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HOSTED BY Gradio · Hugging Face SPONSORED BY [ TBD ] Dates: May 29 2026 - June 8 2026
Making AI Fun Again
The pace of AI over the last year has been anxiety-inducing. Labs release larger and larger models that do more of the things that make us feel human: writing, drawing, speaking, coding. No wonder more than half of us think the risks of AI outweigh the benefits.
We're sponsoring a hackathon to take things back to how they felt in 2021 when models were small enough to tinker with and the vibe was fun and hopeful over how this technology could improve our lives.
This hackathon is different from others. Rather than using a giant LLM to ship yet another B2B SAAS, we want you to think small. Armed with only 32 billion parameters, we want you to solve a problem someone you know is facing or build something whimsical.
Two Tracks
🏡 Backyard AI Chapter OneSolve a real problem for someone you actually know. Pick a person — a neighbor, a parent, a small business owner on your street — and build something that makes their day measurably better. JUDGED ON · problem is specific and real · the person actually used it · honest fit between problem and the small-model constraint · polish of the Gradio app |
🍄 An Adventure in Thousand Token Wood Chapter TwoBuild something delightful that wouldn't exist without AI. Wander somewhere weirder. A toy, a tiny game, a strange interactive story, an art experiment that surprises you. The AI should be doing the fun thing — not just helping you build it. Strange is good. Joyful is the bar. JUDGED ON · genuinely delightful (would you show a friend?) · AI is load-bearing for the experience · originality of concept · polish of the Gradio app |
The Constraints
|
① Small Models Only — Total number of parameters must be less than or equal to 32 Billion. |
② Built on Gradio — your app must be a Gradio app, hosted as a Hugging Face Space. |
③ Show, Don't Tell — a short demo video and a social-media post are part of the submission. |
How to Participate
| 1. Register — join this org. No application, no waitlist. | 2. Find your people — hop into the Gradio Discord. Office hours, AMAs, teammates live there. | 3. Build & ship — build your Gradio app and host it as a Space under this org. | 4. Submit — drop your Space link, a demo video, and a social post by the deadline. |
How to Get Started
- ML Intern Agent Guide. Use this to fine tune a model on the hub without writing any code.
- Gradio Guides
- Gradio's gr.Server for completely custom UIs
- Getting Started with Llama.cpp on spaces
Bonus Quests
None required. Each one grants extra points for your submission. Stack them like badges on a scout sash.
| 🔌 Off the Grid No cloud APIs. The whole thing runs on the model in front of you. |
🎯 Well-Tuned Your app uses a fine-tuned model you've published on Hugging Face. |
🎨 Off-Brand A custom frontend that pushes past the default Gradio look. |
| 🦙 Llama Champion Your model runs through the llama.cpp runtime. |
📡 Sharing is Caring You shared your agent trace on the Hub. |
📓 Field Notes You wrote a blog post or report about what you built. tentative |
Timeline
| When | What | |
|---|---|---|
| I. | Week of [date TBD] | Registration opens — sign up, join Discord, start sketching |
| II. | [date TBD] | Hack window begins — two weekends to build, ship, and demo |
| III. | Mid-window | Live AMA + office hours — ask the Gradio team anything |
| IV. | [date TBD] | Submissions close — Space, demo video, social post locked in |
| V. | [date TBD] | Winners announced — per track, plus bonus-quest leaderboard |
Build something small.
Two weekends. Two tracks. The model on your laptop. The neighbor next door.
→ Register on Hugging Face ← ↳ placeholder link for now
Made with care by the Gradio team · questions? Find us on Discord · vol. III · mmxxvi