Welcome everyone to the Blacks and Technology Big Tech Talk podcast, a shore where
we talk to black people who are engineers, innovators, educators, inventors,
change makers and entrepreneurs doing amazing things in the world of technology. The Big
Tech Talk podcast is where they show how they are stumping the divide by sharing
their stories, experiences, ideas, knowledge and perspective on tech with the big
community. Welcome everybody to the Blacks and Technology Bit Tech Talk Podcasts on your
holds Gray Greenley and Today our guest is Marlena Love. Malena is the Twin
Cities Chapter President of the Blacks and Technology Other Chapter President of Twin Cities in
Blacks and Technology Foundation. I'm messing out all up. But she is also
the founder of the CEO of pipe Dream Ventures. It's a Web three venture
studio committed to helping visionaries transform innovative concepts into fundable, scalable market solutions.
She has over seven years of corporate leadership experience with a reputation for strategic leadership
and effectively guiding high profile global cross functional software experience. She's also at the
forefront of the digital revolution, which we're going to get into, and her
presence is felt in the web three, blockchain and XR ecosystem, which she's
known for immersive storytelling through digital arts, technology, and culture. Welcome to
the show, Malena. How are you doing? Pretty good? Pretty good?
And hoping I can live up to all of that. I'm pretty sure
you can pretty pretty dope. So yeah, so let's let's get into it.
Tell us a little bit about yourself, like, you know, kind
of where you're from, you know, what your background is, your education.
Yeah, absolutely, so thank you for that opportunity to speak today into
the podcast. Very excited. I feel like it's been a while since I've
been on any platform, so I'm excited to just get back into it.
So I would say that I'm originally from Memphis, Tennessee. How I got
up north is a story for the books. Most of it was job related.
So I've been in Minnesota since twenty eighteen, July of twenty eighteen,
after I was expecting the career change at that point, and it's been a
journey. I've been working in project management for the past seventeen years, like
you said. But the interesting part, I've always been passionate about entrepreneurship and
innovation and so What's unique about my career is that I'm always in a new
role, a new company, trying to find that it. Like, what's
my place? Was my spot And about two years ago, I out of
curiosity, I picked up a headset b Acalus Too, and that's where I
kind of found my calling. I've been a virtual reality creator in a metaverse
where I built immersive worlds and environments. I started it for my startup.
I found a community that allowed me to just tap back into my artistry as
a creator and to go back on that path as an entrepreneurs. So since
then, I've been I think for a whole year. I've just been in
the metaverse, just growing my brand, my community, and revamped my business
pipe ding Ventures, my Web three community, the Diamond Resilience, and I
think I now have a following of four hundred people. And I've also made
my first income through my venture in the metaverse. And I've just been meeting
a lot of amazing people that allow me to really found my place, which
is immersive storytelling through digital art, tech and culture. So when I'm not
looking at a project plan all day, I just put on my headset and
I'm literally my character boss Leo, and I feel like I'm changing the world
Metaversey and doing a lot of work in that area. That's pretty very and
we're gon we're going to dive into that a little bit more later because I
want to know more about it. Like it's funny, you know, I'm
an engineer, uh, so I deal with more with kind of like the
building of infrastructure for you know, software, uh to run on and things
like that, and not so much I guess on the cutting edge kind of
other things, right, Like so like we have three metaverse like all that
stuff, Like I'm I don't know a lot about So I'm really really interested
in hearing more about what that is and how you are interacting with it and
how you're building a business from it. But first, let's let's talk about
like your career journey. You say you've been like in a project management space
for quite a number of years. Tell us about how you how you got
started in that. Yeah, absolutely so, I would have to say it
goes down to your network. I feel like the saying your network is your
network, and that is true for me. I had a friend that I
met in college who just recommended me for an internship and they said, Hey,
I think it'd be a good opportunity for you. You're out here in
Memphis. I think you need to go out travel and expand your herot sense.
And I'm like, okay, sure, And they said Minnesota. I'm
like, what's in Minnesota? That was my first reaction. Yeah, I
know, right, So I'm like I had the most cliche question ever,
like is there actually black people there? Like I don't never really hear about
people up north, So it was new for me. So I would say
that just that network, that connection really changed the game for me. It
allowed me to I took an internship in the summer of twenty fourteen and that's
when I got paid to come out to Minnesota work as a business analyst.
And I really liked it. I liked the opportunity, so I came back
another summertime. And fun fact, despite of like all of my involvement and
accomplishments and internships I had, I did not get one offer job offer in
my home city. So I really had no choice but to relocate. And
that offer came from my internship, except that it was in Columbus, Indiana,
and it was as a project manager, which I had no idea what
that was at the time, but I found out very quickly what that was.
So I think the first four years of my career I've been letting others
decided for me, my managers deciding my path. I said that, hey,
if they say that you're a project manager, then that's what I was
going to do. They when I look for roles, they said, you're
a coordinator, you're a project manager. And I've been doing that and there's
always been a disconnect for me into that role. I just never seemed to
find the right fit and the right culture, and so it kind of started
a journey for me where I've just been going from different companies, different cultures,
just trying to figure out that career path for me. And only just
now, like two years ago, I really would say last year, I
just finally found my spot in my niche where I excel it excellent, excellent
and tell us kind of where what is that spot now for you? Absolutely
so for me, it's going back into my rooms as been an artist.
Although I worked as a project manager for the past eight years, for the
past fifteen years, even in high school, I've always been a designer.
I think I did my first side gig as a website designer graphic designer for
local businesses in Memphis, and I never deviated from that. And so I
would say when I start in the metaverse, just learning how to build worlds
with shape, it just allowed me to expand what all I could do with
this technology, that I could build an environment for people to enjoy and to
see it come to life and interact with it. And I just wanted to
pursue that. I would say that being doing the work in Blacks and Tech,
I realized that we're natural artists, we're creatives in general, but some
of the things that we struggle with in the workplace is culture. So after
having some few conversations and seeing that huge gap when it comes to technology,
it just clicked for me and said, that's it. We're controlling narratives,
you're telling stories, and you're doing that through art, tech and culture.
And I just so happened to stumble across virtual reality that has allowed me to
just open doors for myself. Will you typically be hard in a real world
because of what money, access to people, opportunities, where in the metaverse,
I have no limitations. I just literally create a world, set a
goal, and I just put it out in the world, so it gave
me that booster to say, like, this is that people like this,
people want this, Let's continue to do it. That's interesting. Let's let's
dive into that a little bit more. Your CEO of pipe Dreams pipe dream
Ventures, I should say, sorry about that. What is Web three,
right and trying to tell us a little bit about what your company does within
that Web three technology? Yeah? Absolutely, So you want to think of
Web three is the next generation of the Internet. It's mostly focused on blockchain
technology, but the key way here is decentralization, where we as the people
have more control, more ownership over our data, identity, content, acid
like we have more visibility to that. And beyond that, I'm still learning
about Web three. There's so many parts of that. I just found an
area, which is extended reality that takes it to the next level because I
think there's this big debate going on between whether we're in a bear market or
a ball market when it comes to Web three, blockchain and crypto which owns
things that we're still early and that's what makes us pioneers in a space like
we have the power to really shape where the next generation of this Internet to
go. I just so happen to find virtual reality as that first step for
me. And so when we think about pipe dream ventures, we help businesses
and brands typically on board into Web three because it's still so new and people
are still figuring out like where can I even start a career in this space,
or how can I start a business? Or what can I do?
And we're in that part where people need to first get educated about it and
feel safe because the last thing we want, which you're probably already seeing,
is that all the issues that we're currently seeing in Web two Web one social
media is just going to continue to carry over into Web three. And so
I like to leverate my brand and my business to build a culture and environment
to Web three that really sets the blueprint of how you do business and how
you created here and creating that opportunity for others. So let's let's let's talk
about that a little bit more. So. I'm a business and I want
to, you know, expand my business into the Web three. I guess
what's that process look like? Yeah? Absolutely, So you're either looking to
do one or two things, right, You're either looking to expand a brand
or business. You already have, or you're just looking to build in a
space which I have clients on both sides, And most importantly, we're in
a whole digital creator economy where it's more like how do I build a brand?
So when I think of this, not just web three, I just
talk from the area where I'm most dumb it in, which is just the
immersive technology extended reality. I'd like to look at this as social media,
almost like the social like Instagram, Facebook, except that you have a virtual
environment that allows you to connect with your audience on a different level. So
let's say you have this podcast. This is a really great example here,
although you and I are talking on this website, we could do this exact
same conversation within a virtual world environment with a cool design which I have called
the Diamond Lounge, the same audio. We have a live audience looking at
us. It's almost like you're at a talk show in real life, but
you get to connect with people and ask questions and the audio is just clear.
So it's really taking like how can you connect and communicate in a way
with other people that bring you together? And that's what I like about it
here is that I have met people from all over the where, from Dubai,
from the UK, from Atlanta. And it's not just meeting. These
are people that I've actually collaborated, partner with, made sustatial income with,
and some of them are my clients, people that I probably would see outside
with ever talk to a day of my life. But we were able to
work together to our common goal. So that's what allows you to do.
I've seen some commercial business they were able to expand their stores. So if
you have like a hair salon and you're just looking to just have a representation
or a digital clone of that in the metaverse, you can do that and
you have a global network of people who come and see your store versus your
pain probably like what anywhere between twenty to one hundred K to get the real
estate for it, to get the loan and all of that. When you
can literally just say, hey, I want to sell my products, let
me build a store in a week, let me have a lunch party,
and this thing. You know, I have like twenty people buy on a
product on the week your first week. So that's what's possible in this space.
Bit is all He's focused on forming new partnerships and opportunities to assist the
community and our members with their continued professional growth and development. If you'd like
to partner with us, send an email in queries at blacks and Technology dot
net. So that's what's considered like extended reality. Uh your your example of
like this podcast and and kind of having like an in studio type feeling with
an audience and I'm doing it live and I'm doing it real here. Uh.
And then the metaverse it's just it's it's it's still live, it's still
everything, but it's within the metaverse and it's you know, now I have
eyes on it from you know, all across the world could be uh,
and it's done within this environment that's a lot more I guess glamorous than the
my my launch right. Yeah, yeah, that's really what it is.
It gets to be a space that you get to create. I know,
like right now I'm working with a client who is a community tech cub right
and right now we're local where we have students that come in person to the
tech cup to uh to learn about all the amazing resources that we have,
and we're able to like bring that into the metaverse where you get to access
all students from all around the world. Most of them are from the UK,
so I say UK a lot or Australia. But you get to expand
your reach to a broader audience because they're liking what you have. So I
like to tell people think virtual reality, mixed reality almost like a website for
yourself of Hey, I know you see this cute website that I've done,
but come inside any emmers inside of it. Now I've seen more than just
business too. What I really love for this Web three environment is the support
for the artists. For years, we always said that we have the starving
artists. You don't get paid, Like I've seen people come here change the
game for musicians who was able to create their own merch store, build their
fan base. I've seen artists who are so talented, like I don't know
to this day how they're able to take a big square and a cube,
a cube and like a circle and just build a nice statue that tells the
story and a lot of people get to come into that art piece and experience
it. So it's like another way of experiencing emotions of a person art work,
and they actually get paid for it and they monetize on that. So
it's a really way to connect with your audience and tell your story for people
to feel that you have you seen record companies like labels kind of embracing this
technology more because typically in that industry you kind of have like the gatekeepers,
right and being doing things like with extended reality in the multiverse. It does
allow that decentralization of essentially power, right, So now you don't have these
you know, your your large record labels and things like that gatekeeping and keeping
artists from not only getting paid, but doing the actual art that they really
want to do. Right. You know, record labels are good at like
controlling and directing what they want you to put out, and they don't like
it, you know it's not going. But when you start decentralizing that and
you give more power back to the artists, right then you then than the
artists are free and able to be themselves. But I'm wondering is how are
these record companies or if you've seen record companies utilize Web three and embrace this
new technology. I haven't seen companies yet, but this not to say that
they're not probably already doing it and figuring out there's always that because we're early,
right, it's I like to think of this like snapchat. It was
all cool and fun until they start adding in all this advertisement and companies,
and there's no doubt this it's going to go that same way here too.
But I want to go back to that key word, like the power of
the people. The whole thing of decentralization and where companies will continue to fail
is that a lot of people come into the metaverse, and myself included when
I first started out, they come in here and they're like, how can
I make a quick book? How can I be transactional? And a lot
of people who come to the metaverse don't come here to be solo to they
come to connect. They come to escape their reality because it is a challenge.
But what we all say is that we came here to escape, but
we didn't really know how powerful the community is. And that is a big
word in Web three, is that it's power in the community. Like you
have to nurture your community, you have to give value to your community,
because when you're here just transactional and trying to make money or not going to
succeed. Because although companies can be labels, to be quite honest, and
we're seeing it with AI there's really no need for pretty much Hollywood. It's
going to be non existence, like there's no really true celebrities. They're competing
with regular people like you and I. In fact, i've seen successful indie
studios like I have this crazy video that I shared on Instagram of a local
girl. I think she was from Illinois, and I just came in on
a whole out of rap scene. I felt like I was on MTV and
everything, and these are artists I don't better up, but they were.
But I felt like I was a part of MTV just watching it front action
as she's on the mic, you know. And the person behind that world
was actually a producer in the studio. So I see more opportunity for those
who produce music. I've seen opportunities for those who are artists, Like we
even had a fourteen year fourteen year old just in the wrapping flowing in that
community was encouraging and I keep going spit the b and a lot of people
were getting representation. In fact, I think this was two weeks ago.
It was this guy's first day and in his headset and he was just still
trying to figure out how to move around. And I said, hey,
how are you doing who always had like a virtual networking party, and he
was like yeah, like I'm like an artist. I forgot what he said
he was from, but he like, yeah, I'm an artist. I'm
signed artists and just trying to see what we can do. And I'm like,
oh, I think I can connect you with some people. I brought
him into the whole studio with like twenty other musical artists where he was just
able to come in and just start doing what he did best. Got connected
to people from LA to Atlanta and was like rapping with them, connecting with
them like planning, planning, like gates together. And I have one girl,
he's a musician, and she's building her whole team of artists and she's
bringing them from all around the world as a part of her whole like artist
community, and she changing the game for them, like she's showing them like
you can really make money here, like you don't have to be signed,
Like you can grow community and have people experience your music and your artistry.
So it definitely changed the game. And I see for producers, if you
have beats, you're trying to get yourself out there, you can build a
world with all of your beats on it and people just like to sing and
rap to it. What's up everyone? We hope that you're enjoying this episode
of the Blacks and Technology Big Tech Talk podcasts. Do you or someone you
know have a dope story that they want to share with our big audience.
Locks and Technology is seeking guests to be on our podcast. We're looking to
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So if you know of someone, send them our way. Shoot us an
email to contact us at Blacks and Technology dot net, or click on the
link in the show notes and fill out our form. We're looking to hear
from you. I've seen in the music industry how it's gone from you know,
this state of early on, you had to be huge or even within
the local scene. Let's start there. In the local scene. You had
to find if you let's just say, you're not a producer, a music
producer, so you had to go and you had to find somebody. Then
you have to have them believe in, you know, kind of what you
were doing as far as you know, lyrics and music and things like that
and your vision. Then you have to connect and then you have to find
time to go in the studio, and the studio is always owned by somebody
else in time just booked up and blah blah blah. That's and then I
start. And then you know, in order for your music to be distributed,
unless you're out like hand in hand selling mixtapes or a mix CDs or
whatever, you know, you had to go that route of a record label,
and then you have to deal with them and shady contracts and distribution deals
and all this stuff that those are the gatekeepers. And then all of a
sudden there was this transition where you had places like CD baby, and you
had these other ways that you can distribute your music right that you can,
uh, these online distribution outlets, right, CD baby is one of them.
There's a few other ones out there, can't you remember their names.
Then you went from that to streaming. Right then that kind of cut a
lot of that nonsense out right, like so not totally, but some of
it, like gatekeepers and things like that, and people get access to your
music because even with CD baby they would they would press up your CDs and
things like that, you still have to, you know, get them in
their record stores and all that stuff is. This is when record stores are
really popping. I don't even know if there's record stores anymore besides ones that
sell like vintage vinyl, and now you've got streaming and even even they're gatekeepers
there, you know, and you know, no you know, offence to
any of the one but you you know, the YouTube, music, Spotify,
all those like Apple, like all those. You still there's still a
level of gatekeeping happens there. Now the evolution of technology and everything like that,
you have the metaverse. Now that gatekeeping stuff is kind of you know,
kind of fall to the wayside. So you can get yourself in the
right to people. You can connect with people from all over now you don't
have to you know, scour your your your local area just to find you
know, beat makers now as you know, people that have virtual studios that
you can like. That stuff is really really cool and it really shows like
the evolution of technology as a whole. Yeah, it's pretty cool, pretty
cool, Yeah, I definitely agree, tell me so, yeah, yeah,
So what other interesting like besides like this, you know the music,
you know, some of the what other ideas and concepts that you have you
seen like within that that space that or that you feel is really transformative.
Yeah, so I definitely want to revisit that gatekeeping because even here, you
know, in a metaverse, you still have people that like to geatekeep.
But I think what's really valuable is going back to the community piece, especially
with creators like myself. So that's something I do with Pipe Dain Ventures,
and I launch an initiative called the Exchange. And this is a platform,
a world that I created in a platform where I bring creators, usually four
to five creators together every month. This month we'll be doing blockchain and crypto,
and it's a program where for four weeks I get to work with those
creators and we get to four months. Four weeks I work with those creators
and we try to tap in and see what can they do with their current
passion, their hobbies, how can we turn it into like a brand,
a service offering. And the four Friday of that month, they have an
opportunity to tell their story to the world. So we have a tagline that
we use called transforming Stories of Resilience into Impactful Ventures. And through this Exchange,
I call it more of a value exchange. Each of these creators within
the same industry, they have to exchange it with each other, like a
white Elephant party actually, because that's where it really came from, a white
elephant party, where we exchange gifts with each other. Because a lot of
the artists, the creators in the space, we're so new, and you
have a lot of people that really won't show you the way or they try
to gatekeep, and so being a part of my community in exchange really breaks
that for them where they're able to say, hey, I'm developer, I'm
a scriptor, or I'm into blockchain and I do courses. You get to
take that to someone who actually looking for that service for you, and so
you've got a chance to connect that way there. So I would say that
those are kind of the opportunities there is to connect with people to help grow
what you're doing and really get exposure. And that's how we break the ice
there with the boarding there. But what I really love the most for other
opportunities, I say it all the time is the ease of access and the
time to market. It's online, Like you have an idea on Monday,
when you lunch on Friday and I have to met It freaked me out.
I think I was freaked out for like three to six months because I'm one
of those people that I have New Year resolutions. And then the end of
the year, I was like, yeah, I didn't do none of that.
I didn't hit out one goal. But what treated me out a little
bit was that everything I said I wanted to do it somehow happened that I
was doing it. And my friend and remind me, like, we're actually
doing everything we said we wanted to do here, and I was like,
you're actually right, like I'm doing it, and I'm not used to.
I'm always used to saying like I need to do this, I haven't done
that. It's like you have an idea, you act on it. Time
is fast. In fact, last year I did an entire two day Metaverse
summit out on my own there, like I brought in I think over twenty
speakers, creators, the two thousand dollars patch competition, and I did that
in less than three months, no funding and nothing. And we're coming back
doing it again and we got some even amazing creators and now we're launching a
hakathon. It's no longer like Okay, we need to plan this out twelve
months, six months out. It's more like, Hey, I have an
idea. I want to collaborate with you. Let's market three weeks out,
let's do it, let's split profits. And that's how it goes here.
So it's a space that whatever ideas that you have, whatever that you think
you want to do, you can do it. And if it doesn't work
out, it just didn't work out because you have already tested it and you
validated it. And it's metaverse. And that is what I'm doing with Pyderine
Ventures. I just give people like an opportunity, like let's see what you
can do, Like what are your passionate about, and let's just see if
it works and if it doesn't work out the four weeks, let's try it
again. So I actually have one person who's more like you. Actually you
just ran you reminded me of him. He have his own he's a developer.
He built mobile apps and he just so happened and got interested in developing
for virtual reality and makes reality. And so he's like, hey, I'm
trying to tap in, like I see the opportunity, but I don't know
what to do. And so he was a part of the showcase. He
had a chance to speak I think on four shows already. I got him
booked for another important show called Crypto City, and he's getting ready to launch
his world and his business through the metaverse in two weeks through a nice fun
game called Exact Madness, where it's like Shark Take and March Madness, but
a chance for the community to see what he's doing. And it's not something
typical like here's an event show up, let me build a world or an
out for you. It's more of like, here's something of value, like
come to this competition. The winner will get a free mixed reality out built
for them. And so these are just one of the many creators that I
work with to just really bring that into reality. That's that's pretty cool.
I need to explore this a little bit more. Uh. I find myself
getting so busy with a lot of stuff, like when new technology comes out,
and I don't know, Web three, Metaverse and things like that have
been out for a while, but it's still really new, right as far
as you know, people utilizing and things like that, and I don't know,
I guess I got some more. Let me let me wait and see
what happens with this first, but I think I want to have to dive
into it. But tell people if they want to get involved, how do
they get started? Yeah? Absolutely, the most simple way to just dive
in, like get ahead that and just tap into the community. See what
other people are doing. They can follow me. Well, my love Marlanta
accounts is not really well very freely. I actually have an avatar called Bosleo
dot io and my web three community the Diamond Resilience, and I take a
journalistic approach to like sharing like what all these amazing things people are doing from
like working with a person. We're producing a metaverse reality series similar to the
shows you see in Atlanta, but but creators there. So that's actually getting
ready to come out. Y know, it's gonna be interesting. It's definitely
gonna have some drama in it for sure, because you can't escape drama anywhere.
It's gonna be raw, and we have some really good creators that we're
gonna put on there. It's like, you guys are avatars really arguring physically.
That's true. That's amazing thing. Yeah, that's true. That's true.
So I would say one of the best things to do it Like I
just say I give the same advice a person told me, like just explore
and see where it goes. If you're looking to like do a career in
this space. I always go on LinkedIn and I follow a hashtags like I
always like to say, hashtag virtual reality, hashtag mixed reality, hashtag metaverse.
And I like to say, like who are some of the key players,
the key influencers to companies. That's how I stay in form on LinkedIn.
At least I want to know, like what's going on, what jobs
are happening, what conversations are happening. Because although that this technology is really
important, we have to think about it from a safety standpoint, the sustainable
standpoint, like when we're thinking about like our rear, give up our access
and we're saying that we're doing a lot of transparency here, but how much
is too transparent? Transparency here? And monopoly? Who really owns the metaverse
or do you own it? And especially as an artist, how do you
protect yourself in a world where it's so easy to copy, duplicate, Like
how are you protecting yourself? Do you really own that? So there's a
lot of conversations to be had, and I employ people to follow that,
but follow key people who are tapping to the industries into the industry to learn
more about it, and I like to also go to the company, So
I'm always looking at meta seeing what they're doing. Apple has finally entered the
chat, so I'm always keeping up to date with them, seeing what they're
doing and what other companies are doing as well, restidents saying how they're going
to solve some of those. I guess kind of fundamental problems of privacy of
security from the standpoint of in a metaverse, and I don't know, I
haven't been in it. It seems to me like it would be more wide
open, right, like you don't and it could be like, you know,
what regulations are going to come with that, if any being decentralized,
Like how do you how do you start to regulate certain things? For instance,
you don't want a fourteen year old coming in there and being able to
like look at stuff that's inappropriate for a fourteen year old things like that,
you know, or are younger, like, so how are they going to
go about putting safeguards in place? And even when it comes to just you
know, standard stuff between women and men, like women can get harassed,
Like how are they going to safeguard against people doing of that. You know,
I don't know what the term is, but I guess it would be
like metaverse talking or or whatever like they So those things that you know,
I'd like to see like ho come forth with how they're going to deal with
some of those issues. So that'll be interesting. Do you have a product
or service that you would like to share with a big audience or maybe you'd
like to support the big community and do your part in helping us with stomping
the divide. Start by sponsoring one of our podcasts. Please email us at
contact us at blacks and Technology dot net. I said, I have stories
on stuff you said about those experiences, and to be honest with you in
here, it's like they're not really prouditizing that unfortunately. And so we can
have the podcasts the conversations, but it's really going to boil down to the
community and themselves and at least the community I'm tapped into it. We had
to take it into our own hands, like we're actually we're I think for
June Team, me and a lot of high value creators who's like really known
in this space. We're coming together to create a creator code of conduct because
we're not getting that from the creators themselves, I mean the makers themselves.
So we're creating a code of conduct, a coalition, if you call it,
of how we can build a safer community for all of us. Yeah,
yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. Let the community kind
of step forward and handle these issues. So let's let's go from one amazing
journey in your life to another, involving BIT. As I mentioned earlier,
you are the chapter that end up, the Twin Cities chapter of a big
foundation. So I want to talk to you a little bit about about that
and kind of let's start with how did you first hear about BIT, and
then tell us a little bit about how you first became involved. Yeah,
I'm absolutely I think the first time I heard about that is when a friend
from college was telling me about a conference here in Minnesota, and of course,
probably like most people, I thought it was bitcoin and I didn't want
nothing to do with it. I'm like, no, I'm not, I'm
not doing hit like but you you're black and you're inteched. I'm like,
I'm not. I ended up I ended up going like to I think two
weeks before I find out about it, and I'm like, well, you
know what, it's not that expensive, so I go check it out.
It is interesting. It's a conference. You said it was BIGCN and believe
it or not. That was when I met a mentor that I still have
now as my mentor. My name is doctor Elizabeth Adams. She's now in
Atlanta. She's the one that kind of jump started all of this for me.
It started with her really like she was the one who gave me that
permission to just go crazy with it. And I still talk to her.
So that was my first exposure to Ben. And then I think I was
at a period in my life that I felt like I was doing a lot
of Black power movements and I just got tapped out from that. I was
burnt out from always trying to uplift our community and the setbacks, and I
took a break from like black equity movements. And I think it was her
name was doctor Timmant Gebel from Google. She was laid off from Google because
she was challenging their ethics and everything that she was saying in Twitter, you
on LinkedIn doing that period, I was like yes, like I feel it,
Like yes, I go through this and corporate and it just kind of
reignited. That fire decided me to say, you know what, I need
to come out of sleep mold and I need to get back involved because I've
been uninvolved in the community for like four years I believe at the time.
And so I that's when I was looking around Minneapolis to see like what organizations
exist, and I remember I went to Bigcon and that's when I was looking
on the website and I was I just feel it out. So I'm like,
okay, I remember there's a black syntech. Let me reach out.
And Dinner's were like, yeah, we don't have a president, but you
interested. I was like, that is me to always step into a leadership
position. So I was like, so that's how I got involved. I
was like, well, he said it's open. I'm like, okay,
let's do it. So I got I got into then, Okay, shout
out to Dinner Shows. That's our executive director of a big foundation and where
we're happy to have you. Uh, You're you're always super involved and anything
that we're like, we're doing from a from a national standpoint, not just
a local standpoint. So I want to thank you for that definitely. Uh,
but I know you're doing a lot locally as well. Tell us you
know a little bit about uh, if there's other people that are involved in
the Twin Cities chapters that uh, you know, give us their names and
their roles and yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I think with everything else
that we're definitely in a restructuring period. I'm with our chapter, but I
do want to highlight one member that's been really consistent and involved with me.
Her name is Sama, and what I love about her and a lot of
people I have met, She's a connector. She connects with people the community
and bring exposure. We do have a we did have a long term a
long term advisor, Steve Buchanan from macrom Microsoft. He done amazing work for
our I chapter bringing that awareness and also extending that partnership with Microsoft when we
needed just a space to have our meetings in. And we do work in
the community with a tech hub and just really creating career pathways for non traditional
talent. And so we both are sitting on the board representing blacks and tech
and really creating that career pathways here in the Twin Cities. That's that's dope
and shout out to Steve has been involved with big uh, and and I
say involved. He's you know, been involved in the community for quite a
while now. And every time the first two times we had a bit com
up and up in the Twin Cities, you know, he came both times.
We hung out a little bit. Uh. And he's a you know,
he just hit me up on slat the other day just to say what's
up and things going and things like that. He's a he's a really really
genuine guy, super smart. Uh and uh, you know, he's he's
climbed the ranks of in technology as well. I know, he was a
consultant for a consultancy doing like a lot of Microsoft Azure stuff and now he's
working for Microsoft. So that's that's really cool. And he's just really a
cool person. So shut out to Steve Buchannan. Yeah you've been Yeah,
Yeah, he's cool. So you've been to Twins Cities Chapter president for for
how long now? It's almost three years now, right, Okay, yeah,
yeah, we're going up. We're coming up on three and a half
years. It's been. So what inspires you to continue to not only be
a leader, but inspires you to continue along with the big mission and vision?
You know, That's a really good question because it does get hard.
And I explain even to my leadership team, like it's a commitment, you
know, even though it's a nonprofit, we're having time, like you have
to put and work here. And I think one lady she said it best
when I was working on a contract and I was asking her. I'm like,
you're obviously successful, you're dealing with this type of culture. It's like,
why are you here and she said that you have to because as a
woman, as a black woman, you have to pay the way for others.
And that really stuck with me because it's much time. I'd be like,
man, this is too much. I need to take a break.
And sometimes I do take a break. I don't leave because it's like there's
so much work to do, there's so many problems to do, and it's
like we have to keep going. We have to create those pathways. We
have to create our oportunities. No one else is going to give us access
and opportunity. We had to be ones to create that access and opportunities.
So that what keep that's what keep me going is that I know that what
everything that I have done so far, I know another person can benefit off
of that and they can have access an opportunity because of that. That's uh,
that just inspired me. Was featured partnerships and programs with companies such as
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provide our members with the resources we want and need to thrive and succeed in
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net. Join now, and remember membership is free up here. No seriously,
because like it's it is tough. You you know, you as a
volunteer, you know, there's not like pay or anything like that, and
you're giving your time and your energy U and even you know, in my
position as a founder, there's still a lot of times when you get you
feel burned out. But it's always there's any time I ever start feeling like
that, and it must be you know, the energy God sending something.
There's always an email that comes or someone that reaches out to me and says,
hey, man, I really appreciate you creating this space for us in
this organization. This is great. I felt like I was on an island
now, I felt like I found my tribe, my community. This is
great. I really thank you for it, and that right there, I'm
like, all right, I'm back in the game. You keep going right,
re energizes me. And you're right, you know, go ahead.
That that actually helps, Like just hearing someone say like you, I see
you, I appreciate you. It's like those flowers. They really do help.
Yeah. Yeah, and and I kind of lost my place. Yeah,
you're right, No, it's it does help. It helps a lot,
you know, because you got everyday life going on, you have a
job, and in devoting time to something else, you know it could not
only is it a time suck at times, it's straining. Uh So I'll
say, you know, we appreciate everything that you do and all your efforts
and your leadership at Twin Cities. We love having you as part of the
organization. And I'm glad that you feel that way and you feel, you
know, ready to inspire the next person that comes behind, because that's that's
what's needed. And I and for me, it's like, yeah, there's
those moments, those uh uh, those valleys, but then those peaks are
so high. But in those valleys, you know, there's there's times where
you you want to kind of get out. And for me, it's just
like, well, I got to keep going and and like you said,
paving this way and making providing, helping, helping to provide access until this
is no longer needed, Right until we finally can say, all right,
we no longer need but we've done our job. There's you know they're taking
us. They're taking us seriously, you know, we we found our path
in tech. I think where we have a seat at the table now,
Like that's that's when I feel like it's going to be time for me to
walk away once that happens. Right, some of the things that your chapter
is doing to help us stop the divide, right, Like that's our tagline
absolutely. So I say it boils downs to three industries workforce, development,
gaming, and now the creator economy. Minnesota. We are definitely not the
number one state when it comes to technology, but we are and artsy town
in arts and culture town. So we're bridging art, tech and culture and
starting to like lead in that space. And so the tech cub is our
babies, like our adopted initiative here. So we do a lot of initiatives
around career pathways for non traditional talent, focusing on the youth and women entering
on career pathways with that and partnering programs and companies for that, I would
say that would be the biggest one. And now since I'm tapped into the
art scene, we're actually getting ready to launch the xr immerse some creator program
for our creators here in Minnesota that do a lot of work in the scene.
So partnering with different arts schools and other individuals let them know like there's
a career pathway for you, like you can do something in tech here.
So we're trying to connect more with the community more in bringing them into tech
and following that, we're also exploring work with Second Chance program for those who
might have felony so criminal backgrounds, and so we're working out a pathway there.
But we're anything that you can think of when it comes to web three.
Minneapolis is quickly growing into that, and we're also even in the gaming
industry, we're starting to build our career pathways. I think we're starting to
have a growing market now in the gaming industry, from est sports to indie
game development, we're growing. So I'm excited to be a face representing three
big industries here and we're the ones who's creating pathways into our career and as
entrepreneurship. With that, that's pretty that's pretty dope. So how many members
do you have do you all have in the twenty Cities chapter? I want
to say that we have roughly around let's see, like one fifty if I
remember saying that, Okay, give it take by roughly like over one hundred
for sure. And at our key events we have really good attendees come out,
like more than like twenty to forty people that come out. So one
thing about our chapter we like to expand through strategic partnerships. So with our
key sponsor, Arctic Wealth, we do and you want amplify event when we're
bringing all the ergs together to talk all things tach we also are We just
recently partnered with NASBY to do a social event, and we're trying to partner
with more local communities out there. Nice. Nice, and that's good to
hear your partner. And I think a few of our other chapters are doing
some things with NASBY. I think it's good especially and I talked about this
on the last last podcast. I think it's good to start showing that uh,
that unity amongst black organizations, especially with the current like attacks on uh
D E A, D E and I initiatives, like they're coming after you
know, companies that are are are some of these uh like venture companies that
are that are allocating money to you know, to to black founders are coming
after them, are trying to sue them in court, and you know,
they're they're passing laws to strike down D E and I and things like that.
And companies are actually scared, right They're they're they're pulling back funds and
everything like that. Uh So, I think you're right in saying that,
like if if that space, uh that place at the table is not that,
we have to start creating these things ourselves, and I think one of
the ways to do that is through these strategic partnerships with other black lad organizations.
Uh So that I think there's always power in unity and community. Uh
So, it's good to see that that's happening with with your chapter as well.
That's the final question. I like that unity and community, Yeah,
definitely, definitely. I mean that, look, that's what BIT was built
off of. Like it. People see BIT now and they are like,
oh my god, you got this. There's this huge organization and blah blah
blah, I'm like, that's not how it started. It started just because
I wanted community around black people in tech. Uh. And our community started
online at first, and it was just a small group of us just chatting
and having fun and and everything like that. And now it's it's this you
know, this global thing. But we've always kept community at the core of
it. Uh And and I think that is what separates us from some other
organizations, is that it grew organically. It grew through community, and it
grew through trust, right and at that differentiates us from a lot of organizations
that come up now because we still when you go to bitcom, you still
feel that intimate community feel right, and you have you form relationships and network
with people that actually feel like real relationships and they feel close. Right.
So we're going to continue with that, Like, that's one thing that I
never want to change about what BID is doing. As long as we continue
to have you know, that community feel, then I'm okay. So what's
next for you in bit twin Cities? You know, I was telling myself
this a weally good goo that you know says I'm tapped into the art scene
and this is our culture. I'm wanting to really expand that and be a
leader in that space. So those will be the three things that you hear
me say over and over. I say, immersive storytelling through our tech and
culture. I think I'm going to change it and sad like something around narratives
because I think it's important to really control the narrative. And I got that
from Blacks and Tech, like we have to control the narrative of what it's
seen here. So I think launching xr Immerse is going to be a really
big component of that, like creating like their first Web three creator type program
that's really creating the blueprint of how we are creating culture for black people and
like you said, like we said, like creating tables for people to sit
in and really working on that workforce development. So we actually we do a
soft lunch of the Career Pathways program in two weeks with the Community Tech Cup,
so the'LBI first pilot of like ushering that in there, and actually
with Blacks and Tech thanks to Dennis that we're issuing out over one hundred grow
with Google certificates for those who come to the program they can get certified.
I think some of that is with cybersecurity ux design it support, and we
have other up and coming programs like artificial intelligence as well. And I'm working
with a local That's why I love to We're working with local startups and local
founders to help build these initiatives, so we're tapping into our network. So
I'm excited to be working with a local group of men who just graduated college
and we're working with them to build out a career pathways and blockchain rather they
want to be a developer or built out. So I'm excited, so I
said I would be. The two things is that we're really expanding on that
creator program initiatives and on the career pathways, and we have the Career the
Creator Accelerator. They'll be launching soon, so announcements will go out and we
will also be doing our first Hakkathon that would be from July to the October,
and that will be introducing those individuals into Web three. So if you've
never seen or never heard about blockchain and you're curious and no want to be
intimidated, then this will be a international Hakkathan, not just limited to the
Twin Cities, and it's free yes, and you get a chance to really
grow your career for that. So a lot of fun stuff is really rolling
out. And this isn't something we just plan in December. This is something
that I've been working on for the past two years. Thank you for your
your efforts and your leadership at Twin Cities. And you know, we're just
happy to have you. A person you know that like you, that inspires
others and that inspires me as well. It's always good to see people with
the boots on the ground doing the fantastic things. And I wish you good
luck and everything that you're doing with Web three, with Right Dream Ventures and
with the technology Twin Cities that's feeling. Thank you. It's always a pleasure.
I love doing this. Thank you. Thank you everyone for checking out
this episode of the Big Tech Talk podcast. If you like and saw what
you heard, smash that like button and subscribe to our channel and stay in
tune with us for our next episode. Until then, keep stopping the Divide.