It has been a busy September.
A few weeks back I was in Regina for the Saskatchewan Startup Summit and came back home with a bunch of new friends… and Covid. Flash cut to last week were Rob and I recorded an emergency remote podcast, talking about the most interesting news items we had been noticing in tech—like an old-school CanCon episode.
“We don’t need more referees in Canada. We need more builders. Let other countries regulate while we take the more courageous path.”
– Tobi Lütke
It just so happened that most of that news was AI-related.
Flash cut to this week, which featured a number of Canadian tech events all taking place at the same time. Including Elevate, for which BetaKit programmed the AI stage, and All-In, for which Rob moderated panels and recorded future podcast episodes.
All-In is also the event where Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced Canada’s Voluntary Code of Conduct on the Responsible Development and Management of Advanced Generative AI Systems, which has been signed by Cohere, Coveo, and Ada. You can read more about that on BetaKit, but because it hadn’t happened yet, we don’t mention it on this episode.
Nor do we discuss the statements in response to voluntary code by Shopify CEO’s, Tobi Lütke, on Twitter (X, sigh).
“Another case of EFRAID,” he wrote. “I won’t support it. We don’t need more referees in Canada. We need more builders. Let other countries regulate while we take the more courageous path and say ‘come build here.’”
I might have more to say on that at some point in the future but I will note we had our writer Aaron Anandji ask Julien Billot, CEO of Scale AI, about Tobi’s comment at All-In and he said: “I don’t know of a game you can play without referees.”
Anyway, here’s the full list of stories Rob and I discussed on this episode. Covid recording quality aside, let us know what you think of the format and if you feel it’s a worthy addition to our fan-favourite AMA episodes.
George R.R. Martin and other authors sue OpenAI for copyright infringement
How good are you at spotting fakes? Take The Globe’s AI vs. human quiz to find out
New system enlists 5G, AI to fight B.C. forest fires
US Judge Rules AI-Generated Art Not Protected by Copyright Law
OpenAI releases third version of DALL-E
Google and YouTube are trying to have it both ways with AI and copyright
AI Leaders Commit to White House Supported Guidelines
Elon Musk says all users of X, formerly Twitter, could soon be charged a monthly fee
Developers respond to Unity’s new pricing scheme
Oneka raises $12.5 million CAD, prepares to deliver desalination devices along the Pacific coast
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The BetaKit Podcast is hosted by Douglas Soltys & Rob Kenedi. Produced & edited by Kattie Laur. Feature image courtesy Elevate.