Overtomorrow Hackathon: Thinking & Acting 100 Years Ahead

We often talk about yesterday, today, and tomorrow. But do we really talk enough about the day after tomorrow? We believe that if we bring creatives, strategists, and organizations together in the right way, we can make it happen. Enter Overtomorrow: a hackathon where we think and act 100 years into the future.

At Overtomorrow, 25 creatives use a colorful mix of trendwatching, brainstorming, and concepting methods to design the future in a way you’ve never seen before, but that just might become the new standard. Welcome to the future.

Overtomorrow gives you and your organization the chance to look beyond the usual paths and, above all, to step out of your own bubble and see a challenge from a completely different perspective.
– Maarten Eisema, UMCG

Overtomorrow: the 100 year hackathon

Hackathons usually last between 8 and 24 hours, sometimes even 48 hours or a full week. Overtomorrow starts at 5 PM and ends at 2 AM. That might make it seem like it lasts eight hours, but that’s not the case. Overtomorrow is the first hackathon on Earth that lasts a hundred years. From 2023 to 2124, to be precise.

Friso from Brain Fuel had long been haunted by the uneasy feeling that we all operate so short-term. We live from deadline to deadline, while both human lives and global challenges demand a different approach. This gave birth to Overtomorrow, a future hackathon for social impact. And although everyone reacted with great enthusiasm, there was still no group brave enough to actually invest in the future.

But in 2023, Mooiedingenmakers joined in, brought the Municipality of Groningen on board, and Overtomorrow finally gained real momentum. The World Wildlife Fund, the International Salvation Army, and the University Medical Center Groningen were all eager to launch a future-focused challenge, and we were ready to go.

But that’s just the beginning. Where does it end? Predicting the future is easier said than done. What we can do, however, is explore the future, brainstorm, and craft action plans to make the goals as future-proof as possible.

Although “reflecting on the future” might not be the right words. I was really put to the test, which made creativity flare up and spark. Absolutely thrilling to experience.
– Cynthia van Zwol, WNF

How does the Overtomorrow hackathon work?

An Overtomorrow hackathon consists of three phases: trend-watching, brainstorming, and concept development.

But as you can see and hear in just about everything Overtomorrow does, the event is inspired by retro-futuristic films like Blade Runner and Back to the Future.

That’s why we might as well call these phases Science Fiction, Fiction, and Non-Fiction.

Phase One: Science Fiction
We kick off Overtomorrow with a deep dive into the challenge and a rapid-fire Q&A, where creative strategists and strategic creatives act like private detectives, trying to uncover what the client doesn’t even know themselves.

Immediately after, there’s a trend talk by the future agency The Forward Club, covering three key theories the teams need to know when thinking about the future. This is essential, because people aren’t used to looking more than a few years ahead, let alone a full hundred.

Finally, the teams dive into six megatrends that will still be relevant 100 years from now, as well as 50 macrotrends for the next ten to twenty years. They piece together a trend map around the challenge they’re working on. In fact, they even adjust the challenge itself based on their future research, personal insights, and the interview with the client. With the revised challenge and trend map in hand, they’re ready for the next step: brainstorming. Or rather, Fiction.

Phase Two: Fiction
In a high-speed, high-energy, high-quality brainstorm. something only Brain Fuel can pull off, we guide participants to generate hundreds of solutions. First comes an introverted brainstorming method, allowing everyone to empty their own minds onto paper. Then, an extroverted brainstorming method follows, where the group isn’t afraid to push beyond reality. The result: hundreds of ideas, ranging from realistic to wild, and everything in between.

Even more importantly: from those hundreds of ideas, they select the very best. From that massive stack of post-its, they first pick “the best.” Then they complement the top ideas with “the rest.” Just as they once had a map of trends, they now have a map of solutions. It’s time to develop the very best solutions in detail.

Phase Three: Non-Fiction
Each challenge receives a visual, a manifesto, and an action plan. In other words, a concept that can be implemented now but will still prove valuable 100 years from now. This is essential if we want to make the results as actionable and lasting as possible. Because how often do people leave a brainstorm or hackathon feeling like they’re going to change the world? Every single time. And how often does that actually happen? Exactly.

That’s why participants work on developing the concept not only during the hackathon itself but also on the follow-up day two weeks later. In between these two moments, the teams receive feedback from the goals’ stakeholders, from The Forward Club, from Mooiedingenmakers, and, of course, from Brain Fuel itself. With the follow-up day, we’re not just taking the first step. We’re taking the second as well. Double the chance that the results will actually be implemented, so our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren truly benefit from them.

I also want an Overtomorrow!

That’s possible. In fact, we’d love to. Let’s build a time machine together to start solving the problems of the future today.

Send an email to info@brainfuel.nl or call +31 (0)58 203 80 33.

Wanna know more?

Got a problem? We’d love to turn you into a problem solver! Send an email to info@brainfuel.nl or call +31 (0)58 203 80 33, and we’ll help you find the solution!