Anadolu's hackathon concludes with award ceremony in Istanbul

ISTANBUL

Anadolu's hackathon concluded Sunday with an award ceremony, marking the end of the competition.

The hackathon served as a platform for rapid idea generation, skills development and collaborative problem-solving in the field of media and technology.

Sponsored by Turkish technology firm Turkcell and organized in collaboration with Anadolu and Bilisim Vadisi, Türkiye’s technology and innovation base, the event brought participants together in teams to develop projects related to media technologies.

During the continuous 48-hour development period, participants created innovative solutions with a specific focus on areas like artificial intelligence (AI) and video processing.

Teams that successfully completed the online phase convened for an intense 48-hour in-person development period at Anadolu's Istanbul office.

Anadolu's General Manager and Board Chairman Serdar Karagoz, Bilisim Vadisi's General Manager Erkam Tuzgen and Anadolu's Deputy Director-General and Editor-in-Chief Yusuf Ozhan and Anadolu Deputy Director-General Oguz Enis Peru attended the award ceremony.

The projects underwent an evaluation by a jury and awards were presented based on creativity and impact.

The winning team, Deepmind, developed an AI -supported plugin for videos with multi-language subtitles. The second team, Huma, focused on improving real-time video quality in live broadcasts with AI support, while the third team, Med Visionaries, worked on a facial recognition system with a single photo.

During the award ceremony, Karagoz emphasized the changing role of media in the digital age and the symbiotic relationship between media and technology.

Referring to the 2023 Digital News Report by Oxford University and the Reuters Institute, he highlighted a significant global trend, noting a decline from 63% to 48% in people's interest in news from 2017 to 2023.

He discussed the challenges faced by the media industry and highlighted the need for a symbiosis between media and technology to create a healthier journalism ecosystem.

He also expressed concerns about a decrease in public trust in news, attributing it to the widespread production of disinformation facilitated by easy access to communication tools.

Karagoz also discussed the ongoing Anadolu media technologies hackathon, noting its importance in seeking innovative solutions for the media industry. He emphasized the role of AI and its potential impact on various sectors, stating that those who can master AI will be essential in the future.

Tuzgen stressed the importance of teamwork and collaboration in today's world, discussing the rapid integration of AI into various aspects of life and its potential impact on the media sector.

He also pointed out Türkiye's opportunity to play a significant role in the global competition on AI.

Deepmind also shared their experience, expressing joy and satisfaction with their project, which focuses on providing foreign language subtitles for videos using AI and an associated tagging system.

The team highlighted the potential impact of their project in solving various challenges, emphasizing its ability to add subtitles quickly and fluently from one language to another and providing advantages such as searching for specific parts of texts and summarizing long texts.