Red Bull Creation 2014
Contents
Topic
Identify a specific need in your community, or something you think could be improved, and propose a solution. It could be an idea that makes the world a better place, or if nothing else, a more fun and interesting place.
This year’s registration will open to the public May 21st. More information about the qualifying challenge will be released at Midnight EST on this site. In the meantime get your teams and dreams together. We look forward to seeing you then.
Criteria
- This qualifier is about conceptualization and ideation. You don’t have to actually physically build the project this year.
- That being said, this project has to be achievable. Please address how you would actually create something like this in the real world, and prove that you could.
- Create a video (no more than 3 minutes) addressing who you are, what the issue is, and how you would propose tackling something like this. You can use models, 3d renderings, animations, or other digital tools within the video to help state your case.
Due June 6th: Countdown!
Interested people
General
- Konrad B
- Eric M
- Ken S
- Joseph B
- Sean D
- Nate B
- Greg S
Video production
- Sean D
- Greg S
Scope
- Okay, so the first thing to consider is how we want to identify community. The state, our city, or our neighborhood. Or we could look at community as a set of like minded people (other hackerspaces). -Joseph B
- My mind went to transit. Cabs and buses and bikes - Nate B
- Should we assume they chose this topic because we are in Detroit, a city with lots of problems? - Ken S
- There is not budget, so what is "achievable", there is hundreds of thousands of dollars in gov. grants and private grants - Ken S
- They want us to address how to create it and provide proof that we can create it; so keep on your toes and imagine that we're going to have to show how to create it and prove it on a 3 minute video. - Ken S
What makes a good idea?
- I think idea we come up with needs to be "sexy" enough to win an open and ambiguous competition like this one...we must win the hearts and minds of the judges-Ken S
- I would suggest a criteria/question for any idea presented should be “How do we film that?” -Sean D
Idea dump!
- Autonomous drones that deliver fresh vegetables at a push of the button! -Ken S
- It annoys the piss out of me that taxi signs are turned sideways, totally blowing out the carefully-crafted aerodynamics of the car. NBD for city cars, but airport cabs spend a fair bit of time at speed, and it would matter. It's probably a regulatory issue requiring a certain mounting, but more aerodynamic cartop signs would be amusing. Holograms? ;) - Nate B
- one of my coworkers is a volunteer firefighter, and he's got this airflow-be-damned lightbar. -Nate B
- A solar-powered unmanned blimp to serve as an aircraft-carrier/charging station for UAVs. This solves the main limitation of delivery drones: their short range. -Matt A
- Knowing CPR is only so useful... what you really need ASAP when someone's having a heart attack is a defibrillator. Lots of places have them, but how would you know? Create an app that finds the nearest available defibrillator. The hard part is NOT writing the app -- it's collecting and maintaining good data over time. People have already gotten the hang of "check-ins," a la Foursquare. Can we use some kind of gamification/reward to incentivize members of the public to confirm/update defibrillator locations and accessibility? This idea doesn't have an explicit Detroit angle, except perhaps that ambulance response time in the city is embarrassingly slow (making defibrillator access more important). I'm also thinking a superhero theme is necessary. -Ashe L
- Education and Inspiration is a huge problem in any city. Since this is the Redbull Creation competition, this type of education would focus on creating things, basically inspiring children to make things, to become makers. When I was young, I had no idea where things came from or that I could one day make anything I could dream of. I tried to build things, but failed, I didn't have the proper tools, skills, and knowledge to make it work (I had legos). What if "middle-aged" children learned how the tools and machines operate that were used to build our society so when they become inspired, they can at least know the possibilities. The "Dream Team" then takes ideas voted on by students (with some constraint, no moon landers, etc) and they make it in the parking lot, showing them how it's made. Mobile Maker Space that tours schools? Put a lasercutter, mill, plasma cutter, and welder in a tractor trailer? - Ken S
- Develop a crime alert system using a gps app to report crimes in progress anonymously. If you see something while your driving or outside your house, whip out your phone and tap the widget and select a threat level (suspicious to danger). The patrol officers would also have a private application on their tablet to notify them of potential problems, using the data provided by the citizens, based on an algorithm to detect highest threats in their immediate vicinity. This would provide historical data and help officers on their rounds to pin point trouble spots; in addition, to improving response time where an officer could be in route to a situation even before dispatch calls for it. - Ken S
- High efficiency off grid community lighting to improve safety. Imagine two neighborhoods across the street from each other in Detroit, one of them is pitch black at night, and the other one is lit up by solar charged LED flood lights. What side of the street do you want live on or pass through at night? - Ken S
- Develop a special long lasting biodegradable stink grenade that you throw into abandoned houses to prevent bad actors from doing bad things in them. A special neutralizing agent would need to be developed for demolition or in the event someone wants to live their again. - Ken S...ya'll said it was an "Idea Dump"
- Phytoremediation (using plants to remove toxins from the soil). How can it be done on a large scale, in a manner that is fast, affordable, and effective? Detroit has: vast amounts of contaminated land, and a growing interest in urban agriculture. Detroit doesn't have: money for traditional soil decontamination processes. Phytoremediation is much more affordable than traditional decontamination methods, and is already being done on a smaller scale at various locations throughout the metro area (namely on private, corporate-owned land), but how could we make it more efficient so as to do it on a large scale (on vacant and/or city-owned land)? What kind of machinery and/or infrastructure could be designed to make the process as efficient as possible? - Adrienne
- I think Phytoremediation/Urban farming is an interesting direction. I'm not sure how to improve seed spreading, but testing is also interesting especially for specific contaminants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hyperaccumulators ... instead of a until that tells you what is in the soil maybe it should just list what you should plant
