One of our core values at AI-First is "continuous experiments". This Skool Community was an experiment. It started as a place for graduates of the Digital Nova Scotia AI Microcredential to share, discuss, and learn more about AI. It grew to include others from Atlantic Canada that were interested in learning more about AI (and/or wanted to take part in the virtual Friday morning coffee chats). After taking a break and reflecting on the community this Summer, I came to realize a few things: 1. Running a community is a lot of work (and we didn't give it the proper attention it needed). 2. A free community isn't a very effective way to drive change and AI adoption. 3. The best moments of the community were connecting over the virtual coffees. 4. There are A LOT of training videos and valuable content in the classroom that hardly anyone viewed. 5. There is very little incentive for you all to share AI use cases, tools, wins, etc. in the community. So what's next? First, I invite you to join our email newsletter here: https://ai-first.ca/#testimonials (scroll down and you'll see a place to enter your email address). This is where we'll be sharing more of our own AI use cases, wins, client case studies, research, and other interesting things AI-First is up to. We want to make it THE newsletter to learn about AI for Atlantic Canadians. Second, we want to do an in-person meetup. I'm not sure of the size or scale, where it will be, or what we will cover, but we want to do SOMETHING. The best place to stay up-to-date for the in-person meetup is to subscribe to the email newsletter (here it is again: https://ai-first.ca/#testimonials) I still strongly believe community is important, but I also believe we can drive more impact for Atlantic Canadian businesses by focusing our efforts on other areas. Thank you everyone for being a part of the community, whether you were lurking, contributing to discussions, or attending the virtual coffees. Please stay in touch.

Hi Folks, Heads up: the government (ISED) launched the "AI Compute Access Fund" to accelerate the commercialization of new AI products. The fund offers $100K to $5M over up to 3 years, covering up to 67% of eligible compute costs. To qualify, a company must be Canadian-incorporated, fewer than 500 employees, have R&D activities based in Canada, and show commercial traction either through revenue or Series A. You’ll need a compute services contract or quote in place. The window of application is short: opens June 25 and closes July 31, 2025. Go, go, go! More here: https://ised-isde.canada.ca/site/ised/en/newsletter-gc-business-insights/ai-compute-access-fund-empowering-canadian-smes-ai

It's the last Friday of June, so we'll be having our last Friday morning virtual meetup today and taking a pause over the Summer. So if you've been meaning to drop in but haven't had the time, this will be your last chance until September! We're working on a few things behind the scenes and things will look a little different here starting in the Fall... stay tuned! P.S. Want to test your prompting abilities to break AI safeguards and get a password? Try this game: https://gandalf.lakera.ai/baseline

It involves a webinar, a new offer, and 75% savings for Nova Scotian organizations to kickstart their AI transformation journey (only until May 30th!) Also, you NEED to read Ethan Mollick's latest article. Lots of great takeaways you can use for your organization: https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/making-ai-work-leadership-lab-and

Hey folks, In case you missed out on the Friday coffee or haven't seen my latest posts on LinkedIn, we're hosting a webinar on Tuesday, May 27th at 12:30. It's titled "AI-First Accelerator: The Six-Phase Blueprint for Integrating AI Into Your Business" Feel free to sign up and share with any colleagues/friends you think may be interested! https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ai-accelerator-the-six-phase-ai-business-blueprint-tickets-1372810626539 Description: You’ve read the headlines, tried a few prompts, maybe even paid for a handful of tools—yet AI still feels like more hype than help. If you’re overwhelmed by options, short on time, and worried about making costly mistakes, this webinar is for you. In one punchy, value-packed session, we’ll walk you through the exact six-phase blueprint we’ve used to move organizations from AI-curious to AI-capable—without blowing budgets, derailing day-to-day work, or hiring internal AI experts. What you’ll discover: - Our Six L’s Framework—a practical roadmap that starts with executive alignment and ends with measurable ROI. - Behaviour Change Tactics that turn skeptics into champions and free up hours of staff time every week. - Valuable tools and tips to get you using AI more effectively right away! Who should attend: - Business owners, execs, and team leads who keep asking, “Where do we even start?” - Ops and tech managers juggling too many priorities and too little capacity. - Anyone tasked with AI strategy who needs a proven playbook—yesterday