I am Jonathan Carter, co-founder and CTO of Glimworm IT. In 2011 we won the PICNIC Open Data Hackathon with an iPhone app called ‘ParkShark Amsterdam’ and as PICNIC 2012 comes upon us I wanted to let you know what has happened in the last 12 months.
1. PARK SHARK AMSTERDAM
END OF YEAR REPORT,
By Jonathan Carter
PICNIC 2012
I am Jonathan Carter, co-founder and CTO of
Glimworm IT in Amsterdam. In 2011 we won the
PICNIC Open Data Hackathon with an iPhone app
called ‘ParkShark Amsterdam’ and as PICNIC 2012
comes upon us I wanted to let you know what has
happened in the last 12 months.
Jonathan Carter co-
founded Glimworm IT BV
in 2001 with partners Paul
As way of an introduction, ParkShark Amsterdam uses the parking meter data
Manwaring, Marten
provided by the City of Amsterdam (department DIVV) and Amsterdam’s parking
Hoekstra and Colin
enforcement contractor CITION, and uses a custom built calculation module which
Williams. At 15 his
is unique to ParkShark provides the total cost of on street parking, given a starting
professional career began
time, duration, method of payment, and location. It also gives a list of nearby places
as a game programmer.
that you could park instead but pay less. This is possible because Amsterdam is
After more than 10 years of
divided into parking zones each of which have their own price list.
innovative experience
Jonathan was asked to join
After we released it to the App Store we became
CMG’s prestigious Advanced
interested in more aspects of parking and attended
Technology Department
some conferences on the subject. Out of the blue we
consulting for blue chip
were asked to speak to representatives of the parking
companies. Eventually,
departments of several european cities about our
he shifted his attention to
product. This was because they were part of a larger
new media and created
project called ‘smart cities SDK’ which is funded by
Glimworm, bringing his
the EU and aims to encourage european cities to
talents to the world of web
exchange best practises when they automate similar
development. With nearly
services. There are seperate meetings for mobility,
30 years in the industry his
tourism, energy, traffic control amongst others. We
list of accomplishments is
huge
including everything from
project management to
Park Shark
WINNAAR PICNIC 2011
robot building and he
continues to keep on top
of new developments by
constantly evaluating
emerging technologies.
2. “ I hope this open
have been happy to provide the data model we developed for Park Shark
Amsterdam to this group along with the calculation module that works here
in Amsterdam to see if they would like to develop it further. letter gives you, as a
developer, an insight
As the calculation and the advice module of Park Shark Amsterdam is its
strength we re-developed this module and put it online via an API so that
into some of the things
other developers could use it to make their own apps and mashups. This API that can happen after
is in Beta right now and you are free to try it out at http://api.parkshark.nl. As winning a hackathon
a demonstration of the API we made a button which can be added into any
website, similar to implementing a facebook like button The button pops up and both inspires and
a parking advice window. We see this being implemented next to a google encourages you to enter
map on the contact page of businesses websites where they have a visiting
them. I hope you can
address in Amsterdam. With this button we see a potential revenue stream.
see that it is possible to
We are asked often what our business model is for this product and the get commercial results
honest answer is that we are actively exploring several and we feel like
pioneers in this area. We got publicity from the initial hackathon win and
from a hackathon win
we continue to get business contacts which sometimes lead to commercial as long as you think
projects. We provide Park Shark Amsterdam, both the app and the API,
creatively and explore
”
free of charge to the city of Amsterdam and our current plan is to explore
advertising models for this set of applications and in parallel to see if other less obvious routes.
cities would like us to make the same set of applications but this time on a
paid basis. It is too early to tell whether this approach will bear fruit but we
are enthusiastic about it and I’ll keep you updated.
I hope this open letter gives you, as a developer, an insight into some of the
things that can happen after winning a hackathon and both inspires and
encourages you to enter them. I hope you can see that it is possible to get
commercial results from a hackathon win as long as you think creatively and
explore less obvious routes.
If you want to get involved with hackathons please Join Appsterdam
(appsterdam.rs), Join and attend several meetups (metup.com), and keep an
eye on the Waag society (Waag.org). Using these three resources you will
enter a network where you won’t miss a single hackathon.
Thank you for your time,
Jonathan Carter
co-founder & CTO, Glimworm IT BV, Amsterdam
jc@glimworm.com, @jonathanrcarter
Glimworm IT BV Tel: +31 (0)20 - 616 56 40
Eerste Weteringplantsoen 8 Fax: +31 (0)20 - 240 13 57
1017 SK, Amsterdam E-mail: jc@glimworm.com
Nederland
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