That’s what you missed last week. Got questions? Comments? Let us know!

New York City is the city that never sleeps, and next week will be no different! From Friday October 19th to Saturday October 20th, the New York City BlackBerry® Developers Group will be hosting a hackathon. Starting at 6:30 PM on Friday and running through to 5:30 PM on Saturday night, local NYC developers are invited to come and develop applications and games using the best mobile tools available.

This event will be super exciting. I’d like to personally challenge everyone to come out, create a stellar app and get it ready for submission to the BlackBerry App World™ storefront. I’ll extend the challenge even further: The first 3 teams/individuals that create an app and get it ready for submission to BlackBerry App World in the time allotted will receive a BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha Device. Create an app, get it ready for submission, and you’ll get a device. Plain, simple, awesome.

Finally, I (@party_pat) will be on hand to help navigate the waters, give a presentation on Cascades™, and to help out where I can. This should be an awesome event, and I can’t wait to see everyone out there.

We’re having a Super Hackathon in NYC. Two Days. BlackBerry Experts and more: bit.ly/PXZ73y cc: @blackberrydev

— BlackBerryDevNY (@BlackBerryDevNY) October 10, 2012

If you’ve registered already, invite a friend. If you haven’t registered yet, there is no time like the present. The details of the hackathon can be found at http://www.meetup.com/BBDevNY/events/85940442/

New York City is known for many things, including being financial center of the world and home to many media & entertainment firms — and as you’ll see, this stop of the BlackBerry® 10 Jam World Tour had elements of both of these. First, the event was held in one of the original theaters on Broadway – now part of the Millenium Hotel in Times Square. This theater was replete with gold trim and multiple balcony levels. The stage and side balconies of this historic theater were festooned with BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour signage. We had a great developer turnout with attendees from interactive agencies, media companies, banks and financial firms – one developer even flew in from Vancouver to attend!

To match this high-powered group of developers in the audience, we had an equally strong lineup of speakers to tell the BlackBerry 10 story. The event was anchored by Marty Mallick’s keynote, which did a tremendous job in presenting the BlackBerry 10 call to action to this audience. The team had many discussions with the developers about the tremendous growth in BlackBerry App World™ developer registrations and apps in the catalog.

Gary Klassen presented the user experience session, and it made a great impact to have a key product team leader on stage since many audience members knew of Gary’s BBM™ pedigree (evidenced by many tweets about the “inventor of BBM on stage”). Gary did a great job telling the story of the evolution of our BlackBerry products, emphasizing the laser focus we’ve had on improving the user experience for our high performance, multi-tasking customers and how BlackBerry 10 takes this to the next level. Gary brought a unique viewpoint to this stop as he could talk about his own work on both the existing BlackBerry platform and BlackBerry 10.

The developers were very excited to see Patrick Mollins on stage delivering the architecture overview, since he was known by many of the BlackBerry developers in the crowd as the BlackBerry evangelist they’ve seen at our many east coast events. For our technical tracks, we had Tim Windsor covering BlackBerry® WebWorks™ and HTML5, Shadid Haque delivered the Native track, and Brent Thornton, Jim Ing & team covered the enterprise track. This group of developers wanted content from all the technical tracks which was great to see!

The ten lightning pitches were very diverse and somewhat fitting for the event in the nation’s financial capital. Our winner was Alex Garipan, who had created a sophisticated stock analysis tool for the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet that featured direct manipulation of the price charts to drill down on the data set and many other cool analysis features!  We also had applications that implemented photo publishing via email or physical postcards, and a sophisticated plant reference tool for the avid gardener.

We left NYC with a group of energized BlackBerry 10-ready developers, and we look forward to seeing the apps they build — thanks New York! The BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour rolls on to Toronto on Thursday, June 21st.

Yesterday’s WebWorks session at #BB10Jam was awesome and even got my 14 year old inspired to create apps. @BlackBerryDev

— DJ Reyes  (@djr3yes) June 15, 2012

N4_BB: NYC #BB10Jam: Gary showing BB10 keyboard. Prediction, slick, and sharp. Wow! dlvr.it/1kxW4r

— Onita Catoe (@Onitael79) June 19, 2012

Wow great day at #BB10Jam NYC. Got my Dev Alpha! Met some great people.@BlackBerryDev expect great things to come from me!

— James Paul Muir (@jamespaulmuir) June 19, 2012

Lighting Pitch of a stocks app. Dev asks what’s our fav stock. Everyone replies “RIM” #BB10Jam

— JT Teran (@AgentBlackBerry) June 19, 2012

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Being a mother of twins and a mobile app developer has to be quite a handful, but Kathryn has managed to wear both these hats with style. With historical interests in web design, she took a look into the BlackBerry WebWorks SDK and managed to turn these interests into working skills, with the result being top notch mobile application development. Kathryn attended the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) Apps Hackathon in New York this past August, which allowed her to collaborate with other developers and improve the functionality of her apps. Her project, called PowWow, is a one-stop shop for organizing social events that leverages the BBM social platform.

Check out Kathryn’s story in the video above, and prepare to experience the contagious passion that she has for web-based mobile app development. If you want to get into that experience yourself, blog post about upcoming Hackathon events – one might be happening in your area soon!

Have you spread the word about the BlackBerry WebWorks SDK to any web designers? Did you start mobile app development as a web designer yourself? Share your story in the comments.

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It’s no secret that we love to share the success of developers. Today I’d like to shine the spotlight on Dominik, who attended the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) Apps Hackathon back in August. The challenge presented at the event was to include BBM functionality within BlackBerry® platform applications. With a passion for web design and mobile development, Dominik did just that in his BBM Been There app, which has been designed to allow users to collect and share media from places they have visited.

Check out the video to see Dominik’s story, and see our blog post for details on upcoming Hackathon events that you can attend. Dominik said it best: “It’s a social experience to develop social applications!”

Are you working on a social app? What’s the social angle? Share in the comments!

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Our lives are constantly integrating with technology, as well as expanding beyond a desktop environment. It’s on the wave of this trend that Thorben works as a mobile application developer along with a wider team at Gowalla that creates top-notch apps. While attending the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) Apps Hackathon in New York last August, Thorben worked collaboratively with fellow developers and representatives from Research In Motion® (RIM®) on his ShareIt app, which is designed to allow users to share memo and task items with peers in a BBM contact list.

Check out the video above for the full story on Thorben, ShareIt, and the BBM Apps Hackathon. (Pssst – there might be a Hackathon happening near you! Check out our blog post about upcoming Hackathon events.)

When do you do your best work: independently, or as part of a team? Share your stories in the comments.

[ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

With HTML 5 and the BlackBerry® WebWorks™ SDK, developing mobile apps from a web development background has never been easier. Graham is a developer who attended the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) Apps Hackathon in New York in August. He has demonstrated how web technologies can bring functionality and design to social apps. At the Hackathon, Graham was able to collaborate with other developers to convert ideas into realities. Graham’s app, Wink, integrates the BBM platform into a location-based app, allowing users to meet new people around them and share experiences.

Check out the video above to learn more about Graham, his application work, and his passion for mobile web apps. Also, if you’re interested in checking out a BBM Apps Hackathon in your area, be sure to read our blog post about upcoming Hackathon events.

How do you see web technologies impacting mobile application development in the future? Share your thoughts in the comments!