The Strange Data Project Kicks Off at Vibeworks
Nomad AI's 16-day competition launched at Vibeworks Dublin. Find data that LLMs can't see, transform it, prove improvement. €5,000 prize pool. Demo Day February 15th.
What is the Nomad AI Strange Data Project?
The Strange Data Project is a 16-day AI competition run by Ben Barrett and Thomas Von Teichman from Nomad AI. Teams find data that language models can't currently access, transform it into something usable, and prove measurable improvement without retraining. The kickoff was hosted by Kevin Collins and Anthony Fildes at Vibeworks Dublin on January 31st 2026. Demo Day is February 15th with a €5,000 prize pool.
TL;DR
- •16-day AI competition run by Nomad AI, launched at Vibeworks Dublin
- •Challenge: find data LLMs can't access, transform it, prove measurable improvement
- •€5,000 prize pool — €3k / €1.5k / €500 for top three
- •Teams of 1–5, no model retraining allowed, Demo Day February 15th
- •Kickoff hosted by Kevin Collins and Anthony Fildes at Vibeworks
01.A Competition About Data, Not Prompts
Last Friday, Ben Barrett and Thomas Von Teichman from Nomad AI kicked off the Strange Data Project at Vibeworks Dublin. Anthony Fildes and I hosted the space and helped people get set up with their projects.
The premise is straightforward: find data that language models can't currently access—whether it's locked behind paywalls, exists in non-text formats, or simply hasn't been collected before—then transform it into something usable and show measurable improvement on a real task. No expensive retraining allowed.
It's a good challenge because it forces you to think about data problems rather than just prompting better, which is where a lot of the real value in AI work actually sits.
02.How It Works
Teams of 1–5 people have 16 days to build their submissions. The competition runs from January 31st through to Demo Day on February 15th, back at Vibeworks.
What Teams Deliver
- •Data narrative — source and scaling potential
- •System pipeline documentation
- •Baseline vs. enhanced model comparison with demo
- •Forward evolution path
Evaluation Criteria
- •Demonstrated Improvement — 25%
- •Data Novelty — 20%
- •Representation Quality — 20%
- •Future Potential — 20%
- •Clarity of Explanation — 15%
03.€5,000 Prize Pool
🥇
€3,000
1st Place
🥈
€1,500
2nd Place
🥉
€500
3rd Place
At least one team member needs to attend Demo Day in person on February 15th to claim prizes. Prizes are distributed via bank transfer within 14 days.
04.The Kickoff
The morning started with Ben and Thomas walking through the competition structure—scope of work, deliverables, evaluation criteria, and timeline. Then we shifted into a working session where teams formed up and started scoping their projects.
Anthony and I helped people figure out their approaches. A lot of the early conversations were about identifying genuinely novel data sources—things that aren't sitting in a convenient API somewhere. Irish cultural archives, environmental sensor data, domain-specific records that haven't been digitised properly. The kind of stuff that's valuable precisely because it's hard to get at.
The working session ran until the afternoon, with teams getting their initial plans together and figuring out what they'd need to build over the next two weeks.
05.Demo Day: February 15th
Teams now have until February 15th to complete their submissions. Demo Day will be back at Vibeworks where teams present their data pipelines, show baseline vs. enhanced comparisons, and make their case to the judges.
If you're interested in what comes out of it, keep an eye on Nomad AI's competition page for updates.
FAQFrequently Asked Questions
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