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>> Pat Ryan: Nick tell
me about the background

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of the International
Space Apps Challenge.

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Where did this idea come from?

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>> Nick Skytland:

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So the International
Space Apps Challenge grew

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out of our involvement with the
Random Acts of Kindness Project.

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Which was a collaboration
with Microsoft, Google,

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Yahoo, HP and World Bank.

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And the idea of that was we
wanted to change the world

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through mass collaboration,
and engage people

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in solving real challenges
that matter to organizations.

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And we came up with the idea

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of the International
Space Apps Challenge

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by applying that model to NASA.

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And the ultimate goal
was to engage citizens

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around the world, and
helping solve grand challenges

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that NASA offers.

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>> Pat Ryan: It's not
anybody in particular,

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or any group of people;
everybody?

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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We're not prescriptive in
anyone's title or talent

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or whatever they have on their
resume, if they have a passion

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for space exploration,
we want to engage them.

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>> Pat Ryan: The first of these
activities took place last

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year --

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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>> Pat Ryan: -- how did it go?

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah we had
the first one almost exactly a

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year ago in April.

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It went really well.

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It exceeded our expectations
at the time.

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We had 25 cities around the
world, and 2,083 participants.

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And the 101 solutions were
developed in 48 hours.

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We thought that we were really
onto something at the time.

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>> Pat Ryan: That
many solutions,

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you say, were developed.

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How many of them turned
out to be something

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that were very worthwhile
and useful?

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>> Nick Skytland: You know, we
were actually surprised by this,

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a very large majority of them,

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like 80% of them were actually
useful solutions after the fact.

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>> Pat Ryan: This year you set
out 50 different challenges

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for people to try to
solve, including some

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that were directly applicable to
the International Space Station.

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Give us a few examples.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah so this
year -- just to clarify --

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this year, we actually had
a lot more participants

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in our even this year too.

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So we had about 9,000 people
participate this year.

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>> Pat Ryan: Wow.

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>> Nick Skytland: And the event
actually took place in 83 cities

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around the world
and 44 countries.

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So all 7 continents.

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And we had a space
station involved

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with a pre-recorded message.

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And so we offered 58
challenges, actually totally.

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And there were a number of
solutions that came out of them.

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One of them directly applicable

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to a space station
was a challenge called

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"Spot the Station".

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And we had over 35 --
or about 35 entries

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to this one challenge alone.

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And one of the solutions that
came out of it was a software

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or hardware application
that both allows a user

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to follow the space station
using augmented reality

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in an iPhone app.

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And then it takes that data
and augments it with hardware

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that lights up when
space station is nearby.

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>> Pat Ryan: Okay that's one.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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And so there's a few others.

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Obviously many related
to space exploration.

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We had one that I'm just really
particularly excited about.

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It was called "Wish You Were
Here", was the challenge name.

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And the idea was to
help citizens connect

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with our Mars mission
that's happening right now.

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We have a lot of data from
Mars exploration programs,

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but how can we actually make
that more tangible to the user.

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So what they developed was
a solution called "Soul".

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It's the first interplanetary
weather system for your iPhone.

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And the idea is that you
can see the weather on Mars.

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So you can compare that
with your weather on Earth.

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And it's a really just ingenious
app that's actually going to be

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on the app store this week.

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>> Pat Ryan: Hmm.

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And you can probably
better about yourself too

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because you have better
weather than Mars right?

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>> Nick Skytland: [Chuckles]
that's definitely true.

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That's definitely true.

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>> Pat Ryan: Okay.

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Space station, Mars.

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>> Nick Skytland: And then we
had a number of other ones.

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One of them really looked at
the corona activity on the sun,

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and allowed you to understand
when that was at a high level

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or when it was at a low level

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because we're constantly
being bombarded

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on earth with this activity.

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>> Pat Ryan: Right.

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>> Nick Skytland: But often
times we don't have any idea

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of what's actually happening.

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And so this was something you
could just hang onto your wall

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and it would light up when
there was activity going on.

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>> Pat Ryan: Now you
mentioned it's --

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I'm sorry, is it 83 countries?

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>> Nick Skytland: 83
cities; 44 countries.

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>> Pat Ryan: 44 countries
all over the world,

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and we brought a
couple of photographs

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to show you what it looked
like when it went on.

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Describe what we're
seeing here, the brochure?

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Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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So this is just a
brochure that a lot

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of the participants were given

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that just described the
challenges ahead of time.

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The participants would
have a chance to look

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at all the challenges
before the weekend started,

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and really pick the ones
they gravitated towards.

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And then the weekend
of the event,

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they actually chose
one to work on.

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>> Pat Ryan: And the
second picture give you,

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kind of an example in
this location anyway,

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of the people who are there.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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This is a picture
from Philadelphia,

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which was our global main stage.

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And this is the receptioning --
the reception on Friday night

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where all the participants
came together.

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It was part of Philly
Tech Week actually.

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And it was a huge event where
there was a number of speakers,

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including Leland Melvin --

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>> Pat Ryan: Mm-hmm.

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>> Nick Skytland: --
who just, we're excited

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about space exploration; we're
talking to the participants

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about the future of NASA.

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>> Pat Ryan: You mentioned
a moment ago to me too

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that you were surprised that
quite a lot of the people

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that you had turn out,

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there were a lot more
women than you expected.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah we have
a really interesting case this

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year, that we had
a very large amount

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of participation from women.

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Usually in the tech industry,
when you do something like this,

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you have a lower -- and just
stemic [phonetic] in general,

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you have a lower population
of women that participate.

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In New York City, half of the
175 participants were women.

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It's incredible.

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>> Pat Ryan: So you've
got all these people

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that are turning out,
and they put up some

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of their own signage actually --

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>> Nick Skytland: [Chuckles].

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>> Pat Ryan: -- that --
to show you where to go --

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>> Nick Skytland: Yes.

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>> Pat Ryan: -- but this is
-- these are the people --

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>> Nick Skytland:
This is fantastic.

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>> Pat Ryan: -- that
turned out, right?

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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>> Pat Ryan: These are
our computer geeks.

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>> Nick Skytland:
Yeah what's great

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about this event is it's
not only developers,

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it's also technologists,
entrepreneurs,

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designers, programmers.

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So this is a great
example of what --

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the creativity that comes
out of this weekend.

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>> Pat Ryan: And we got a
couple of looks inside the room

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of the people at work.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah
they're hard at work --

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>> Pat Ryan: Drawing
on the wall.

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>> Nick Skytland: You
know it's interesting,

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we will offer them
food at lunchtime,

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and they won't even
want to stop working.

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>> Pat Ryan: Yeah.

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>> Nick Skytland: They
just work [chuckles] right

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through the weekend.

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>> Pat Ryan: And
this one, you said,

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was actually one
of your favorites.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah this
is one of my favorite photos

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from events like
this from all time.

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Because what you see here
is, the men are a minority

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in this picture [chuckles].

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>> Pat Ryan: Mm-hmm.

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>> Nick Skytland: And
the women just look

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like they're really
having a great time.

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>> Pat Ryan: This International
Space App challenge happened

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this past weekend.

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>> Nick Skytland:
That's correct.

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>> Pat Ryan: Is there a way yet
for people to be involved in it?

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>> Nick Skytland:
Yeah, we actually --

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so we had 770 solutions
submitted to --

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for the judging process.

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Which is incredible;
it's overwhelming.

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And so we've down selected
those to about 100.

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And we're going to have
a people's choice award.

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And what we're asking people
to do is go online and vote

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for your favorite solution.

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We're then going to down
select from those into the top,

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you know, 15 or so,
and we're going

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to have a second round
of that competition.

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We're going to choose
one overall winner based

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on popular vote.

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>> Pat Ryan: From all
of the different areas?

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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>> Pat Ryan: All 58
different challenges.

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AS well as, I guess,
a winner in each area?

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah
we're going to have --

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in addition to that one winner,

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we will have 4 additional
winners.

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One for best use of data.

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One for best use of hardware.

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One for galactic impact.

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And then one for most inspiring.

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>> Pat Ryan: And it sounds like
some or more of these are going

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to be available for
anybody to use.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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The great thing about this
event is that every solution

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that was submitted -- all
770 of them, are submitted

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under an open-source license.

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Meaning that NASA
can use the code

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or anybody can use the code.

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And a lot of them will -- you'll
find them on the app stores.

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Android; iPhone, a lot of them
are web-based browser tools,

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and some of them are hardware
that you can download the plans.

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Build yourself a cube
sat [phonetic] based

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on their plans and go for it.

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>> Pat Ryan: It --
obviously this is tying

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in with NASA's overall effort
at education and outreach;

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getting more people involved.

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>> Nick Skytland: Yeah.

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And it's not just
education and outreach.

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What we tried to do was
develop an event here

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that we can educate the public

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about what space exploration's
all about and what we're doing

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and then the missions and
the programs that we have.

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But more than that,
we are trying

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to aggregate useful
contributions

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to the Space Program.

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There are a lot of
people outside of NASA

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who love what we do, but
have never had an opportunity

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to actually participate
first hand.

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They don't have a job here.

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They're not an astronaut;
they can't fly in space.

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So -- but they have
great, brilliant ideas.

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And so what we've done here
is provide a way for people

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to actually contribute.

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And our goal is to
actually pull a large amount

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of these solutions back
into the space agency.

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>> Pat Ryan: You looked like --
but you had a lot of fun there,

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and going to have some
good results as well.

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>> Nick Skytland:
Yeah it's incredible.

248
00:08:10,255 --> 00:08:11,623
I live for these events.

249
00:08:11,623 --> 00:08:16,094
They are so inspiring to see
people from around the world,

250
00:08:16,094 --> 00:08:20,499
ages 8 to 75 participating
in an event like this.

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00:08:20,499 --> 00:08:21,600
>> Pat Ryan: Nick
I appreciate it.

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00:08:21,600 --> 00:08:23,969
Thank you for bringing
us up-to-date on it.

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00:08:23,969 --> 00:08:25,938
Nick Skytland is
the Program Manager