Community Guidelines

1. Treat people with respect

Disagree about ideas, code, and judging, never about who someone is. On HackHoster, don’t:

• harass, bully, or intimidate anyone, or keep contacting someone who has asked you to stop;
• attack or demean people based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, caste, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, age, or serious illness;
• threaten or encourage violence or self-harm;
• post sexual or sexually suggestive content, or graphic violence;
• share someone’s private information (address, phone number, private photos, or documents) without their permission;
• impersonate another person, team, company, or organizer.

Assume good faith, especially with beginners. Critique projects the way you’d want yours critiqued: specific, honest, and kind.

2. Keep teens safe

Many builders on HackHoster are 13 to 17. Everyone shares the responsibility to keep the platform safe for them.

• Don’t ask anyone you don’t know offline for their age, school, address, phone number, photos, or private social accounts.
• Don’t invite a teen to a private chat, call, or meeting outside HackHoster unless the hackathon’s organizer runs it as part of the event (for example, an official Discord server).
• Don’t offer teens gifts, money, or jobs in exchange for anything outside the hackathon.
• We have zero tolerance for sexual content involving minors or any attempt to groom a minor. We remove it, ban the account, and report it to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and to law enforcement.

If someone makes you uncomfortable, stop replying, report them, and tell a parent, teacher, or another adult you trust. If anyone is in immediate danger, call your local emergency number first.

3. Build honestly

• Make it during the hackathon. Unless a hackathon’s rules say otherwise, build your project during its submission period. If you started from earlier work, starter code, or a template, say so in your submission and describe what you built during the event.
• Credit what you reused. List the libraries, APIs, datasets, models, and assets you used, and respect their licenses.
• No plagiarism. Don’t submit someone else’s project, code, video, or write-up as your own, even if you change it slightly.
• Show what really works. Your demo and description should match what you built. Mark mocked or hard-coded parts clearly.
• One person, one account, and real teams. Don’t create extra accounts, add people who didn’t take part, or enter the same hackathon on more than one team unless its rules allow it.
• Reusing a project. Submitting the same project to more than one hackathon is allowed only if every hackathon’s rules allow it.
• Award applications. Apply for Project of the Month only with work you or your listed teammates built, list only people who really took part, and keep your video and answers accurate. One application per person per month.
• Don’t game the numbers. No buying, trading, or farming likes, and no fake registrations or submissions to inflate reputation.

4. AI tools

AI coding assistants and generative tools are welcome unless a hackathon’s rules limit them. Tell judges how you used them: say in your submission which tools you used and for what (for example, “used an AI assistant to write the database layer and generate placeholder images”). You are responsible for everything you submit, including AI-generated code, text, and media, and its licenses. Don’t submit a project that an AI tool generated for someone else, or a generated demo video that shows features you didn’t build.

5. Ship safe projects

• No malware, phishing pages, credential collectors, crypto drainers, or code meant to harm devices, accounts, or networks.
• Don’t test or attack systems you don’t own without written permission. Security projects should use your own systems or test environments built for that purpose.
• If your demo collects personal data, tell people what it collects and why, collect as little as possible, and delete it after the event. Don’t publish real people’s data.
• Don’t put API keys, passwords, or other secrets in public repositories or project pages. Rotate any key you exposed.
• Follow the terms of the APIs and data you use. Projects about sensitive subjects such as health, money, or safety shouldn’t present themselves as professional advice.

6. Teams

• Agree early on what each person will do, how you’ll decide, and how you’ll share any prize.
• Captains: invite only people who agreed to join, and remove someone only for a fair reason. Tell them before you do.
• Everyone listed on a project should have contributed to it. Don’t remove a contributor to take the credit.
• If a team dispute affects eligibility or a prize, the organizer decides. HackHoster doesn’t settle team disputes.

7. Discussions and updates

• Keep threads about the hackathon: questions, team-finding, help, and feedback.
• No spam, repeated posts, chain messages, or advertising unrelated to the event. Sharing your own project in a feedback thread is fine.
• Don’t post links to scams, malware, or adult content, or links that hide where they lead.
• Don’t post other participants’ email addresses or personal details.
• Organizers: use announcements for news participants need, not for unrelated promotion.

8. Hosting responsibly

• Clear rules. Publish eligibility, the timeline, what to submit, judging criteria, prizes, and how you will contact winners before registration opens. If you must change something, announce it and don’t change it to favor anyone.
• Real prizes. List only prizes you can and will deliver, with the real value. Deliver them within the time your rules state. HackHoster does not hold prize money.
• Fair judging. Judge against your published criteria. Judges shouldn’t score teams they belong to, advise, or have a close personal or financial tie with; disclose and step aside when that happens.
• No fees or chance. Don’t charge an entry fee, require a purchase, or pick winners by lottery.
• Respect participants’ data. Use the participant list only to run your hackathon. Don’t add people to unrelated mailing lists or share the list with sponsors without each participant’s consent.
• Events with teens. If you accept participants under 18, keep official communication in moderated channels, and have adults follow the teen-safety rules above.
• Be reachable. Keep your hackathon’s contact email working and answer participants’ questions about rules and results.

9. Other people’s work

Upload only images, video, music, logos, and code you have the right to use. If you believe something on HackHoster infringes your copyright, follow the DMCA process in our Terms. For trademark or other rights complaints, email legal@hackhoster.org.

10. Reporting a problem

Use the Report button on any hackathon, project, profile, discussion thread, or reply. Choose a reason and add details that help us understand, such as links, dates, and what happened. A person reviews every report. We don’t tell the reported person who reported them.

For urgent safety issues, or to report a hackathon that didn’t deliver its prizes, email legal@hackhoster.org. For questions about a hackathon’s rules or results, contact its organizer first, using the email on the hackathon page.

11. What happens next

We look at what was posted, its context, how serious the harm is, whether it was deliberate, and the account’s history. Depending on the case we may:

• take no action, or add a note asking someone to fix something;
• remove a post, a reply, or part of a profile;
• hide a project from public view, or unpublish a hackathon;
• correct reputation earned by breaking the rules;
• suspend an account for a period, or permanently;
• report illegal content to the authorities when the law requires it or someone is at risk.

Disqualifying a project from a hackathon is the organizer’s decision under their rules. We may hide a project that breaks these guidelines whatever the organizer decides. Serious harm, such as threats, exploiting minors, or malware, can lead to a permanent ban on a first offense.

12. Appeals

If you think we got it wrong, email support@hackhoster.org within 30 days with a link to the content or account and why you disagree. A person who didn’t make the original decision will review it when possible, and we’ll reply with the outcome. We may update these guidelines as the community grows; the date at the top shows the latest version.