Chicago hacks, hackers brainstorm MoJo Challenge ideas

By Katherine Zhu

A group of 30-plus hacks and hackers gathered last week in the basement of the Tribune Tower for a “MoJo Beerstorm.”

The event, hosted by the Chicago group of Hacks/Hackers, was a brainstorming meeting intended to inspire participants to submit ideas for the Knight/Mozilla MoJo Innovation Challenge – a chance for individuals to shape the future of news and re-open the web, à la Firefox.

Phillip Smith, a key leader of the MoJo Challenge, flew in from Toronto to attend the May 24 event. The evening kicked off with pizza and soda before Smith gave a brief presentation about Mozilla and the challenge details.

“Open source software is key,” Smith said. “Knight and Mozilla want to open tech culture of the Web to be a core part of how news is made.”

MoJo aims to change how journalism is done and how users interact with that journalism, Smith said. For each of the three challenges – open web video, reimagining comment threads and “people-powered news” – all it takes to enter is a napkin sketch.

The challenge is a three-year initiative of the Knight Foundation and Mozilla to harness open-web innovation for journalism. The goal is to identify 15 people who will receive paid fellowships to be embedded in leading newsrooms around the world. These fellows will create new tools, ideas, and news experiences that benefit both readers and newsmakers—all using open technologies.

After Smith’s presentation, event attendees broke into small groups to brainstorm ideas for each of the challenges. Each group had 60 seconds to pitch the ideas they came up with. Here are videos of the pitches, courtesy of Phillip Smith.

The event ended with the “beer” part of the event: drinks at the Billy Goat Tavern across the street from Tribune Tower.