HackerNoon Projects of the Week: PLOT, Insurmatics ESG Lite, and Scheme-langserver

Welcome to HackerNoon’s Projects of the Week, where we spotlight standout projects from the Proof of Usefulness Hackathon , HackerNoon’s competition designed to measure what actually matters: real utility over hype. Each week, we’ll highlight projects that demonstrate clear usefulness, technical execution, and real-world impact - backed by data, not buzzwords. Three more projects cleared the bar this week. One wants to stop couples from fighting about money. One wants to drag ESG compliance out of spreadsheet hell. And one is quietly doing something that the Scheme community has needed for decades. Here's the rundown. \ :::tip Want to see your own project spotlighted here? Join the Proof of Usefulness Hackathon to get on our radar. ::: \ Meet the Projects of The Week PLOT - Household Budgeting PLOT is a shared household budgeting app designed to give couples equal visibility and control over their finances, eliminating the "household chancellor" dynamic where one partner manages everything and the other has to ask permission. PLOT helps couples stop arguing about money by building shared control for couple finances — where both partners can see, plan, and act on their budget together without one person becoming the de facto CFO. \ Proof of Usefulness Score: +48/1000 \ :::tip See Plot’s full Proof of Usefulness report Read their story on HackerNoon ::: \ Insurmatics ESG Lite Insurmatics ESG Lite is an AI-driven platform designed to automate the ESG scoring process for the Canadian insurance industry, replacing fragmented manual reporting with a continuous, auditable pipeline. It is designed to help insurance companies navigate a complex and fragmented ESG regulatory landscape. Now's a good time for Insurmatics ESG Lite to exist because mounting pressure from regulators and investors is forcing insurers to report meaningful ESG metrics — and most are still doing it by hand. \ Proof of Usefulness Score: +50/1000 \ :::tip See Insurmatics ESG Lite’s full Proof of Usefulness report Read their story on HackerNoon ::: \ Scheme-langserver Scheme-langserver is a Language Server Protocol (LSP) implementation for Scheme that brings modern IDE features — autocomplete, go-to-definition, hover documentation, and static type inference — to a language community that has had to go without them. Scheme-langserver aims to make Scheme accessible and productive for everyone by treating code editing as a first-class concern. Unlike existing tools that rely on REPL-based keyword completion, it uses static analysis against the R6RS standard — meaning it works even on unfinished, non-executable code. \ Proof of Usefulness Score: +51/1000 \ :::tip See Scheme-langserver’s full Proof of Usefulness report Read their story on HackerNoon ::: Want to submit your project to the Proof of Usefulness hackathon? What is Proof of Usefulness? It's our answer to a web drowning in vaporware and empty promises. We evaluate projects based on: \n ▪️ Real user adoption \n ▪️ Sustainable revenue \n ▪️ Technical stability \n ▪️ Genuine utility Test your project’s usefulness and submit your report on Hackernoon before August 10, 2026 , to compete for over $150,000 in cash prizes and software credits. Projects score from -100 to +1000. Top scorers compete for $20K in cash and $130K+ in software credits. You’ll be in good company. The hackathon is backed by teams who ship production software for a living - Bright Data , Neo4j , Storyblok , Algolia , and HackerNoon . \ What happens when you submit: 1. Get your free Proof of Usefulness score instantly \n 2. Your submission becomes a HackerNoon article (published within days) \n 3. Compete for monthly prizes \n 4. All participants get rewards Complete guide on how to submit here. \ :::tip 👉 Submit Your Project Now! ::: \ That’s all for now. Until next time, Hackers! \