On Thursday, June 26th, 2025, during Toronto Tech Week, we gathered a room of leaders, builders, and thinkers to explore how we unlock AI’s upside without sacrificing human trust, creative integrity or long-term value.
When we decided to host this event, we saw it as an opportunity to not just unveil The Opening Door’s rebrand as a responsible AI integration agency– but to ignite a community of people that believe in the power of responsible innovation. People that believe that when built with ethics, fairness and transparency, AI becomes more than a system upgrade. It becomes a catalyst for shaping the future with intention, a future that centres humans. The future of AI isn’t just technical—it’s deeply human.
As headlines continue to highlight the likelihood of significant labour market disruption in the upcoming years, and as generative AI capabilities continue to scale, we need to be operating with both eyes open as frontier labs, and countries, race to create artificial superintelligence. We’re at an inflection point in history. This is our opportunity to create guardrails to ensure we don’t gamble away humanity as we know it, trying to push the limits of intelligence that itself seeks to mimic human intelligence and consciousness.
This is why responsible AI is critical.
Design, development, deployment, and governance of artificial intelligence systems in ways that are ethical, transparent, accountable, and aligned with human values.
Human-centred AI is an approach to that design and deployment that prioritizes human well-being, values, and agency at every stage of the AI system’s lifecycle.
Both aim to align AI with human values and societal goals because a truly responsible AI system should be human-centred.
This is our work.
Ensuring the future of human-machine interaction is collaborative, and keeps us as humans in control of our destiny.
Thank you to our sponsors Toronto Tech Week, and Thinkingbox for helping us bring the vision for this event to life. To the speakers and presenters, for sharing your intellectual and creative capital, and to the community that showed up, and engaged in this work. Thank you for joining us on this journey to create a future intentionally shaped responsibly—where innovation, strategy, and ethics are inseparable.
“The conversation around what our duties are at this stage of AI's development was enlightening. It reminded me that everything is connected, and as such, the choices I make also impact others, which means there is always a need to be responsible. I enjoyed the conversation and learned a lot. I look forward to connecting more in the future.” - Kimberly Gayle, Team Leader
“A fascinating event with a fascinating mix of people from tech, the academy and the arts. Exactly the kind of thought-provoking mix that I was hoping for!” - Ross Manson, Artistic Director
“The diversity of panel experiences and stories provide a unique view of human centered AI.” - Nick Trendov ENODES, Educator & Technologist
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We’re exploring turning Human-Centred AI x The Future into an ongoing series to continue these important conversations and build a community around responsible, human-centred AI.
If you attended, your insights will help shape what future gatherings look like. And if you’d like to stay updated on upcoming events and resources, now is the perfect time to connect.
Share your feedback, sign up for updates on this event series, or reach out if you’re interested in bringing responsible, human-centred AI practices into your organization.
Let’s keep building the future together, responsibly.
