Coworking space and AI lab

Bite-sized explanation:

simple diagram showing relationship between the coworking space and the lab

More detailed explanation:

Let’s talk about how Kuleana.work coworking space and the Kuleana AI lab fit together. Both share a similar name and (for now) the same physical space - the old First Hawaiian space in Kukui Grove Mall, facing the bus stop -  and the same people, but they are in fact two distinct things with aligned but different missions.

Kuleana.work is a registered nonprofit, a federal 501 (c)(3) organization doing biz as a coworking space on Kauai. We were founded 7 years ago to provide a pretty specific kind of place to work and grow a community. We’re all looking for a lounge-y, friendly, centrally-located,  quiet place to get work done. And maybe chat and socialize a bit. 

From the very start here, we did other things at the coworking space - we had “digital literacy” conversations where we talked with coworking and community members about their tech questions. We held art gallery showings featuring local artists, and we’d hold the occasional workshop. In time we’d come to host bi-weekly talks about generative AI as well. 

All of these things raised our visibility, and our own awareness of a set of needs in our Kauai community. Particularly, these conversations about AI gained attention and seemed to really serve a need. This emerging technology seemed very much on people’s mind, and in their workplace… but it was all informal. Lots of hype. More than a few related scams. 

So after more than a few conversations and planning meetings, we decided to stand up an AI “lab” here on Kauai. 

It’d be a place we’d do research with folks here to find out about how they use AI, what their thoughts and  feelings about it were. This is kind of rare to begin with; we didn’t know anyone asking folks on Kauai in particular, so it seemed necessary and worthy work. We’d take what we learned and pass it on to the public, but we’d also use these gained insights to put together workshops for the people of Kauai on AI and relevant topics - an introduction, using it with a small business, understanding how educators are using it, how to use it in a transition to a new career, and so on. We’d then build our own AI, a local model trained on Kauai-specific information. We applied and got the grant!

Kuleana AI Lab is now a program administered by the folks running the coworking space, Kuleana.work. Right now the lab is not its own business entity, it’s something we at the coworking space are developing to research, educate, and develop with generative AI tech. We’ll see how it grows over time, and if we spin it off into its own thing. 

That lab is running today. We’re doing research, holding seminars, hosting public conversations and office hours. If you live on Kauai and haven’t done so yet, please take our quick survey about AI and help us understand how folks here feel about and use it (or not). We publish the results of our work.