Why 36 hours? For the 24-hour hackathons I usually stay up the whole time but 36 plus the surrounding time might be pushing it. I'll try it though :)
I see that the tickets are limited in numbers based on what they bring to the table: dev, design, biz. What was the thinking behind doing it this way? The page mentions that it was to make sure to get enough devs, I don't recall that being a problem at the hackathons I've been to.
(On details page say typo: says that have over $2,00 worth of prizes.)
For me, 24 hours felt like too little to get something very cool out. However, I had the same mindset as you in that I felt a 40 hour or 48 hour hackathon I would never be able to stay up for. So, I decided to meet in the middle: 36 hours :)
The idea behind the tickets was that, this was first and foremost about programming, meaning I wanted designers and developers to make up the majority of the attendees. I felt while Startup Weekend was building a startup from scratch, this was about building a great product — and not having to worry as much about the marketing, business profitability, etc. I had also been scorned after going to a "Engineer and Entrepreneur meet and greet" in Ann Arbor and realized that everyone there was looking for a programmer, and there were no engineers/programmers at the event. My number one worry was that people would come and would all have ideas, but no one to build those ideas.
Thanks for the typo as well, we fixed it right away!
I see that the tickets are limited in numbers based on what they bring to the table: dev, design, biz. What was the thinking behind doing it this way? The page mentions that it was to make sure to get enough devs, I don't recall that being a problem at the hackathons I've been to.
(On details page say typo: says that have over $2,00 worth of prizes.)