Let’s Womansplain
▶ WATCH: LUDA ON WHAT A HACKATHON ACTUALLY IS, 33 SECONDS
Pam Boiros has sat next to an AI PhD who said she felt behind. Her reply: if you're behind, what about the rest of us?
She and Luda Kopeikina built a free community - Women Applying AI - and here are four things to take from our conversation.
INSIDE THE EPISODE
Four things for you to take away
01 · What a hackathon actually is. Logan admitted on mic that the word has never felt accessible to her, so Luda walked through one. TLDR you don’t need to be technical! You can bring a problem you understand from your work. Knowing what needs fixing is a contribution. Luda's walkthrough →
THE DOC · FREE, NO SIGNUP
Before your first AI hackathon
Luda's five steps, three ways to contribute without writing code, what to do before, during, and after, where to find one, and the text to send a friend. Every quote carries its minute in the episode. Take it, share it, paste it into your own notes.
02 · Don't lead with the gap (or do? what do you think?)
Mara published a Substack called “The New Gender AI Gap” the day before recording. Luda had written on her intake form that she hates the framing, and Mara read it back to her on air. "Closing the gap" starts from a hole, and it weighs on women who are already shy about technical rooms. Nobody disputes the numbers (Pam's is 79% of working women in roles highly exposed to generative AI, against 58% of men). They just won't open with them. Mara's Substack → · The 79% figure →
03 · Permission not to know, by design. Everybody is learning AI in public and the technology keeps moving, so Women Applying AI is built for the not-embarrassing-basic question. Someone asks it and five people say, I'm so glad you asked that. Mara, who is 50-ahem-something, said she only started saying "I don't know" out loud after she turned 50, and it's a relief. Pam and Luda on this →
04 · A movement, not a community. 2,500 members in a year, 100% volunteer run, 30% of new members sent by an existing one, born in Boston with regional hubs starting up around the country and abroad. The scaling lesson came from a failure: the first Atlanta hub got a long document that tried to pass along everything and it stalled. The second got the main tenets and took off. Pam wants 25,000 next. Women Applying AI →
It's actually quite accessible.
You can come really clueless.
LET'S WOMANSPLAIN
Feeling behind? Your turn.
The first one is in the can. We recorded it this week for Thursday's episode, September 24: one listener's real AI situation, worked through on air. Yours could be the second. Anonymous if you want.
This week's question:
What's the room or conversation you skip because you’re scared you'd be the one who doesn't know the words?
Or hit reply and type it, or email [email protected] any time. A sentence is plenty.
LISTEN
Listen to the episode
Want to hear the whole conversation? Episode 28, You Can Come to the Hackathon Clueless, is 35 minutes with Pam Boiros, Luda Kopeikina, Mara Bolis, and Logan Currie.
Short on time? The gap fight starts at 1:50, the origin story at 7:52, the hackathon at 15:25, the AI PhD who felt behind at 19:17, the 79% figure at 26:20, and both closing asks at 33:36.
Two more things from the conversation:
The New Gender AI Gap
Mara's Substack from the day before recording, the one Luda argues with for six minutes. Read it and pick a side. Read it →
The Human Edge: Women Leading in the Age of AI
Women Applying AI turns one on Thursday, September 24 at MassChallenge in Boston, during Boston AI Week. If you're in town, this is the room. Register →
NEXT EPISODE · THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 24
Mara + Logan, Europe edition
A duo episode recorded while Mara was in Riga, and the first Let's Womansplain.
WRITTEN BY
Logan Currie & Mara Bolis
Women, work, and the messy middle of AI.
P.S. Logan will be at the Women Applying AI anniversary in Boston on Thursday night. If you're there, come say hi!
