirit and adrenaline. I also like it when handing out T-shirts. This is my trigger, although I think it is different for everyone. And the atmosphere of hackathons always surprises, at one event, for example, a cook arrived and fed us very tasty.

Q: What course did you visit the hackathon for the first time?

A: On the second.

Q: That is, it turns out that in a year you pumped yourself into hackathons and work. Describe yourself at the start and now.

A: At the start, I was a student who completed 3 courses on Coursera. Now I have quite a lot of experience in computer vision, I work as a middle data-scientist in the company and have a bunch of hackathons behind me, a good experience in many areas: I can develop and manage.

Q: How at work do you like your hobby? Does it interfere with the work?

A: This is quite an interesting story. At first, everyone at work was surprised, questioned, rejoiced. The last time, with FapAdvisor, I was scolded because I used working servers to drive pornography on them. But this is the only case when something was not pleasant at work.

Q: What are your future plans for hackathons?

A: I have long wanted to go to Europe. Judging by the reviews, this is not very scary, although it is hard for me to overcome this threshold. In general, I do not really know English, although, perhaps, my teammates will help me, and I will do my usual thing. In Russian, we already have a fairly large party of 10 people, every week we evaluate hakatons, and we choose if we are suitable, think with what we can come and decide where we will go. The closest to which I will go, probably Hack.Moscow. I was called there to talk about how to hack hackathons, and I don't mind walking (smiles)

Q: What is your future IT career?

Well, I am interested in data analysis, I see myself in this. In general, I would like to either invent a startup on the hackathon and work on it, or become an existing CTO. Well, I want to further develop in the field of computer vision.

Q: Do you read Habr?

A: Last time, no, only if something google and stumble upon a useful article.

Q: You can finally give some advice or tell some interesting story.

A: Well, the first advice, as I said, you should always not be afraid and go - this is at least a cool experience. It seems to me a big problem guys that they are afraid or can not assemble a team. Also, I think the problem of some IT people is a poor presentation of their projects, so I advise you to work on the presentation skills. You can see the pitches of different startups and take note. It's just that often good ideas perish because of a bad presentation, poorly written logic, monitoring or development plans. And this is very important for the jury.

Q: Artem, thank you very much for the interview! Successes and new victories, read this interview on Geektimes

A: Haha, thank you. I will wait!

Useful links:

What's next, readers?

I noticed that on Geektimes and Habré they write quite a bit about hackathons. I am interested to tell something else. Vote in the poll or write in the comments

Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/411759/

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