Hasta La Ideas

Reporting by Carly Ayres, RISD Industrial Design ’13; photos by Sarah Pease, RISD Furniture Design ’13.

With the premise, “you have to start somewhere,” t=0 marked the beginning of a new tradition at MIT and the starting point for students to come together and create new technological ventures. A two-day festival aimed at bringing together everyone from engineers and designers to hackers and makers, t=0 was a celebration of entrepreneurship and innovation in a learning environment.

Entering the Johnson Ice Rink where the event was held, participants were instantly greeted by an enormous bouncy castle as well as modern white furniture emitting blue light. “We wanted the layout to feel like a festival. Not like a conference,” Elliot Cohen (MIT MBA ’15) explained, relating how he, along with a small staff from the MIT Entrepreneurship Center, chose to plan the event. “So we were really careful, all the terminology we used was like that of a festival.” Hence the ‘lineup’ of Mitch Kapor, Brad Feld, Rich Miner, and other ‘artists.’ The terminology and decor, combined with an endless supply of complimentary Red Bull, worked to create a room of high energy that would act as a catalyst for entrepreneurship amongst attendees.

A group of eager entrepreneurs in the Startup Lab

Speaker Drew
Volpe, co-founder & CTO at Locately

The energy was palpable in the Startup Lab, which was full of groups that had broken off following the presentations Friday night where each student pitched his or her idea. Depending on what the group needed—designers, coders, etc.—participants would join up and start hacking at the various steps needed to bring the project to fruition. MIT Mentors floated from table to table, discussing business plans and various obstacles the groups might face further down the road.

The Startup Lab ran throughout the day in that format, while various ‘artists’ took the stage to speak on their experiences. Workshops ran simultaneously in another corner of the rink, which included everything from sequencing your own DNA to sketching to communicate thoughts and ideas. The “Creating an Instrument” workshop run by Jason Sanford and Zach Katz showed participants how to design instruments to produce music via hobby electronics and a hex-inverter chip.

Speaker Andrew Cove, founder of Quirk.

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