FIG. 00 — THE BACKROOM

AI SLOPATHON

Build it stupid. Ship it by the tenth. One vote each.

Add yours to the wall — one per person

Pick one, then stick it on the wall.

AI SLOPATHON / LEVEL 0

Draw the curtain

0 / 3

AI Slopathon

LEVEL 0 — FLUORESCENT, INDEFINITE

Tickets
An empty fluorescent-lit backroom with yellow walls and beige carpet receding into the distance
FIG. 00 — 600 m² / NO WINDOWS / ONE NIGHT ONLY

The eventAI SLOPATHON

Build the stupidest thing you can with AI. Enter alone or as a team, submit by August 10, and everybody gets exactly one vote.

01 / POSITION

Every other hackathon asks you for something that works.

This one asks for something that shouldn't. Bring a laptop and a model of your choosing. Build a thing that would never survive a code review, drop it in the Dropbox by August 10, and put it in front of a room of people who came for exactly that. The room votes. The room is never kind. The room is usually right.

No panel.No sponsors' pick.No consolation.

02 / ORIGIN

Why wemade this.

At every hackathon we went to this year, we kept seeing the same project: another AI tool designed to make people faster and essentially more productive.

The projects weren't necessarily bad. The strange part was how identical they all felt. Hackathons have become obsessed with proving that an idea is good.

So Ethan, Jonathan, and Angela— two Brown students and one CMU student —created the AI Slopathon.

  • Jonathan Gong

    Jonathan Gong

    Carnegie Mellon University

  • Angela Jin

    Angela Jin

    Brown University

  • Ethan Barlay

    Ethan Barlay

    Brown University

Your challenge Build the stupidest
thing you can with AI.

We welcome AI slop, as long as it's satirical, whimsical, surprising, or genuinely funny. No need to solve a serious problem. No need to justify the market size. Just make something that probably shouldn't exist.

The best part? We're giving away $100 as the grand prize, plus other ridiculous prizes.

We're betting that when people stop trying so hard to be useful, they create something far more interesting.

03 / TERMS

Three rules,
then nothing.

  • Enter

    Come on your own or bring a team. If you're a team, only one person registers — they list everyone else on the form, and the rest of you just build.

  • Build

    No prior code required — the models do the typing, you do the deciding. Stupid is the specification.

  • Submit

    Everything goes into the project Dropbox by August 10. It will break when somebody else opens it. That is the point.

04 / AWARD

620 mm 340 mm GRAND PRIZE — ELEVATION SCALE 1:4 SHEET 01 OF 01

The room decides
who takes it home.

01

Grand Prize

$100+an oversized trophy

Physically inconvenient by design. You will be asked to carry it home on public transport.

02

Runner-Up

The Mystery Prize

Every project is different, so some awards are too. Build something unexpected — you might unlock a prize designed specifically for what you create.

Both awarded by community vote. No judging panel exists.

05 / THE VOTE

One person.
One vote.

  1. 01

    Submit

    Everything lands in the project Dropbox by August 10. One submission per entry, whether that entry is one person or six.

  2. 02

    Vote

    Voting opens August 10 and closes August 14. Everyone who entered gets exactly one vote. Builders vote too. You cannot vote for yourself.

  3. 03

    Crown

    Winners announced at the ceremony on August 15, 11:00 AM EST. Highest count takes the hundred and the trophy. Counts are read aloud.

06 / PROGRAMME

Submit by the tenth.
Trophy on the fifteenth.

Jul28

Registration opens

Enter alone or as a team — one person books for the whole group and names the rest on the form. Registration closes August 9 at 11:00 PM.

Aug10

Submissions due

Every project goes into the project Dropbox by August 10. One submission per entry. Late slop is still slop, but it will not be voted on.

Aug10–14

Community voting

Five days for everyone to look at everything and pick one. No panel, no sponsors' pick — just the count.

Aug15

Award ceremony

11:00 AM EST. Counts read aloud, winners announced, prizes handed over.

07 / ADMISSION

Cheap on purpose.

Save your money for your terrible AI ideas.

Early Best value

$5

Early Admission

Jul 28 → Aug 2, 2:00 PM

Get in before everyone realises this is a real event.

Regular Still cheap

$7

Regular Admission

Aug 2, 2:00 PM → Aug 9, 11:00 PM

Two dollars more, exactly the same terrible ideas.

Get your ticket

Sold on Eventbrite — opens in a new tab. 13+. One vote per entry.
Entering as a team? Only one of you registers and lists the rest on the form.

08 / NOTES

1Do I need to know how to code?
No. A good share of past winners had never opened a terminal before doors. The models do the typing; you do the deciding, and deciding is the hard part.
2What counts as slop?
Anything built fast, with a model, that is satirical, whimsical, surprising, or genuinely funny. Ugly is permitted. Useful is suspicious. Boring is not allowed.
3How big is the trophy, really?
620 mm tall. See the elevation above — it is drawn to scale, and it does not fit in a tote bag.
4Can I enter on my own?
Yes, and plenty do — solo entries win about as often. If you'd rather bring a team, only one of you needs to register; that person lists everyone else on the form, and the whole team counts as a single entry.
5How do I submit?
Through the project Dropbox, by August 10. One submission per entry. Voting runs August 10–14, and winners are announced at the ceremony on August 15 at 11:00 AM EST.