CanCon Podcast Ep. 52: Canada's AI obsession

Ed note: this week’s podcast was recorded Thursday. A lot has happened in the interim. We’ll cover that next week!

The day after the inauguration of the 45th President of the United States, people around the world took to the streets to protest. So why wasn’t the event trending on Facebook? Elsewhere on the internet, rogue Twitter accounts began popping up en masse in support of US government agencies that have had their social media feeds silenced by the newly inaugurated administration. The CanCon podcast team is left wondering if these are the first shots fired in the coming information wars.

For the third week in a row, Canada has seen major news on the advancement of AI research and funding. This week, NextAI announced that it will be partnering with IBM Canada, Google, and NVIDIA, who will be contributing valuable resources in addition to mentorship, datasets, and access to industry experts. These contributions, in addition to the $5.15 million that RBC, Magna, BDC Capital and Scotiabank have already contributed, makes NextAI a force to reckoned with in the AI space.

Finally, Mark Zucerkberg and Priscilla Chan’s $45 billion philanthropy organization announced they have acquired Toronto-based Meta, a company focused on applying machine learning to scientific research papers. The CanCon team once again digs into Canada’s AI obsession.

Tune in as CanCon’s podcast crew – Jessica Vomiero, MobileSyrup Staff Writer, Robyn Edgar, CanCon Podcast Producer, Rob Kenedi – TWG’s Entrepreneur in Residence and host of the amazing #smallrooms podcast, and Douglas Soltys, BetaKit Editor in Chief – ponder if the resistance will be tweeted.

Have some hot takes on the topics that were covered? Maybe you want to suggest something for a future podcast! Perhaps you have a burning question about something you read in tech news that we didn’t cover. Email us, post a comment below with the answer or question, or better yet, rate CanCon 5-stars on iTunes and post your thoughts there.