Understanding and Using Generative AI

On June 6, the Austin Forum on Technology & Society will be hosting an exciting event to teach you how to use generative AI tools in co-creation of content. more than a dozen AI experts will participate in leading this event. The evening will start with a presentation of the key concepts behind generative AI and how it can be used to create novel and innovative solutions in a variety of fields. We will highlight the growing importance of generative AI tools in industries such as graphic design, marketing, and content creation, and discuss some of the most promising applications of this technology.

Following the presentation, attendees will be given the opportunity to try out various generative AI tools for themselves--bring your laptops, smartphones, etc.! (We will have virtual tables for online attendees, too.) Attendees will be able to experiment with ChatGPT, an AI-powered chatbot that can generate human-like responses to user input, Bard, an AI writing assistant that can help generate creative writing, DALL-E, an AI image generation tool that can create images from textual descriptions, MidJourney, an AI tool that can generate music in real-time, GitHub Copilot for generating code, and many more!

Overall, this event promises to provide attendees with a deeper fundamental understanding of the possibilities of generative AI and the chance to experiment with some of the most promising tools in the field. The Austin Forum on Technology & Society continues to be at the forefront of exploring the intersection of technology and society, and generative AI is one of the highest potential impact technologies of 2023. Join us!

Catering provided for in-person attendees from 5:15-6:15pm

5:15-6:15pm - Networking (In-person only)

6:15-7:30pm - Presentation (In-person and virtual)

7:30-7:45pm - Q&A (In-person and virtual)

8:00-10:00pm - Networking at Trifecta (In-person only)

This is an in-person only event that will take place at the Austin Central Library, 710 W. César Chávez St.

Join us at the Austin Central Library, 710 W. César Chávez St. Parking information can be found here. In-person attendees, please join us from 5:15 to 6:15 for networking and food. We look forward to chatting with you face-to-face!

In-person attendees will also receive all the Zoom information in case for any reason you decide to attend virtually instead. Virtual attendance details can be found below.

Amina Al Sherif, Practice Lead- AI and Machine Learning, Google

Amina Al Sherif is a technical engineering lead in machine learning and generative AI at Google. She immigrated to the United States in 2010 as a first generation Arab-American. She has spent twelve years in the Department of Defense serving as an Army officer in the Reserves and North Carolina National Guard as a tactical cyber operator and cyber targeter.

Amina has previously worked as an early stage startup executive focused on artificial intelligence innovation and product. Prior to her startup experience, Amina worked at Google as a Cloud Engineer bringing the innovation and power of Google’s capabilities to the Department of Defense and Intelligence Community. She focused on big data and machine learning, gaming and simulation, and data privacy and security in cloud computing and analytics.

Amina has worked with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) as an Arabic, Farsi, and French language enabled Open Source Exploitation Analyst at Fort Belvoir, VA and Fort Bragg. She deployed under Operation Inherent Resolve to Baghdad, Iraq in 2015/2016. In 2016-2017 she deployed to Afghanistan supporting the Special Operations Community. Most recently Amina deployed to Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Israel for a Special Missions Unit out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina supporting cyber-HUMINT operations.

Amina holds a BA in Linguistics and Arabic from the University of Mississippi and a Masters in Professional Studies in Cybersecurity and Information Sciences from Penn State University. She is currently attending the University of Texas in San Antonio to pursue a career in astrophysics at the PhD level. She regularly blogs on Medium documenting her self-taught technical career. In January 2020, she published her first book An Approach to Machine Learning in Cyber Defense for the Department of Defense. She is also working on a three-part young adult fiction novel series and is currently contracted with Black Rose Writing for publication. She also blogs regularly on her website, https://www.aminaalsherif.camp

Jay Boisseau, Executive Director, ​Austin Forum on Technology & Society

​Jay is the executive director and founder of The Austin Forum on Technology & Society, which he started in 2006 and is now the leading monthly technology outreach and engagement event in Austin--and starting to attract national and even international attendees online. The Austin Forum is one of the pillars of the Austin tech scene, providing connections to information, ideas, collaborations, and community overall. Through Vizias, Jay also founded the Austin Smart City Alliance (July 2015, formerly Austin CityUP Consortium) and currently serves as the Executive Director, with a vision of creating an integrated smart city fabric throughout Austin—leveraging mobile devices and IoT data collectors, as well as supercomputers and AI for predictive analytics and scenario simulation—in the years ahead to address city issues, empower city planning, and improve city life in general.

John Lockman, Artificial Intelligence Research Specialist, Dell Technologies and ​CTO, Vizias

Skilled researcher, developer, and evangelist for containerized applications, John Lockman is CTO at Vizias and consults for the Dell Technologies HPC & AI Innovation Lab. John has over 15 years of experience working with academic and private research institutions covering network architectures, parallel file systems, accelerators, and containerization technologies. He has expertise in nature-inspired algorithms, deep learning, and large scale graphs with a passion for building tools that enable advanced computing.

Luke Wilson, Head of Global Research Infrastructure, ​Optiver

Luke is the Head of Global Research Infrastructure at Optiver, a global market making firm which works to provide liquidity and stability to financial markets around the world. Prior to Optiver, Luke served as a Distinguished Engineer at Dell Technologies, where he designed High Performance Computing (HPC) & AI solutions and served as the Chief Architect for Omnia, Dell’s HPC/AI solution automation framework. Before that Luke held various roles at the University of Texas at Austin’s Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) in HPC software development, performance optimization, and training. Luke received his PhD in Computer Science from The University of Texas at San Antonio, and both MS and BS in Computer Science from Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi.

Erik Summa, Innovation Experience Lead, Innovation Studio, Dell Technologies

Erik Summa is an award-winning Experience Designer, specializing in creating new and innovative experiences that leverage touch, voice, gaze, gestures, biometrics, and more. He has 15+ years of experience in the creative industry and spent over five years of teaching and mentoring future experience designers

Saurabh Jha, Director of Data Science, Dell Technologies

Saurabh Jha is an accomplished Director of Data Science with over 15.5 years of experience in Industry across data engineering, data visualization, Information Architecture, advanced analytics and building machine learning systems.

​He has strong background in machine learning with strong focus towards development of deep learning algorithms and is skilled in Computer Vision and NLP automating data driven decision making. He has a proven track record of leading successful complex transformation programs that drive Innovation at scale. As a Director of Data Science at Dell – Customer and Financial Services group he has built and grown the team ground up and leads the business unit with over 26+ talented data scientists, data engineers providing them with strategic direction and guidance to ensure team is equipped with the necessary tools and resources to succeed. In his current role he is responsible to drive operational efficiency and improve customer experience in Order to Cash, Customer Care, Disbursements and CFO Org by developing and integrating Intelligence as a Service into their operational business systems.

He is also Executive in Residence at UT, Austin and collaborates with University Professors and Students to drive joint Research. He has filed several patents in US Patent office and also has a paper published at NeurIps 2022.

Adam Ghetti, Founder, NewCo

Technologist, entrepreneur, and explorer founded Ionic Security (acquired by Twilio, Inc. in 2021) in 2011 to address the problem of trust in our machine-scale world. Nearly two decades of experience building large-scale systems in multiple internet-related markets. Extensive work in complex systems and task automation along with an applied knowledge of application security, network security, data security, and artificial neural networks.

Fmr. GM/VP of Emerging Businesses at Twilio, Inc. While there, had the opportunity to lead the R&D teams focusing on AI/ML, Enterprise Solutions, Healthcare & Life Sciences, and IoT/Wireless.

Member of the inaugural Global Future Council on Cybersecurity and member of founding Advisory Board for the Centre for Cybersecurity at the World Economic Forum. An elected member of the Council on Foreign Relations, advisory board member for the College of Computing and the Institute for Information Security and Privacy at Georgia Tech, a charter member of TiE, a Distinguished Lecturer for the Robson Program at Emory University, and as a board member for Savvy Cyber Kids a 501(c)(3) providing educational materials for families to better enable them in navigating the digital world safely.

Nature lover (https://www.ghetti.com), driver of equity in computing via the Constellations Center at Georgia Tech (http://constellations.gatech.edu/), and a constant explorer of the verities of life.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Austin Central Library, Austin Public Library, 710 West Cesar Chavez Street, Austin, United States