Even in college they always seemed like a waste of time. Cool to meet new people, but to "build" something and win was always a fools errand.
This was further enforced when I drove up to attend Hack the North at U Waterloo with a few friends from Boston. One of the contestants stayed up so late he tore a muscle in his eye and now has a permanent deformity / disability.
As an adult I'd simply never even show up to such an event, if my employer wants to pay me overtime sure - but I'd still say no.
Build cool things, get normal amounts of sleep. It's not about the clout its about improving as an engineer.
I genuinely think most people don't see identifying whether an image is AI generated or not, especially with a dedicated app, as a problem they're willing to pay to solve.
App looks cool, but I think more of the issue with growths is few people needing the app altogether.