Quick answers to the questions we get most. If yours is not here, email hello@bc-ai.ca, use the contact lanes, or bring it to a public meetup.
Why BC + AI exists
Why does B.C. need this kind of AI community?
AI lands inside every profession, not inside a tidy AI sector. The people dealing with its consequences need recurring places to meet across those boundaries. Conferences, directories, and mailing lists can connect people, but trust grows when people return to the same rooms, share real problems, challenge bad ideas, and build together.
What makes BC + AI a real community?
Cadence, contribution, and shared responsibility. People meet every month and every week. Members teach each other, create focused groups, organize regional events, document the work, and help decide what the association represents publicly. Participation matters more than being listed as part of a network.
What is BC + AI’s role?
Three layers: recurring rooms where relationships form, professional programs that turn discussion into capability, and a nonprofit public voice that can represent member interests in policy conversations. Community is the base. Collective agency is the point. Read how the model works on the About page.
What does BC + AI advocate for?
Fund community AI infrastructure. Create procurement paths for local companies. Support responsible adoption by small businesses, regional access, and clean compute. Make privacy and accountability real. Trust is built through participation and proof, not awareness campaigns.
How is BC + AI different from other ecosystem organizations?
BC + AI is member-supported, practitioner-facing, and organized around recurring participation. Members meet, teach, run groups, document the work, and build a public voice together. Directories, resources, company visibility, and occasional events can all be useful, but they are not this operating model.
Joining + membership
Do I have to be a member to come to a meetup?
No. Meetups and most regional events are open. Membership funds the work and opens member rooms, weekly Office Hours, working groups, the member directory, and member savings on selected programs. It is a way to keep the infrastructure running, not a ticket to the public room.
How do I join?
Choose a seat on the membership page and check out through native signup. Individual, student, and small-team seats are self-serve. Larger team packs are set up with us by email.
What does membership actually get me?
Member rooms, weekly Office Hours, working groups, coworking, community channels, the member directory, and a voice in association priorities. Active members also save 25% on all public ticket types at Futureproof Festival; authenticated members retrieve the current code from their account. Your seat helps pay for gatherings, documentation, regional support, and public-interest work that stay available to the wider community. See membership options.
What is the difference between the newsletter and membership?
The newsletter is free public updates. Membership is a paid seat in the rooms: Office Hours, working groups, member channels, directory access, and member savings. You can take the newsletter without joining, and members still get the public updates.
Is there a sliding scale?
Yes. If the standard membership price does not work for your situation, email hello@bc-ai.ca and we will sort it out. Cost should not block participation.
How do I sign in or manage my account?
Use the account dashboard with a magic link to your membership email. From there you can manage your profile, subscription, and member benefit codes.
How do I cancel?
Manage your subscription from your account dashboard or email us. No retention scripts.
Programs + events
What is the difference between a Meetup, Film Club, SIG, and Hackathon?
Meetups are large community gatherings with short talks, demos, food, and time to meet. Film Club screens AI-assisted film and brings creators into the conversation. Special interest groups are smaller, topic-focused rooms for sustained inquiry. Hackathons are time-boxed building events with a shared brief, teams, and deliverables. See what is next.
How do I host a meetup in my region?
Email us. Active rooms currently gather in Vancouver, Surrey, and the Comox Valley. If your region is not represented and you are willing to organize, we can share the playbook, help with operations and promotion, and connect the new room to the wider network. Explore the current communities.
Can I propose a topic or a speaker?
Absolutely. Use the speaker pitch path or email hello@bc-ai.ca. Community proposals are how many of the current groups and programs began.
Are recordings posted?
Most public talks and many gatherings are recorded and added to the video archive when they are ready. Some smaller conversations stay in the room so people can think out loud without turning every sentence into a public position. Browse the videos.
Learning + certification
What certifications and learning programs do you offer?
Three public programs today: Responsible AI Professional for decision-makers and practitioners, the AI Animation Accelerator with Tiny Ghost Studios, and the AI Upgrade for Creative Professionals. Cohort dates, pricing, and registration live on the certification pages.
Where do program-specific FAQs live?
Each certification page keeps its own practical FAQ (background expected, tools, refunds, rights, and member pricing where it applies). Start at /certification and open the program you care about.
Organization + governance
Are you actually a nonprofit?
Yes. BC + AI Ecosystem Association is a registered British Columbia nonprofit, incorporated August 22, 2025. Community programs have been running since 2023. The nonprofit structure formalized work that was already happening in the rooms.
Who is on the board?
The founding board includes Kris Krüg, Founder and Executive Director; Lorraine Lowe, Executive Director of the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre; and Carol Anne Hilton, CEO of the Indigenomics Institute. Board contact: hello@bc-ai.ca.
How are you funded?
Through paid memberships, corporate sponsorships, program partnerships, and grants. Member support matters because it keeps the organization accountable to the practitioners and communities doing the work, while a mixed funding base keeps any one funder from defining the whole agenda.
How do I sponsor a program?
See the sponsorship page for current ways to support gatherings, regional chapters, public resources, and professional programs. We can also shape a partnership around a venue, theme, community, or shared public-interest goal.
Where can I see your impact?
Start with the About page: 300 members, 3,000+ event attendees, 94+ events since 2023, and 3 active BC regions. See the story and public proof.
Still stuck? Get in touch or come to a public meetup.