14 DAY TRIAL // Facebook prides itself in its hacker culture. It's also looking to hire as many talented engineers as possible. In an effort to marry the two perhaps, Facebook is running a Hacker Cup in which the world's best hackers compete to solve the problems laid before them in the simplest and fastest way.
"We’re announcing open registration for Facebook’s second annual Hacker Cup. Programmers from around the world will be judged on accuracy and speed as they race to solve algorithmic problems to advance through up to five rounds of programming challenges," Facebook announced.
"This is your chance to compete against the world’s best programmers for awesome prizes and the title of World Champion," it said.
The competition will get underway later this month. There are five rounds, each with increasingly difficult problems. The Qualification Round starts on January 20 so if you need to brush up on some things, now is the time.
The first round is eight days later, at the end of which as many as 500 people will advance to the next round. The top 100 hackers in the second round will make it to the third and final online round.
Of those, 25 people will participate in the final round, at Facebook's new headquarters.
"Facebook will fly the top-scoring 25 competitors to Menlo Park, California, for the final round of competition on March 17, 2012, where they'll receive some great cash prizes and other awesome goodies," Facebook explained.
"Out of these 25 finalists, one champion will emerge and be immortalized on the Hacker Cup trophy," it added.
Last year's cup, the first one, didn't go too smooth and there were plenty of problems in the qualification rounds. Hopefully, Facebook has learned its lesson and will handle this year's competition better.