Wednesday is the festival's data day. Data Nerds Day brings three communities into one building: the Data for Good volunteer network (1,600 members), the DAMA-Vancouver data governance chapter, and the BC + AI practitioner community.
The Data Storytelling Hackathon (Rival Technologies, $5K prize, Round 5) anchors the morning. Teams present weekend builds. Finalist presentations run mid-afternoon. Winners are announced live at the evening Meetup.
Afternoon talks follow the Data for Good showcase format: short, practitioner-led, nonprofit-focused. Themes include AI for social good, data governance for nonprofits, responsible AI adoption, and data storytelling as a craft. Nonprofits are in the room as potential clients; Data for Good's 1,600 volunteers are the talent pipeline.
Data is the connective tissue between communities that don't usually share a room. That's what Wednesday is about.
— Gordon Hamilton, Data for Good Vancouver