NEW ORLEANS – On Tuesday night, May 19, GNO, Inc. presented the second event of a new series spearheaded by the organization’s board chair, Kim Boyle, called GNO After Dark, described as “a forum designed to bring our community together for relaxed, smart conversations about the issues shaping our region.”
Held at Freret Street music venue Gasa Gasa from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m., the event was entitled CultureTech: Innovating the Creative Economy. It featured a panel of leaders in music, technology, food and hospitality in New Orleans, including Ryan Chavez, founder of Imprinted Group; Donald Link, famed local restaurateur; and McKenzii Webster, manager of the Memphis chapter of The Recording Academy, most known for its production of the Grammy Awards. Sean Mulligan, senior programs manager at Idea Village, moderated the panel.
During the panel, Link shared that he is working on a tech offering with a friend that uses AI to automate tasks in the restaurant industry. A blend of restaurant and AI, it is called Rāi, and according to Link will “allow managers to get home sooner” by “automating all the things that need to be done at the end of a shift.” He noted the tech is currently being beta tested by some of his restaurant connections around the country.
When asked about some of the biggest challenges in the culture focused tech, Chavez noted a lack of access to capital. Link agreed, noting, “I’ve never raised money before… At the end of the day, it’s going to be me and five of my friends that fund this thing.”
Other issues raised on the panel included familiar concerns about keeping talent in the city and the need to support incubators like GNO, Inc.’s Metronome. Webster also noted that her home city of Memphis is also battling with many of the same issues as New Orleans in regard to creating an industry pipeline.
A few notable moments of the night received strong crowd reactions, including loud gasps when Link — in a discussion about the restaurant industry’s hesitancy to adopt technology — shared how he was at one time paying $150,000 a year to OpenTable for use at his six restaurants.
GNO, Inc. President Michael Hecht received applause when he shared his belief that AI will lead to a “revaluing of authenticity.” He then asked the panel “If authenticity is going to be the new new, how can we leverage that?.. How can we get people to pay for authenticity and how do we get that to our culture bearers?”
The discussion then moved to the importance of supporting culture bearers, which is when audience member Dr. Gerald Paige spoke out.
“You have to be in the culture to be able to explain the culture,” he began, before introducing himself as a third-generation Afro indigenous chief with the Great Spirit Warriors. After being pulled up to the stage, Paige noted, “There’s a big disconnect…Everybody’s saying the culture bearer term. The problem with the culture bearer term is that too many of our culture bearers are dying broke.”
The biggest audience applause was given to Paige’s speech, which ended in a call for more people to step up and go into the community and talk to the community that is responsible for New Orleans’ culture.
The evening ended with Hecht adding his own call to action, which started with noting the success of the recent campaign to vote down all five proposed constitutional amendments on May 16.
Noting the power of politics, he said, “If we really to talk about this in real terms, there has got to be a better form of political organization to suggest/scare our elected officials into doing what we want. And absent that, nothing really happens. Because they’ll let us do this (gesturing at the room) and it’s all well and good, but they’re not going to be forced to change.”
