Over the years, we've heard plenty of smart ideas from Baltimore technologists about improving city services, infrastructure and the criminal justice system.

This week, members of the tech community took a step to harness that energy with a public launch for Hack Baltimore, a citywide hackathon that's coming up later this spring.

Inside the room, this one felt like it could be big. The technologists were joined by local civic leaders who sounded notes of collaboration. They talked about how it's been in the works for a while, meaning there has been time to build up a portal full of ideas, and make plans to create projects that last. Plus, there were capes.

Read more about the event below, and have a good weekend.

—Stephen Babcock, Assistant Editor, Technical.ly (stephen@technical.ly)