Latest news with #Qin
Business Insider
3 days ago
- Business
- Business Insider
How AI startups are using hackathons to compete with Big Tech for talent
Hackathons bring together computer engineers to rapidly solve technical problems. Now, they are increasingly helping startups solve another problem: scouting AI talent. The event, which brings people together for around 24 to 72 hours to build a software product, gained traction in Silicon Valley in the 2000s and became a staple affair for Big Tech companies like Meta. But after the pandemic, hackathons were slow to get going again, said Bela Wiertz, founder of Tech: Europe, and organizer of multiple AI hackathons across the continent. That changed with the AI boom. Wiertz said that, since the arrival of ChatGPT in late 2022, more research labs and AI startups have been arranging hackathons in cities with less "tech organization" in a bid to bring together top talent. And the events' talent-pulling power is making hackathons "a viable way for hot AI startups to compete with Big Tech for a top talent pool," Zoe Qin, vice president at Dawn Capital, told Business Insider. Big Tech companies typically have a major advantage over startups in the talent market: they can outspend them in recruitment and entice candidates with substantial compensation packages. Hackathons are one way for startups to level the playing field. "Startups cannot spend as much money on LinkedIn ads or copy what Big Tech do in terms of prestige, but they can show that they're more agile, and more approachable, that they're more committed during a hackathon," said Benjamin Wolba, the founder of European Defense Tech Hub, which organizes hackathons across the continent. In some cases, startups use hackathons to scout early-career talent that they might not reach during traditional hiring processes. Angelo Giacco, an Imperial College London and ETH Zurich graduate, participated in an AI hackathon organized by ElevenLabs in November. Two weeks later, he landed a job offer as an engineer at the AI startup. "I wouldn't even have considered applying if I hadn't gone to the hackathon," he told BI. "We're now hiring a few more people from hackathons, and we've launched one in seven different countries," he added. It's not just junior roles. Dawn Capital's Qin said that after some hackathons, she's seen some startups go after "high-performing candidates, or in the case of a hackathon run by a tech company itself, their engineers who have performed really well." Often, AI startups want entrepreneurial talent that's not rooted in a specific background, and recruiting from a hackathon allows these upstarts to find people "who want to tinker, build, and make things better — who may not necessarily match a classic profile of a computer scientist who wants to work in Big Tech," Qin added. While traditional AI research labs may not hire pure research talent from hackathons, it's useful for them to source solutions and customer-facing engineers who can build up the technology at the application layer. "For the foundation labs and all the infrastructure partners like Mistral and Eleven Labs, they're labs, but they're selling their technology as an infrastructure," said Wiertz. "So for them, yes, it's about hiring, but it's also the adoption of the technology in the ecosystem." Non-technical talent also has a shot Increasingly, more people from non-technical backgrounds are using AI coding assistants to vibe code and create technical products. That has lowered the barrier to entry for coding-related projects and broadened the talent pool that participates in hackathons. "University can be so theoretical, but hackathons help us to tackle real-life problems and get projects off the ground," said Franziska Harzheim, a venture scout at Flashpoint who has participated in multiple AI hackathons. With a degree in business analytics, Harzheim has still found a way to leverage her background to build an AI product with a team. "I feel like those hackathons are not about having a team of five super-experienced coders. It's more like we look at everyone's skill set, and according to that, we divide the tasks," she said. "If you're willing to learn something new on the spot, this is your space, it's amazing." They're also a valuable opportunity for companies to assess potential candidates from technical and non-technical backgrounds. "You get to see how people perform, whether they earn the food or are actually doing stuff in real life, not in an assessment center," European Defense Tech Hub's Wolba said. "You get to see them working on the inside — it could be very information dense, so it's a time-effective way to understand whether you want to work with this person."
Time Out
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Australia's largest-ever Terracotta Warriors exhibition is headed to Perth this year
Right up there with the Great Wall of China and the Forbidden City, the Qin dynasty's Terracotta Warriors aren't just one of China's greatest cultural treasures – they're a wonder of the world. Now, Aussies have a chance to see part of the 8,000-strong army in an exclusive exhibition at Perth 's WA Museum Boola Bardip. Running from June 28, 2025 to February 22, 2026, Terracotta Warriors: Legacy of the First Empire is set to make history as the largest museum exhibition Western Australia has ever seen – and you'll want to catch it before it marches home to China. For more than 2,000 years, this life-sized army stood guard at the tomb of Qin Shi Huang, China's first emperor, in Shaanxi province. Their existence remained a secret until 1974, when unsuspecting farmers digging a well struck archaeological gold. A rare delegation of eight Terracotta Army figures is marching into Perth for this exclusive exhibition – including a general, an armoured infantryman, a charioteer officer and a kneeling archer – plus a seated attendant and a saddled horse. Sure, eight out of 8,000 warriors feels a little measly, but ten is the maximum number of Terracotta figures China loans internationally at any one time – so we should feel pretty lucky! Joining the warriors are a whopping 225-odd treasures from ancient China, the majority of which have never been seen in Australia before. Almost half of these artefacts have never left China, with highlights including a lifelike bronze swan crafted using ancient lost-wax casting techniques, a 50-kilogram ceremonial bell and four recently excavated gold ornaments that will make their global debut in Perth. Enhanced with brand-new immersive multimedia experiences, Terracotta Warriors: Legacy of the First Emperor will be unlike any Terracotta Warrior exhibition the world has ever seen. It will be on display at the WA Museum Boola Bardip from June 28, 2025 to February 22, 2026, in what is being billed as the boldest museum exhibition Western Australia has hosted to date. For the first time ever, the museum is offering season passes, allowing visitors to return as often as they like throughout the entire exhibition run. General admission is $30 for adults and $15 for kids aged five to 15, while season passes will set you back $90. WA Museum Boola Bardip has also curated a program of special events: think tea-and-talk sessions on Thursdays, after-hours performances on Fridays, hands-on workshops over the weekend and family-friendly fun every Sunday. You can find out more about Terracotta Warriors: Legacy of the First Emperor here.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Graves Discovered on Silk Road Route Reveal Ancient Burial Customs
Archaeologists working deep within China's Xinjiang province have discovered over 200 ancient tombs which date back to the Warring States period as well as the Qin and Han dynasties, according to a study published in NPJ Heritage Toksun County, located near the oasis city of Turpan, researchers have unearthed a communal graveyard spanning approximately 10,000 square meters, the largest ever found in the Turpan Basin. The sites are adorned with large mounted piles of dirt and stones, leading scientists to conclude that these were communal burial cultures, a sharp contrast to the solitary graves that China's elite were given. Located near a river, the burial site is thought to have been especially important to nomadic groups. In Central Asia, early nomadic or semi-settled societies would place their plots near river valleys or springs. This allowed different groups to converge on the site, feed their animals, and bury dead members of their community according to their after the burial site was established, Turpan would become one of the key destinations on the Silk Road trade route. Ekbar Kelim, a local cultural official, told The Greek Reporter that he and his fellow researchers have already unearthed evidence of trade within the tombs. Kelim and his team plan to conduct further excavations of the tombs and surrounding areas. They will examine burial offerings and other artifacts such as ceramics, fabrics, and skeletal remains to hopefully find other evidence of intercultural interaction. They believe that the tombs of Turpan could reveal how ancient China interacted with the rest of the world.
Boston Globe
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
Words, music, and more combine to tell overlooked stories of women of color in Boston
Advertisement The presentation was part of Narratives of Women of Color in Greater Boston , a new performance series that aims to reintroduce these kinds of rich but overlooked narratives with original compositions. These new works, many of which fuse music, dance, video, or poetry, are based on historical documents about women of color in Boston, ranging from decades-old archival interviews to contemporary poetry and manuscripts submitted by community members. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up The April event launched the series with programming that was primarily inspired by the Advertisement The series is the initiative of Qin cites community engagement as a key component of her artistic practice, and decided to dig deeper into the history of neighborhoods across her new-ish home last fall. She launched an open call for materials preserving the experiences of Boston-based women of color, requesting text-based documents like letters, poetry, and manuscripts. She ultimately received 'eye-opening' submissions from residents of Roxbury, Dorchester, Cambridge, Brookline, Jamaica Plain, Roslindale, and the Fenway, touching on topics such as life as a Black disabled woman and the city's desegregation busing crisis in the 1970s and 1980s. Combined with the interviews from the oral history project, the wealth of perspectives would serve as the inspiration for the series's six composers: ' I wanted to really go into those histories, see what actually happened and what I didn't know, and what I could create from those unknown things,' Qin says. Guests at Tuesday's event in Roxbury can expect to hear five of the eight new compositions created for the series, including a work by Qin that was inspired by 'Present/Presence,' a poem from Boston disability advocate and author Heather Watkins. Another event in the series, scheduled for May 31, will move the experience outdoors to the Little Free Library at the Rose Kennedy Greenway and unveil two previously-unheard compositions created for the series. Advertisement Qin says she hopes the multimedia nature of the performances will pique guest's interests in the materials that inspired each event, as well as the careers and backgrounds of the composers themselves. 'Even if it's just one phrase or one note, if that moment really speaks to them, I think it could start a new journey for them,' she says. GIG GUIDE Puerto Rican star At Roadrunner on Brooklyn's Sunflower Bean revive a retro rock sound at Deep Cuts this Saturday. Anna Nazarova Two of Brooklyn's best rock bands visit Deep Cuts this week; after releasing their taut EP 'Shake' last year, Advertisement Los Angeles singer-songwriter Samia brings a clash of ethereal pop and indie folk to the House of Blues on Wednesday. Riley Dwyer Some of the finest funk and psychedelia in the country – nay, universe – touches down at the House of Blues on After supporting the European leg of embarks on her own headlining tour across North America, bringing her youthful pop-rock to Somerville savant Ezra Furman releases her tenth album 'Goodbye Small Head' – a reference to a Sleater-Kinney lyric – this Friday. Eleanor Petry NOW SPINNING Rico Nasty's third album "LETHAL" is a 15-track salvo of trap and rap – and on a few occasions, rabid nu-metal. Emerald Arguelles Rico Nasty, Advertisement 'Lucid Dreaming,' Tune-Yards's sixth studio album, unfurls a surrealistic plane of art-pop. Shervin Lainez Tune-Yards, BONUS TRACK has a new season of local 'n' live music on tap. Starting this weekend, the brewery's stage will host free performances from area musicians on Fridays and Saturdays; Victoria Wasylak can be reached at . Follow her on Bluesky @
The Guardian
29-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘The eighth wonder of the world': China's terracotta warriors to march on Australia for blockbuster show
Two thousand years ago, in a bid to conquer death itself, China's first emperor Qin Shi Huang commissioned a city of the dead: a 49 sq km mausoleum guarded by an army of clay warriors, built to defend his tomb for eternity. When farmers near Xi'an unearthed the first clay head in 1974, they cracked open one of humanity's greatest archaeological mysteries, with more than 8,000 Terracotta Warriors discovered over the last 50 years. Now, fragments of that dream of immortality rise again – this time in Perth, where the largest exhibition of the Terracotta Warriors ever staged in Australia will head later this year Opening on 28 June at WA Museum Boola Bardip, Terracotta Warriors: Legacy of the First Emperor promises not just a glimpse into ancient China, but a sweeping journey across its foundations in more than 225 artefacts, many of which have never left China. Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning 'It's hard to put into words how significant this is,' said Alec Coles, CEO of WA Museum Boola Bardip. 'Seventy per cent of these objects have never been to Australia before, and 40% have never left China.' 'For me, this is the eighth wonder of the world,' he said. 'There is nothing like it anywhere.' Developed in collaboration with the Shaanxi Cultural Heritage Promotion Centre and the Emperor Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum Museum, Terracotta Warriors features 10 of the lifesize clay soldiers – the maximum number permitted to leave China – each weighing up to 180kg and standing 1.8m tall. Meticulously crafted from separate parts, each warrior was finished with a uniquely modelled face, capturing the individuality of a living army. Eight warrior sculptures last came to Australia in 2019 for the National Gallery of Victoria's show Terracotta Warriors: Guardians of Immortality. WA Museum Boola Bardip's upcoming exhibition will explore the story of China's first emperor and the world he sought to recreate in death: bronze vessels, ancient chariots, gilded belt hooks, painted cavalry figures and rare gold ornaments, some so newly unearthed they've never been displayed anywhere before. 'Qin Shi Huang not only unified China, he standardised measurements, currency and even language – and all of this decades before the Rosetta Stone was carved in Egypt,' Coles said. 'You have to think about the extraordinary impact he had in such a tiny period of time. The Qin dynasty lasted only 15 years, but it changed China for ever.' Sign up to Saved for Later Catch up on the fun stuff with Guardian Australia's culture and lifestyle rundown of pop culture, trends and tips after newsletter promotion There is an enduring enigma to Qin's story: his tomb remains unopened, its secrets sealed beneath a great earthen pyramid. Ancient historians described a vast underground kingdom complete with rivers of mercury and deadly booby traps – legends that the Terracotta Warriors exhibition will reimagine in an immersive final installation. 'The patience and respect shown in leaving the tomb unopened is extraordinary,' Coles said. 'Who knows what secrets still lie buried?' Among the highlights is a bronze swan, cast using the ancient lost-wax method and discovered near a pleasure garden meant for the emperor's afterlife. 'It's absolutely exquisite,' Coles said. Terracotta Warriors will also frame Qin's reign within a longer narrative arc, from the preceding turbulent Warring States period, which ended with the start of the short-lived Qin dynasty in the second century BC, through to the rise of the Han dynasty, which lasted four centuries. In a world riven by political tensions, the exhibition will also gesture toward the enduring power of cultural diplomacy. 'Cultural connections are important at any time, but perhaps especially now,' Coles said. 'They transcend politics. Building stronger relationships and understanding is paramount.' 'I hope visitors experience the same wonder that I did,' he added. 'The beauty, the rarity, the achievement. And an appreciation of what Qin Shi Huang created, not just for China, but for human history.' Terracotta Warriors: Legacy of the First Emperor runs at WA Museum Boola Bardip from 28 June until 22 February 2026
