Janus: A View to a New World

An interactive map that delivers real-time news on social impact and humanitarian issues, both locally and around the world, with AI-driven summaries that deepen understanding of current events.

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Inspiration

We explored a wide range of ideas and initially struggled to narrow our focus to a specific humanitarian issue, such as healthcare or sustainability. We shared our personal experiences and discussed the causes we felt most passionate about. However, we soon realized that it wouldn’t be fair to prioritize any issue over another, especially when we had the opportunity to raise awareness on multiple causes simultaneously. This led us to our current idea, which is an educational news platform for people to connect with humanitarian causes.

What it does

We created an interactive map that presents news stories from across the world and automatically fetches up-to-date information. Our solution features an easy way for users to discover news stories across the globe. Simply click on any pin to view its linked news article, an AI-driven summary, similar and related topics, and LLM-based analysis that processes user choices to suggest ways to contribute and make a positive social impact.

How we built it

We first spent an hour brainstorming to find and finalize our project vision. We focused on creating something that everyone agreed had a large societal impact and would truly benefit people. Next, we researched the packages and libraries we would need, and started implementing them into our codebase. We designated roles to each member, some working on front-end, back-end, and polishing our submission, allowing us to collaborate efficiently. Along the way, we constantly iterated and kept track of new ideas and features, discovering new ways to incorporate them into our current plan.

Challenges we ran into

We learned how to work with Flask and connect with an AI framework for the first time! We also ran into multiple deployment issues (so many packages…), difficulties learning to format API requests, and building our own web scraper.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

This is the first hackathon we’ve done as a team. We bonded closely over our struggles, became much more confident in our coding skills, and got to experience a real-life development environment. It was fun conquering the challenges we faced together!

What we learned

We learned how to read through documentation and communicate effectively, experienced competing in a hackathon for the first time, and most importantly, developed a stronger friendship.

What's next for Janus: The World in View

We hope to build on this project in the future and build it into a successful startup in the future. We plan on adding a more comprehensive article analysis and additional news filtering options to help people connect with their passions.

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