Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Juliette Powell: Toronto Mike'd #1354

Episode Date: October 31, 2023

In this 1354th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Juliette Powell about winning 1989's Miss Canada Beauty Pageant, working at MuchMusic, on Electric Circus and at CP24, her move to New York and ongoing work in the field of responsible deployment of AI, ethical data exploration and the search for and removal of negative biases. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Pumpkins After Dark, Ridley Funeral Home, Electronic Products Recycling Association, Raymond James Canada and Moneris. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Welcome to episode 1354 of Toronto Mic'd. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery. A fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga

and Oakville. Pumpkins After Dark. Get your tickets now for PumpkinsAfterDark.com Happy Halloween everybody! RecycleMyElectronics.ca. Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past.

The Advantage Investor Podcast from Raymond James Canada. Valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed, and focused on long-term success. Season 5 of Yes, We Are Open, an award-winning podcast from Moneris, hosted by FOTM Al Grego, and Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making her Toronto mic debut

is Juliet Powell. Hi. Hello, nice to see you. Do you see me now? Yeah, you look great. Oh, you're very kind. How are you? Good.

You know what's funny? I actually was like five feet away from you last month because I was at that David Kine's Hollywood Sweet Breakfast. And I saw you and then I'm like, well, she doesn't know who I am. And I thought I needed somebody to like introduce me. And then I'm like well she doesn't know who I am and I thought I needed somebody to like introduce me and then I no one and bottom line is I know I'm sorry you felt that way I'm like that's Juliet Powell I can't just approach her and say hi I'm Mike and nice to meet

you well what are you talking about I mean my entire life and career has been spent talking to people on the street. Intimidating. Why am I so intimidating to you? Okay. So when you're born, this is all a joke, obviously, but when you're born, they say, okay, do you want to be very good looking or do you want to be very smart? Right. And people have choices to make. Some people pick a little of this, a little of that.

You mix and match or whatever. You know, I said I don't need either of those things. I'll just pass. But somehow there's people like Juliet Powell out there who like, yeah, I'll take both, please. And then look what happens. Like that's wild. Oh, I love your whole concept of the world and the choices that we have at birth. Some would even say that we have these choices before we're born. I don't know. What do you think, Mike? Okay, well, my grandmother used to tell a joke.

She would say, this is the joke, and I've been telling it to my kids, too, for like 21 years. But when I was born, they were handing out noses, and I thought they said roses, and I asked for a big red one. She's funny. Your grandmother's very funny. She was very funny. I totally get it.

Yeah, so that explains everything. Okay, nice to meet you. Now, this will be a blend of nostalgia and then I'm very interested in what you're up to these days and I think we're going to blow a lot of minds. Some people might have, maybe they aren't aware

of what you've been up to the last long while here. But can we go back? And can you please tell us, firstly, happy Halloween to you. Happy Halloween. Thank you. Are you dressing up tonight? This is it.

Can't you tell? You're dressing up as Juliet Powell. Juliet Powell. One of my favorite Halloween costumes ever was Suk-Yin Lee, who one year decided to dress up as her hurt inner child. And every year I channel my hurt inner child, and every year she gets happier and happier. So here she is.

There you go. On that note, so did you see the documentary 299 Queen Street West? Have you seen that? I did not. No, I live in New York and I don't know whether it has come here yet. I know that when I was in Toronto, it was all the rage. Everybody was talking about it when I did my book launch there. And Mike, had we met, had you had the, I don't know, the stamina, the gravitas, the drive to come and meet me, despite your fears, you probably would have been invited to my book launch.

I would have loved to include you. And I, you know, again, it was so great seeing fantastic people, people I hadn't seen in over 20 years. But I have not seen the movie i've i've not even really heard about it because the people that i met in toronto hadn't seen it yet either but i so tell me is it worth seeing what do you think about it does it reflect what you remember it is uh what i would say is the director i think wrote a love letter to much music, the much music he loved. And I think on that front, it is a fun, nostalgic romp. And much like with many of these types of love letter documentaries, you know, we kind of, we gloss over some of the, you know, it's a happy-go-lucky. Everybody is a creative genius.

And look what we did with the shoestring budget. And I enjoyed watching it. of genius and look what we did with the shoestring budget and i enjoyed watching it but you know of course some some facts are cherry-picked and some are conveniently omitted and uh you know it is some choices were made but all in all i think when it does arrive on crave here in canada i think a lot of people are gonna watch it and remember i thought because my favorite scene was something sookin lee said on much music where she was using terms like terms like cunts and words like this and i guess this is when denise donlon was in charge of programming and they were you know had a little chat with her like the delay is for the artist not for the vj okay and then she says well in, in her community, queer culture, these words are actually not bad words.

So it was interesting to me. She just didn't consider words like cunt to be a word you can't say on much music. And it's one of my favorite scenes in the whole documentary. Isn't it interesting, though, that here we are 20 some odd years later and we're on the internet and you can use these words without any problem. Nobody's going to sense you there. And these were just dreams back in the day where you absolutely had gatekeepers and you still do with broadcast television. No doubt. So first mind blow I think we've already uncovered here. I like the mind blows. The first mind blow is that you're not actually Canadian, right? Like you're an American.

Is that correct? I have dual citizenship. Mind blow. But you're not born here. I was born in New York. Okay. So I grew up in Montreal. What brings you to Montreal?

And then when I'm really eager and I brought a clip when we get to this, but I'm very eager to find out, you know, why you decide to enter a beauty pageant. Are we calling them pageants? Are they contests? What are they? I really don't know. It's so interesting. So my life has been definitely an uncharted path. I was brought to Canada by my mom, who was French Canadian. And she absolutely wanted me to learn her culture. She wanted me to learn French. And above all, I mean, essentially, she chose a man that was an abusive asshole. There you go. Thank you. No censorship. And she made the right choice. She escaped. She escaped a very difficult, violent, abusive situation with him. Brought me to Canada. Canada, as a result, became, you know, in many ways, my savior, my new outlook on life, my new possibility.

And I I'm just so grateful. I'm so grateful to my mom. And I'm also grateful to Canada just in grateful. I'm so grateful to my mom. And I'm also grateful to Canada, just in general, I always have been. And then years later, I was 17 years old. And my boyfriend at the time, my first love, we used to do math together, and we'd go out dancing. And we were making out on the top of the Mount Royal in Montreal. And the radio was on and there was an ad for the Miss Montreal pageant. Wasn't even paying attention to it, but the darn ad kept coming back, right? Breaking into our makeout.

And so at some point, I'm just like, what the heck is that? And he says to me, Juliet, I had a friend who had entered the Miss Montreal pageant and she came in second. And the judges got drunk that night and told her that she was supposed to win, but they chose not to give her the title because of her skin color, that she was too dark to be to represent Montreal. And immediately I just stopped, stopped all make out activity, stopped everything else that I had been planning in my life. And I just thought, bull twang, that is just not realistic. That is not the world that I live in. That is certainly not the Canada that I've come to know and love. And I decided to make a point. And as a result, I entered Miss Montreal pageant, and I came in second. And the lady that was doing the pageant, what a wonderful lady. She also had the charter for the Miss Laurentian Mountains pageant. And it turns out that my grandparents on my mom's side had started something called Santa Claus

Village up there. So there was history with the Laurentian Mountains. And I had like a summer job there at one point. Anyway, I qualified and she asked me if I would enter this thing, even though I had absolutely no interest. In other words, I went in to prove a point. I couldn't prove the point. And why would I go do this? And she said, well, because I'm going to lose the charter. I've got 20 girls. I need 21. Can you please do me this favor? And again, she was incredibly kind. And I just thought, I've got nothing to lose. Why not? And I go in and I freaking win the thing. But what I realized is when you win the Miss Laurentian pageant, it's the same thing as if you win the Miss Montreal in that you end up going to the Miss Canada pageant. And because I was just not invested in that, I honestly didn't really care about that. I didn't pay attention to it and I didn't compete.

I wasn't, you know, you hear all these backstage stories about how contestants are with each other. They weren't like that with me and I wasn't like that with them, because honestly, I couldn't wait to get back to school. I wanted to finish. I was studying mechanical engineering at Concordia University in the sub-basement during the summertime while I was still going to high school. And this whole thing about beauty, I didn't even see myself that way at all.

So anyhow, it was kind of an internal joke for me until the day that they actually said my name. And I thought it was a mistake. I mean, if you ever see, if you saw this clip, Mike, you know,

the expression on my face is just like a mix of horror. And this can't be my life. Okay, Julia. So I obviously I have questions. But first I want to play some audio because I think it'll help bring you back. This is 1989, right? This is the Miss Canada beauty pageant,

I'm going to call it. 1989. I'm going to play this. And then again, it goes about, let me see here. It's going to go a couple of minutes. I think it's worth it here. Let's listen.

Thank you, Melinda. Ladies and gentlemen, Miss Canada 1988, Melinda Gillies. Thank you, Melinda. You've been a lovely Miss Canada. Thank you. Well, the suspense is almost over. The results have been tabulated. I have been informed that the judges have reached their final decision, so may I have the envelope, please? Good luck to all of you.

I have the name of the new Miss Canada in the three runners-up. I will announce the names beginning with the third runner-up. The third runner-up is Miss Calgary, Leslie Ann Holder. The second runner-up, Miss Red Deer, Nancy Weintjes. The next name will be the first runner-up.

If for any reason Miss Canada cannot complete a reign, the first runner-up will assume the title. The first runner-up is Miss Toronto, Miss Canada 1989, Miss Lawrence and Juliet Powell. Miss Lawrence and Juliet Powell. There's your song, Juliet. I'm excited for you. I know it's many years later, but I'm very excited for you. So weird.

It's like they say that there's nothing like smell to bring you back into the past. Hearing that audio, I literally got a cold sweat. I remember that feeling of disbelief and horror. And it was on Halloween. That really is. See, that's a mind blow, too. OK, so this is the anniversary. Oh, my goodness.

I had no idea. It's like I booked you on Halloween on purpose because I knew that. But no, I'm not that smart. So what's interesting is so the first runner up it's funny guys so the first runner up is actually Miss Toronto right so had you and I guess this would be the Vanessa Williams rule I don't know what this rule

is but this if you if something had gone down I suppose she would have taken over for you but Miss Laurentian that's you Juliet Palette you you won. So take me back. You were shocked, I guess. I was horrified. Have you ever seen the Miss

Canada contract? I mean, they have every consensus. Actually sign this contract before you appear on television. Which means that no matter what, if you win, you're stuck with this contract. And this contract literally said that I had to have a chaperone 24 hours a

day, 24 hours a day. I mean, that's worse than a parent on, you know, the worst day of the year. It was quite interesting to have someone actually follow me to the ladies room to make sure that i wouldn't be attacked very strange year how long does that contract last is it for one year like that's one year it's a full year and you sign on and and again the i i'd be very curious to see if this contract was ever published. But ultimately, all of the sponsors of the Miss Canada pageant have the right to have you go to their event and speak on their behalf. And so every day is scheduled. And so every day is scheduled. You've got something like 12 to 14 hours of nonstop Miss Canada-ing where you always have to wear this crazy Miss Canada sash and this crown and this chaperone that follows you everywhere. I didn't just have one chaperone, I would have just thrown the sash and the crown away and said, screw this, and just given it to somebody else.

But again, there had never been a black or person of my skin tone Miss Montreal, let alone Miss Laurentian, let alone Miss Canada. So it was, I think to a lot of people in Canada, it was an event. It was very much talked about. To this day, some people, you know, don't even think that I was actually Miss Canada. It must be fake news because Canadians don't look like this, right? They look like you. Wow. Worthy winner, but the story of how you enter is wild because you have women who would like, this is their goal. Like they're literally out there to win the miss canada beauty pageant meanwhile you're making out with your boyfriend mount royal in montreal there and it's like you just hear an ad and then you get that that story triggers something in you where you're going to prove and you proved it but what's interesting to me is when you're like in miss canada 1989 do you have

any personal rivalry against miss uh? Because she beat you. Oh, my gosh. Miss Montreal. Laura Dawn Mool. That was her name. And I remember this specifically not because she was Miss Montreal. Get this, Mike. You want to get the behind-the-scenes scoop?

One day I might have to write a book about this. This woman. So I had never been skiing before. I didn't know how to ski. My background is, you know, we really didn't have a whole lot of money. We shouldn't, sure didn't have, we didn't have a car, sure didn't have skis or any way to pay for that kind of thing. But she invites me and now she's Miss Montreal and I'm Miss Laurentian. This is a few weeks before going to Toronto for the Miss Canada pageant. And she invites me to Mont Saint-Sauveur, which is a small mountain in the Laurentian Mountains.

And of course, at this point, I'm Miss Laurentian and I should know how to ski if I'm representing the mountains. So I go up there and I tell her, right, it's an hour and a half ride that I don't know how to ski. I've never skied. I don't have any kind of wherewithal sports wise. And can she please help me if we're going to go do this together? Oh, no problem. She's been skiing since she was a kid. Or so she told me. Anyway, we rent the equipment. We go up to, I think it was a black diamond. She brought me on top of a black diamond, my first ski run. and I can barely get off the ski lift because I have no idea what I'm doing and I end up on my ass and as I'm trying to get myself up for the first time on skis I see her whip down the mountain and she's waving at me and I'm like oh man I cannot believe she's

trying to take out the competition and I so didn't see her as competition I just saw her as a friend as a new friend as somebody that was going to go do this adventure with me first the mountain and then you know the the trip to Toronto I thought it was going to be fun and she literally abandoned me there and I was very lucky there was this really hot ski patrol guy who saw me and she's like you really don't know what you're doing and he helped me all the way down the mountain but so I that was my first experience of having someone just obviously not want me to do well and in her case she I don't know what her deal is, but, um, I think years later she ended up going to work for mother Teresa or something.

I, Hey, another mind blow. Okay. Let's see. Too many mind blows. I heard mother Teresa was a heck of a skier too, by the way.

There you go. Okay. So I think it's wild though, that, uh, she beats you in the local city there in the Montreal, but can't touch. I didn't hear her as a runner up in that when Robin, Robin Ward, right?

That was the host, Robin Ward. Oh, that's a very good question. I think that's Robin Ward. Since you're in Canada and you know things all Canadian and you did your research for this, I'm going to go with you. Okay. So where are you now in the universe? You're not in Toronto, obviously. Where are you? I'm in New York. I've been in New York City since 2002. So right after 9-11, it was horror, if you remember, just for everyone.

They shut down the border and we didn't actually know what was going on. And I was doing the news at that time at CP24 and City TV. going on. And I was doing the news at that time at CP24 and City TV. And to be honest, because it was a 24 hour news station, we had to fill time, but we actually didn't know what was going on. We had no idea what was going on. Nobody knew what was going on. It was chaos, if you remember this. And so, you know, I'm just not the kind of person who wants to make stuff up about important world events. And so that was it. I left and I came to New York. I wanted to see on the ground what was going on. And you never came back. Oh, I come back all the time.

Not to live, I mean. Of course, you come back to visit. But you've been calling New York home ever since. I call the world my home. I feel very lucky that way. I think because I have dual citizenship and I've been lucky to travel in so many different places, much of that came from MuchMusic and Music Plus where I worked prior in Montreal. Okay, we're going to talk about Music Plus right now, but do you remember, I have to show you, I don't know if you can pick it up,

very white hair on me. I absolutely do remember 9-11, so very white hair on me. Okay absolutely do remember 9-11. So very white hair on me. Okay. So you win Miss Canada. How does that change things for you, Juliette? Because I would imagine doors, opportunities present themselves.

You tell me. I guess it depends how you look at it. So for me, as I said, I literally had this schedule that was nonstop. There were a lot of rules. One of them was that I had to move to Toronto. There was an apartment that I had to stay in. And it was hard. I was still living with my mom when I won. I was really, really young. And so it was the first time that I was away from home. It was the first time that I didn't have my family near me. And I didn't know anybody in Toronto. In fact, at that time, I was still very much living in a Francophone world. So I never thought that my English was good enough to be able to navigate on a daily basis in English. And I think ultimately the whole experience taught me that I could do anything that I put my mind to doing that, you know, all of the obstacles that

we, we think that we have, oh, I don't know anybody, or I don't know how to do that. Or I don't know, you know, even where to begin. I think all of those things were put aside in my mind with this idea of my gut is telling me to go do this. And even if it's irrational, I have to follow my intuition because I got positive reinforcement in that by actually winning the Miss Laurentian and then subsequently the Miss Canada pageant. I think that when I saw somebody doing an interview in Montreal, and the interview was in French on Musique Plus, but the, sorry, actually the VJ was interviewing a rock star in English and then turning the camera live and then trying to do a translation of what the person had said in French. And the translation was so bad. I mean, so bad that it gave me confidence to think I can do better than that.

I can absolutely do better than that. I don't know anything about television. I don't know anything about communications, but I know that I can do better than that. And I followed my intuition. I went and I stocked the place and we're talking music in Montreal. This was a very, very long time ago. So pre nine 11, there was a lot less security in buildings. And I noticed that everybody that went through the front door got, you know, sent back almost immediately. And I thought, where the heck do the employees go in? And I noticed that there was a back door. And so

the next day I went and I walked in at the same time as the employees coming back from lunch and nobody stopped me until one guy stopped me and he said, where are you going? And I said, I'm going to the photocopier. I'm going to photocopy my resume because I'm going to be your next VJ. And the guy happened to be the general manager of the television network, Pierre Marchand, who later, I think, ended up going to jail. But it was a strange time. Anyway, long story short, I was, you know, given the opportunity to do a test on television because Sonia Ben-Izra, who was their number one VJ, their number one interviewer, had quit that morning. The morning I walked in with my CV was the morning she quit. And so I was given an opportunity because I was at the right time, the right place

and I had one thing on my resume which was that Miss Canada pageant but no experience whatsoever and I had never worked before, I had never done anything before so I got very, very, very lucky. You have to be good to be lucky. Well, they interviewed 300 people after me, but again, I think it was the timing and because I was so sure that I could do it, that I just I did it.

Alright, let's listen to just a little bit of you on Music Plus. Here we go. Les Beastie Boys qui sont rentrés à la position numéro 1 du palmarès. Bill Boyd dès la première semaine de la sortie de l'album. Ça va très très bien pour le groupe. Vous savez qu'ils ont déjà vendu des millions d'albums à travers le monde. D'ailleurs, la semaine dernière, c'était l'album qui a vendu le plus aux États-Unis. Tout le monde adore les Beastie Boys. Surtout avec la chanson qu'on vient juste de vous jouer, Sabotage.

On va continuer à vous le faire jouer en rotation forte. Également en rotation forte, cette semaine, le boss clip de la semaine qui nous vient des Rita Mitsuko. Ça s'appelle Les Amants. I love it how the artist's names and the song titles are in English. And well done. Okay, so a little background is I have grade 9 French, which means I only understood Sabotage and Beastie Boys and Us 3. But I have four kids. All four are, well, one lives in Montreal right now going to McGill, and she's fluently bilingual and my

oldest is fluently bilingual and the seven and nine year old are like, they're on their way. They're in French immersion and they're getting there. I love that language. And yeah, that, well, I don't know what you said, but I was interested. I was talking about the beastie boys and i was talking about the fact that they were number one in canada and the u.s and uh then i mentioned which is a french band that i love and so strangely i listened to them yesterday i probably hadn't listened to in 20 years and i got inspired yesterday and boom and here it is so you know it's these things that I

pay attention to these little moments of magic I'm still stuck on the fact we're talking on uh you know Halloween October 31st and you won the Miss Canada beauty pageant on uh October 31st 1989 so that's where I am okay so obviously you're talented and uh the camera loves you and you're well-spoken and bilingual. So I'm curious, do you get a phone call? Like, do you get, you know, oh, Moses on the line for you. Like, how does it work that you get the call to come to Toronto? No, no, no, not at all, actually. That's a longer story.

So I was actually introduced to Moses while I was still in Toronto. a longer story so I was actually introduced to Moses um while I was still in Toronto I think I had I was still Miss Canada or had just given back the crown but for whatever reason I'm at the sky what was called the sky dome at that point and um Moses is there and I have no idea who he is and a friend of mine um Anik Kavoukian who who is an amazing photographer, decides that I should meet Moses. And so he introduces me to him. And again, I have no idea who this person is. And I don't know whether Moses even registers that I really don't know. But he said, do you want to be in television?

And I said, sure. And he said, well, to be in television, you must adhere to my church. And I look at him, and now I really don't understand what's going on. And I don't know Merce's personality or where he's coming from. So I just said what was true to my heart, which is I don't follow anybody else's church but mine. And I walked away. Years later, years later, I am in Montreal and um that that whole adventure that I just told you about I do this audition and I get this job to be a VJ on Music Plus and Pierre Marchand tells me you don't actually have this job until Moses says you have this job and he's gonna call you and I get this phone call and I was painting my balcony at the time I'm covered in

paint and hey it's Moses and um I'm sitting at Shed Cafe on Saint Laurent Boulevard come meet me for lunch um you don't have this job yet and I'm like great this bodes well so I run down to Shed Cafe and um we order burgers and he proceeds to, he removes the bun and he's like cutting his burger with a knife and fork. And I'd never seen anything like that before. And I just start laughing. And I said, you don't remember me to you. And he said, no. And I said, oh yeah, that whole, you must adhere to my church. And I only want to adhere to mine. So Moses, if, you know, I have to adhere to your church. I'm not the right person for you. But if you're willing to work with me, if we can work together, then let's do this.

And that was it. Actually, a friendship was born. And that's how I ended up not only getting the job at Music Plus, but I think four years later, because I was also at McGill, my alma mater. So, yay, big props to your daughter. It was, so I was going to school while I was working at McGill, my alma mater. So yay, big props to your daughter. It was, so I was going to school while I was working at Music Plus. And one of my projects was writing a TV show and doing all the budget for it and how it would actually get produced. And the show that I created was for Music Plus, Much Music. And we had a station down in Argentina called Mucha Musica, and there was only one hour delay between Argentina and us, and I thought, great, we could do a live simultaneous show in three languages, and wouldn't that be amazing, and so I write the show, I give

it to school, I get great grades on it, I give it to Pia Marchand, Music Plus. And he's like, who the hell do you think you are? I mean, really, you're just a VJ and you're barely good at that. I mean, who the hell are you? And he got really angry at me. And because he got angry at me, I got really angry at the situation. And I thought, this is just silly. I've got nothing to lose. Again, nothing to lose. I've got nothing to lose again nothing to lose so I had to go to Toronto because I was doing commercials for dance mix something something and they were shot in both English and French in Toronto and while I was there I tried to see Moses he wasn't available and so I wrote a note on a napkin I went to have a coffee across the street and I wrote, I wrote the show. I was laughed at by Pia Marchand. And because I believe so much in the show,

I think that you should take a look at it. Here it is. And honestly, I was also told that I was too ambitious. And I said, if you weren't too ambitious, you never would have built much music city TV. And so let's be ambitious together. And I left that with my proposal on his desk and the next thing you know I was being offered a job in Toronto so that's what happened. With a love song that he made Flying in the street light Steps out of the shade Says something like

You and me, babe How about it? Juliet says, hey, it's Romeo He nearly gave me a heart attack He's underneath the window She's singing, hey I have my boyfriend's back You shouldn't come around here Singing up to people like that

Anyway, what you gonna do about it? Juliet, the dice was loaded from the start And I bet many rates exploded in my heart And I forget, I forget Happy Halloween. That means today is the last day on Toronto Mic'd in the year 2023 that I'll be shouting out Pumpkins After Dark, an award-winning Halloween event in Milton, Ontario. Get your tickets at pumpkinsafterdark.com. And as we say goodbye to Pumpkins After Dark,

let me just say if there's anyone out there who needs to promote an event, needs to reach tens of thousands of GTA residents, not just Gen Xers, but a lot of Gen Xers in the mix, some younger, some older, hit me up, mike at torontomike.com. There's an opportunity for you. If you enjoy beer, you need Fresh Craft Beer from Great Lakes Brewery.

Available throughout the province. They'll be providing FOTMs with a cold, delicious beverage at TMLX 14 on December 9th at noon. And that's taking place at Palma's Kitchen. Palma's Kitchen is where you go to get authentic Italian food. That's delicious too. Thank you, Palma Pasta.

Shout out to Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of this community since 1921. Cliff Hacking is dropping by soon. He's at EPRA. They're responsible for recyclemyelectronics.ca. That's where you go to find out where you can drop off old electronics, technology, old devices to be properly, safely disposed of and recycled so those chemicals don't end up in our landfill. A couple of podcasts I want to tell you about. One is called Yes, We Are Open. They're dropping episodes from season five.

This is a Moneris podcast. It's won awards. It'll win more. Al Grego is a great host. He collects inspiring stories from across the country and presents them to us entrepreneurs and small business people to inspire the heck out of us so we can make money. And then when we have money, we know how to invest money because we listened to the advantaged investor

podcast from Raymond James, Canada. That's hosted by Chris Cooksey. It's also excellent. Subscribe to both. Let's get back to my conversation with Juliet Powell. I love the detail and I love to get the origin story. Yeah, thank you for that.

Now, okay, so I do a follow-up question. All right. Just, okay, so bouge de là. Am I saying that correctly? Bouge de là? Yeah, move it. bouge de la am i saying that correctly bouge de la right so is this like the french version of electric circus like can you is that what that was i had never actually seen electric circus so possibly if you had seen electric circus and then you saw bouge de la they're both on sister stations. One's in French, one's in English. They both have dance music.

But because I had never seen EC at that point, I was going to clubs. So I was hanging out with a really great cross section of very different people. And I had done my first fashion show when I was still in high school with a bunch of drag queens. And they just embraced me. They loved me and I loved them. And I just thought that they added so much to my life. And as a result, when I was given the opportunity to create a show in Montreal, I wanted to bring that into everybody's living room. I thought that, you know, I was incredibly lucky to be welcomed by that community, but wouldn't it be great if they could come in and participate in my community? And as a

result, yeah, we'd go dancing and essentially recruit people just to see if they wanted to come. And the only way that I felt true to, you know, what was going on in Montreal at that point was if we had a smart bar and then we had like all kinds of just fun stuff just created on the spot. And, you know, we didn't have a budget. We just had a whole lot of imagination and amazing people. The entire crew, all of the dancers, all of the performers, all of the DJs, we made the show together. So one of my favorite, favorite times of my life because I get to test out on a daily basis just the ideas that we had in our head and what can we create to make it interesting on television today for us and for the viewers. And, you know, having viewers be able to come into the studio

and, again, experience like a club-like environment live on television is still to this day something that's pretty unique and amazing. I am not at all surprised that they wanted you at 299 Queen Street. You're pretty perfect, I'd say, for that environment. I'm perfect in my imperfection. I'm very wabi-sabi. And even that attitude, you know, it's one of those things like, I like the cut of your jib, Powell.

You know what I mean? You know, the jib, I don't know if it's still called that, but we used to call it God. Yes. Okay. Yeah, jib God. don't know if it's still called that, but we used to call it God. Yes. Okay. Yeah. Jib God. Now you, so you, you're moving now.

You're moving. Now I will say, you know, and this will kind of, when we find out what you've been up to lately, you know, the world of academia kind of comes back. I don't know if anybody's actually going to listen through this entire podcast to get to where I am now. We haven't even got you to much music yet. A small slice of it. It's so funny.

Well, have you ever, here's a, I'm putting you on the spot here, but have you heard any episodes of Toronto Mic'd ever? I did. Oh. Yes. As soon as you reached out to me when you finally got the nerve, I listened to Rick Campanelli. I listened to Denise Donlan.

It was so great to hear them talking about their experiences because while you're living it you know you're too busy to really kind of compare notes um but hearing Rick's journey and I didn't realize he was like a 50 year old man being called a temp I mean that's just silly yeah yeah he leaned in though you know oh no no he he did great with it but the point is it's just not something that i ever thought about while we were working together so it's spotting you that that again uh shout out to fotm david kines who sent me a note and said you should come to this thing and i think kines is awesome yeah and so is denise i mean without them,

I don't think that I would have gotten a job no matter what anybody else said, right? They really ran the station. But it's because I saw you that morning and a couple, so spotting you put you top of mind. You know how it works. It's like, oh, it's Juliet Powell's here.

And it's like, oh, I used to watch her. I watch music and electric Circus and then you just noodle you know I do these bike rides and I'm thinking I can't stop thinking about Juliet Powell I think I wonder if she would and at the time I was ignorant to where you were located I thought you were in Toronto so I'm like oh maybe I'll

get her in the basement and then I reached out and then I found out you're not going to be able to make that's a long drive for you to come into my basement we'll do this on Zoom but that's why I reached out and then I found out you're not going to be able to make, that's a long drive for you to come into my basement. We'll do this on Zoom. But that's why I reached out is because I saw you at that event. Well, I'm very grateful that you did. And big shout out to Dave Kynes because you're right.

I mean, he had no business inviting me to that, but he did. He's just one of those people. He's got no business inviting me to that. Okay. You're Juliet Powell. he's just one of those people hold on he's got no business inviting me to that okay you're juliet powell it's like it's like if i'm getting an invite you better get an invite come on uh well clearly he needed to fill the place so there you go leave that humility i got no time for that humility and leave it at the border okay so but now now that we got yet much music here i know it

took a long time but i i do think that's a fascinating arc because that whole Miss Canada angle and then Musique Plus and Bouge de La, and now you're moving to Toronto. Now, academic wise, though, I will point out, you know, there's, I know that when you're Miss Canada, you're at Vanier College studying commerce, And then you mentioned you went to McGill and I'm pretty sure you're about to study economics at the U of T. Like how many of our fine institutions have you attended, Juliet? I've attended, well, four actually. So Concordia University where it was a summer assistantship in mechanical

engineering. That's when I was a teenager and that's, blame my math teacher for that. He saw me, he's like, you're very good at math. Go over here. Thank you. And sadly, I forget his name, but he totally changed my life. And then I did end up going to McGill while I was working at Music Plus. I did go to U of T studying economics while I was at Much Music, City TV, CP24. And then when I got to New York, I eventually went back to school to Columbia University here in New York. Look at that. Okay. Again, is it fair that you could win Miss Canada and be smart enough for these higher institutions of learning? It doesn't sound fair. What's going on here, Julie? No wonder you were invited to that breakfast. Come

on. You know, I just feel lucky enough to have been accepted to these institutions. These are pretty good institutions. And Columbia is like a 3% rate. So I got very lucky. Well, again, you have to be good to be lucky. We've already covered that too late. Okay. So you're right. Mike, come on. We've already covered that, Juliette. Okay, so you're right. Mike, come on. I've done more things of my life. Have you read my books? You know, my TED Talk.

You can listen to it. I have all this, but this is Toronto Mike. So we will linger just a little bit on 299 Queen Street. Okay, look, Michael Williams just came over. I'm like, sit down. Yeah, he actually gave me polite no's for 11 years. Oh, that's stunning. But you have perseverance, Mike.

That's impressive. Well, there's another word for that, Juliet. Like stalkering? Oh, well, there's multiple words. Stalker, annoying. Yeah, there's a lot of words. Okay. But for you, I will say, I only asked once.

I got a yes, and here we are. See? Well, I had to see you in the flesh at that event. Okay. So, I know you just shouted out David Kynes, and you shouted out Denise Donlan. Who else at 299 Queen Street do you look back at fondly for either mentorship or just companionship or for inspiration just do

you want to shout out any of the much music alumni that you may have worked with oh there's so many people um i feel like i that wouldn't be fair um because i would never be able to name all the people. So what I will say is that the folks, all of the crews, every single one of the crews at CP24 taught me to go out and actually report on a story, come back, write it up in a professional way, deliver it in soundbites and be able to do five stories a day. That's a talent that I did not have before. I want to thank the crews at Much Music for their patience with me because, again, I was not used to speaking in English. And they explained so much to me because, again, I was studying business.

I was not studying television. I didn't really know what I was doing. And they knew that. And they made me feel welcome and at home. And of course, the people at Music Plus who trained me to do live television, it happened once in my life where I literally froze. It was like in the first few weeks at Music Plus. And I don't remember what I was supposed to be saying. But all of a sudden, I realized that I was on live television and it kind of hit me and I just, I blanked, I froze. And it took me a few seconds to come back. And of

course the floor director and the camera people and everybody. So it's thanks to all of these people. And I don't want to send out individual shout outs just because it's everybody and all the unsung heroes and i hope that that that documentary that you mentioned does show the unsung heroes the people that weren't necessarily on camera that did 99.9 of the work it is as you can imagine heavily focused on the vjs and those we saw in front of the camera without a doubt with some shout outs to behind the scenes people like a John Martin for example or yeah and of course Moses although I feel like I feel like I don't know

this for a fact I feel like the first cut of that movie had more Moses and I feel like there was a Moses extraction may have taken place before I got to see it so okay your speculation Juliet okay so we have you at $2 queen uh you're you're brought there so you're brought there obviously this is before you're hosting electric circus right because

monica diol is hosting electric circus when you come to toronto right okay yes and i think she was getting married i think she was moving and she was getting married and all of a sudden there was a vacuum. And she's moving to Vancouver, right? I think so. I mean, you'd have to ask her. Have you not had Monica Diol on your show? Come on! Until the pandemic, this is a true

story. Until the pandemic, I insisted that you visit me in person or we didn't do it. This was my rule for many, many, many years and then I added some remotes like this when the pandemic struck. And I've decided I'll select, you know, select special people like you can still zoom in once in a while.

But so Monica, who I actually did not see her at that event I met you at, but I did see her at an electric circus reunion of sorts, I suppose. It was like a 35th anniversary of electric circus event that's where i actually met moses and uh i saw monica there and then i saw her at like a she was presenting at a um rock rock hall of fame canadian hall of fame thing that i was literally on the red carpet for some reason so anyway anyway. Fun! Yeah, it was fun.

What am I doing on that red carpet? But I just did it for shits and giggles. Just to see, can some independent guy who broadcasts in his basement get a red carpet spot in the Hall of Fame? You know? It turns out you can. If I can end up on television, you can end up on the red carpet.

I do believe that we live in that kind of a world. I guess they didn't have mirrors in Montrealreal okay okay so okay well you are miss canada they don't give that out to schlubs right this is or do they i don't think so okay i honestly i think that um to be very realistic and i've done this deep analysis in my mind over time, I think that I fit the bill. They hadn't had anybody from Montreal. So they always went apparently East Coast, West Coast, East Coast, West Coast. This is a rumor. I don't know whether this is true or not.

But certainly the person that had won the year before was from the West Coast. I was from the East Coast. They hadn't had somebody that was francophone in many, many years. hadn't had somebody that was francophone in many, many years. At that time, this is how long ago this was, there was like a free trade agreement between the US and Canada that had just gone through the North American free trade agreement. And I represented both, I had dual citizenship. So for me, it was very much a political choice. Now, I've never spoken to the judges about this. I've never spoken to the press about this. This is my intuition, which may or may not be true.

Okay, since you went back there, so I'm going to just pick on one quick thread here, which is that you lost the Miss Montreal pageant. Like you finished second. Okay, so, and this is the woman in the ski story and everything. I have to ask now, the woman who beat you in Montreal, was she a white woman? Yes, Laura's white.

Okay, I don't know, so okay. Do you think maybe this speaks to your first love's point when you guys are making out this whole idea that maybe, because you clearly should have won Miss Montreal. You ended up winning Miss Canada. You should have won Montreal. Do you think you lost? But these are different judges. But there might be

an inherited bigotry. Well, honestly, you have probably watched far more pageants than I ever had. I've only watched one, and it was the one that I won. I've never seen one before it was the one that I won I've never seen one before I'd never seen one afterwards I was there to prove a point and I proved it but I can't

we can't know we can't know you can't know no Juliet you can't know I'll just throw it out there that maybe you prove that point as well which is that maybe there was some inherent racism in the judging in the Montreal pageant? I'm just throwing it out there. Quite possibly. I mean, my book, the one that I just launched a month and a half ago, has to do with artificial intelligence. Hold on a second. I'm getting there. It has to do with artificial intelligence, but ultimately, the fact that this technology is shaped by us and we shape it. So our inherent biases, especially our negative biases, are also baked into our technology. So I do think about

negative biases a lot, not necessarily in the context of my past, but rather in the context of our present and what we're doing in the future. So in that sense, thank you very much for bringing it up. What's the name of this book? Oh, it's right behind me. Oh, look at that. The AI Dilemma. Okay, you know what? Yeah, there it is. Okay, The AI Dilemma.

What made you interested in artificial intelligence? Now, suddenly, this is in the zeitgeist, But I'm guessing you didn't write this in a weekend. I did not. No, and I did not have Chad GPT write it for me. No. So while I was doing all of this wonderful stuff on television that we've been talking about, you also mentioned that I was at school. And I was a coder.

Gosh, I was a coder probably from nine years old on. My mom really wanted me not only to learn French, but also to be very well versed with technology and science. And I think that, you know, the first time I ever coded anything was because she brought me to school with her. She went back to school, she went to McGill. And instead of getting a babysitter, she'd take me with her and I'd sit there in class and then we'd go home and we do her homework. So I've always, always, always been interested in technology. When I started working in live television, I realized the impact that live television had on people because we get immediate responses. If we asked for something, people would show up and deliver it. And I thought, wow, so what happens with the convergence between television and the internet?

And then how do we start managing the influence that, you know, those of us who know how to use these technologies have on the rest of the world? And so I've always been very, very interested in that particular intersection. It's just not what I was paid to talk about on television. And so I didn't. That simple. I mean, are you still a member of the faculty at New York University's Interactive Telecommunications Program?

As soon as I'm done with this conversation with you, I'm going to teach. Yay! Do you have a hard out? It's my way to kind of give back, you know? On that programming note, do you have a hard out or you need to get out of there by this minute

because you got students to teach? Yeah, by 11, 10 at the very, very latest. So let me mop up, yeah, let me mop up 299 Queen Street and then let me get you to this fascinating, where your career has taken you, and all this academia, and et cetera. Let me get there.

So, quick mop up. I did take note of it being Halloween, so I thought it was appropriate to play this short teaser. The electric circuit is Halloween. It's Bravacanza. Pumping sounds. Pumpkins can move. And great giveaways for best goth.

Be there if you dare. 2.30 Saturday on City. There's the voice telling us that the Electric Circus Halloween episode is airing. So I thought that was appropriate. That was Mark Daly's voice. Sadly, he's passed away. But what a wonderful man. Sharon Cavanaugh was the producer of The Electric Circus.

Brilliant and passionate woman. So many fantastic people worked on that show. Mark Daly is known as simply The Voice on this program. Doesn't even need a first name. The Voice. Now, was there any hesitancy or any like, oh, I have to fill these shoes that Monica Diole, because Monica Diole, by the way, not the original host of Electric Circus. Did you know that? I did not. In fact,

I suspect you know far more about all things VJ much music than I do, Mike. What I can tell you is that I was told very specifically that I'd have big shoes to fill. And so if you watch that first show, I made it a point. In fact, I had a dream about this the night before, and I ended up doing it during the show, my very first electric circus show. I said that I had big shoes to fill. And as a result, I took off my shoes. And I invited everyone that hung out outside to come inside and all the dancers that were used to being inside the studio to go outside so that we could completely change things around and I

think we did a pretty good job at that absolutely a little more taste and I won't play too much of this just to give us a taste actually before i play this i should set it up okay so so why do you leave uh how long were you the host of electric circus and why do you stop hosting electric circus uh i believe i did it for probably four years three or four years yeah um and i quit because i was offered a job doing the news doing hard news actually no first doing financial news because cb24 when it first started was a financial news station and because i was studying economics it made sense to me all of my school um hypotheses about the japanese economy the american economy the can economy, I'd go into the newsroom and ask, you know, the economists and ask the news people what they

thought of my my ideas. And they're like, oh, you don't understand her. Oh, yes, you're on the right path. And so when I was offered the job, I just didn't see myself doing electric circus, you know, until midnight. And then the next morning at 8am doing opening bell, it just didn't see myself doing electric circus you know until midnight and then the next morning at 8 a.m doing opening bell it just didn't make a whole lot of sense for me so you leave essentially you're leaving electric circus for cable pulse 24 as a business reporter not just not just electric circus i left much music as a whole right for me it was kind of like turning the page even though we're all in the same building so i didn't lose any of my friends i didn't lose but it was kind of like turning the page, even though we're all in the same building. So I didn't lose any of my friends. I didn't lose. But it was rather a mindset. It was for me, it was time to stop just entertaining and and maybe tap into that other side of myself that any that nobody really seemed to know because I hadn't shown it before. All right. Here is your final break on Electric Circus. Before you say goodbye, let's

listen to that. And this is it, ladies and gentlemen. Ah, the time is now. I can't believe it. Four years of love, laughter, so many wonderful performers, dancers, oh, so many

great people have come on this show. So many great people have come to be discovered on this show. People have had babies on this show. dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, dancers, is she's just moving down the hall. So I hope she'll come back and visit us. And we will miss the sparkle you brought to all of us in our hearts and to everyone in their TVs at home. So thank you for the news. You know that without this woman, Sharon Cavanaugh, the producer of the show,

I probably never would have moved to Toronto in the first place. It's all your fault, lady. Thank you so much. I'm going to have the show. I probably never would have moved to Toronto in the first place. It's all your fault, lady. Thank you so much. I'm going to have to see your question. And what a collection. An incredible collection of memories to do. Thank you.

Thank you, guys. Oh, my gosh. Oh, the heat is on. Okay, ready? What you got going, girl? What you got going, girl? All right, we got a little bit of champagne for the lovely lady who's

entertaining us for all these years. Thank you! Thank you! Okay, one last thing we've got to do. Outside! Outside, everybody. Outside, everybody. Outside, everybody. And that was it.

You moved down the hall. You moved into news. And then, of course, as you mentioned, this was a gateway. Now, I want to get the right words here. This is called Powell International Entertainment. Pi. Oh, that was my first company. Yeah.

But that comes out of your your when you're moved to cable pulse 24 it was as it was known then that essentially opens that's when you start your own media and consulting company um i think i actually started it before i actually started while i was working at much music uh the the Canadian government would often come to me and ask me to moderate things in Ottawa for certain ministers. And that had to be approved by David Kynes. And he would always say yes. And invariably, I ended up getting a contract to do, Invariably, I ended up getting a contract to do, I think it was 44 videos for Made With The Trades, which was a component of the Canadian government. And so this had nothing to do with the work that I was doing on television. So I formed a company on the advice of my accountant.

And it was my first one. And yeah, I started producing all kinds of content, none of which was ever aired for the channels that I worked for. I licensed it all over the world. And again, that business side of me that I wasn't necessarily exercising in front of the camera very much came out when I started my first business. And I mean, here's some of the names I believe that you were producing features with when you were working for yourself at Powell International Entertainment some of the names I believe that you were producing features with when you were, you know, working for yourself at Powell International

Entertainment, but some names I'll just drop. Ruben Hurricane Carter, Sir Richard Branson, Tim Burden, Stephen Spielberg, Tom Cruise, Janet Jackson, Tina Turner, Prince Charles, and again, one more clip here. I'm just going to play

a little bit of this. Ladies and gentlemen, the messenger! Okay, the audio is only coming in one side, but that's okay. This is from YouTube. Did you like that, kids? Oh, I remember them.

Uh-oh. Are you dancing in your seats? This is Nelson Mandela at Skydome. Now, did you notice? About 1996, I think. Maybe 1998. Okay. Okay.

Yeah, that was my second time meeting Mandela. What an, oh. Now, he was my number one mentor, I mean, in this world, I am so grateful that I had a chance to actually speak to him one-on-one and get some of his wisdom and the greatest wisdom that he shared with me. And I have not shared this with a whole lot of people, Mike. So here it is. I remember his wife, second wife, Masha pulled me over after this event at the Sky Dome or formerly the Sky Dome and I ducked my head in and hi your wife said that you wanted to talk to me and he says yes he said you're extraordinary and I said well you're extraordinary and I said I've always wanted to make a difference with my

life and he said Juliet it seems to me you already have. And that, to me, was the big lesson. And I think it's the lesson that we all need to know, is that everything that we've done in our life has led us to this moment. And if you're being true to yourself, then you're on the right path. Whether you see it or not, others do. And surround yourself with that kind of love. It was a wonderful wonderful human um thank you thank you for sharing that i will say so your episode 1300 and i don't know we're at 44 or something like that and i will say often people with your trajectory people who

you know find themselves at 299 queen being on much music electric Electric Circus moving on to CP24. They tend to continue swimming in similar ponds or lakes or oceans. But what I find absolutely remarkable with you, which is why I could easily do another episode where we begin like in 2001, but just digging into like Juliet Powell and then learning, okay, you co-authored the media section for the UN plan of action at the world conference against racism. This is back in 2001. Yes. I spent a month in South Africa and Durban. Yeah. I mean, that's the stuff that again, I never talk about,

but thank you so much for bringing it up because that was also an extraordinary moment where I actually realized how much actual difference there is for someone that looks like me, but would have been born at that time in South Africa versus being born in New York or in Canada. And I'm sure that you have a sense of what that difference is. Absolutely. And then we're going to talk about the AI book that is behind you. And we're going to get a screen cap because it's going to be tied to this episode. So make sure people see that. But I mean, you wrote a book in 2009 called 33 Million People in the Room, How to Create... how to create i wrote that before i wrote that in 2007 and 8 and i was watching this dude by the name of obama that nobody knew anything about and he's like but i was looking at how he was using social media so i'm not a political person at all but i am very much a technologist at heart and i was amazed at how he was using social media in the way that really no other

politician was at that particular time. We had seen some seeds of it in the 2004 campaign, but he was running for president. And so I predicted in my book, based on the way that he was using technology, that he would win. And I was right. And as a result, my publisher just fast-forwarded the publication of the book, and it came out for Obama's inauguration in 2008. And I was there, which was awesome. I was tweeting.

I was live-tweeting for Huffington Post. Okay, amazing. And it's worth noting, you dropped Huffington Post, but it's worth noting that your commentary, your live your live commentary you've been popping on nbc cnn abc bbc bnn i mean bloomberg you're you're still uh uh a go-to person for commentary on uh sort of the the intersection here the the the ethical issues from like social media, privacy, cybersecurity, and bias, which is going to lead to something I'm going to play right now.

But I think that would surprise some people who know you best as the host of Electric Circus. Fair. Well, surprise. Happy Halloween. And that, okay. So, but because I'm, you give me another nine minutes here. So I'm going to just play a bit of this

and then I'm hoping you'll elaborate and this will lead us back to your new book. But let's just a little taste of this. I am delighted to be here today, but I hope I don't disappoint you. And I say that truly from the bottom of my heart because I am not going to talk about what I thought I was going to talk about.

I had prepared this since June. I knew exactly how to make you laugh, how to make you cry, how to push all your buttons, how to make you go home feeling empowered and wanting to do something great. And then I got in the cab at five o'clock in the morning yesterday

to come here and my taxi driver asked me what I did. And I kind of stopped in my tracks, because I wasn't quite awake. You know, it's 5 o'clock in the morning, and you're not ready to have a conversation necessarily yet with a stranger, but I was curious to see what he was going to say. So he looks at me through the mirror as he's driving, and he says, oh, of course, you're a model.

Very old model. You know, I can listen to the whole thing here, but I only have 10 minutes with the real Julia Powell, the real life here. But please tell us what we're listening to here. So that's a TED Talk that I gave in 2016. And that TED Talk was, in fact, prepared well in advance. And I had a conversation with my friend Ron Dembo,

who lives in Toronto. He's a brilliant man. And he has a great book out called Risk Thinking, if you're interested. But Ron has known me since I worked at CP24. I interviewed him way back in the day. And we've been, you know, collaborating from time to time on different projects. And he pointed out that I never, ever, ever talked about the fact that I was Miss Canada. And he called me on it. And I told him that I was going to give this TED Talk. And he said, well, clearly you're biased against yourself. And you're biased against this idea of beauty and

intelligence inhabiting the same person. So you did a great job, Mike, when you opened up this segment, because that's exactly where you went. And I think many of us grew up with that bias. And I called myself out during my live TED talk. Spur the moment. So many people watch that video and think that, you know, it was that I thought about it before, that there was no way that I actually got in a cab and that all this stuff happened. But no, I think some of the reasons why people hire me to go give keynotes is because it's not cookie cutter. It's not anything that I've given to anyone else. I try to, you know, get a sense of what people that are in front of me want to talk about what they care about. And I utilize that to give myself enough courage to get back on stage because I'm terrified every single time. And I never actually know what's going to come out of my mouth. So that was a surprise when I started talking about that. I was like, oh my God. Okay. I've gone down this road. Now what? Were you terrified to come on Toronto Mike today?

I'm sweating. There's a little sweat action happening here. I've never naturally been comfortable talking about myself. It's way easier for me to do an interview where I get to ask all the questions than to be the one who answers the questions. And I have to say, Mike, of all the interviews I've done in my life, I have to say, Mike, of all the interviews I've done in my life, you so far are the one who has successfully kind of gone from beginning all the way through to the present. The book for me being, you know, my current present. Oh, well, thank you very much. I'm going to cut that out and that'll be like a promo clip.

I'll play. Juliet Powell says, okay. And here, just before we say goodbye, because I know you're a little humble in this regard, but you did graduate from Columbia University. I'm going to use a little Latin on you here, okay? I'm trying to impress you now. Summa cum laude. Is that good Latin?

I don't speak Latin. It sounds good from my French ear. That sounds fabulous. I think it means you got good marks. And you got a Bachelor of arts in sociology and um this is like animal house time uh phi beta kappa yeah the whole phi beta kappa thing it's one of these things you don't talk about phi beta kappa when you're in phi beta kappa it's like fight club. Kind of, sort of. Okay. But your thesis research, okay, the limits and possibilities and the self-regulation of artificial intelligence,

that's essentially what eventually is like the foundation for your book that we're talking about, The AI Dilemma, Seven Principles for Responsible Technology. So quick question, if somebody is listening, what IQ do you need in order to read and understand this book? Like can somebody within a 100 IQ read and understand this

book? 100 IQ is an average IQ. So I would hope so. And for those of you who do not know how to read or just don't feel like reading, which happens a lot these days, I voiced my own audio book, which makes me so happy. I had a fight with the publisher about this, but I just couldn't imagine someone else voicing it because a lot of the research came from interviewing my friends in big tech. The engineers and the systems engineers are actually coding the AI that underlines our entire modern world. And so it wasn't just based on random research, it was very much in-depth research where I was kind of led into the halls where very few people have access to. And if they're terrified on the inside, that made me very nervous as well. And so

I'm hoping that I was able to speak in the same voice that I'm speaking with you now. I want it to be something that anyone can read and relate to in that, again, we all have one of these, right? We all have a device. We're speaking on a device. You know, we wouldn't be able to have this Zoom call and record this without artificial intelligence. So it affects all of us. Did you read the book in French and English? Oh, now you got me. I'm so embarrassed. So that was the other fight that I had with my publisher because my first book was published, I think it was published in Korean, in German, in Portuguese, in Spanish, and it was not published in French.

No one in the francophone publishing world wanted to publish it. And so I said this time around, we absolutely have to do this in French. And again, I have gotten no traction en français. Ça me fait chier. Bon, si il y a quelqu'un qui parle en français, qui veut entendre mon livre en français, venez me chercher, OK? Je veux que mon livre soit en français. Merci.

I'm going to have my kids tell me what the heck you just said. Okay, so, you're leaving me now because you're going to teach students at New York University, so just tell us what program, like, what class are you teaching, what graduate students are you teaching there today?

So, I am teaching graduate students. I am at the Interactive Telecommunications Program, ITP program at NYU. And the campus is right in Manhattan. It is absolutely beautiful. And we're with the School of Engineering. We're kind of a mix between engineering and Tisch School of the Arts.

So it's a little bit of both, which suits me very well. I am going to teach a futures class. So one of the things that AI is very, very good at, it's detecting patterns. One of the things that our human cognition is very good at is detecting patterns. And so I'm going to help my students detect patterns within the technology to make it better for more of us versus less of us. All right, Julia, now I'm going to get my kids to tell me what that all means as well. Okay, so I want to say thank you very much because I thoroughly enjoyed the chat, you know, Miss Canada, electric circus, much music, but wait, that's just tip of

the iceberg stuff. What you what you're up to is highly impressive. And I'm proud to call you an FOTM. That's a friend of Toronto Mike. Thanks for doing this. Say a little words in French, maybe get the Francophone community involved all over the world. What's up, Mike? You've been doing this for a long time. I love the fact that you stay true to your Toronto roots. But I think that the world right now especially could use a little bit more Toronto and certainly a lot more Toronto, Mike. And that brings us to the end of our 1,354th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike.

I'm also on Blue Sky at Toronto Mike. You can learn more about Juliet Powell and you can buy her new book, The AI Dilemma at julietpowell.com. There's even a QR code to save 30%. Much love, much thanks to everyone who made this episode possible. That's you, of course, for listening, for supporting, for coming out to the events. But it's also Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Raymond James Canada, Moneris, Recycle My Electronics, Pumpkins After Dark, and Ridley Funeral Home.

See you tomorrow when Tom Wilson visits. We've got plenty to discuss. Well, I want to take a streetcar downtown Read Andrew Miller and wander around And drink some Guinness from a tin Cause my UI check has just come in Ah, where you been?

Because everything is kind of rosy and green Yeah, the wind is cold but the smell of snow warms me today And your smile is fine, and it's just like mine And it won't go away, cause everything is rosy and green

Well, you've been under my skin for more than eight years It's been eight years for more than eight years. It's been eight years of laughter and eight years of tears. And I don't know what the future can hold or will do for me and you. But I'm a much better man for having known you. Oh, you know that's true Because everything is coming up Rosy and gray Yeah, the wind is cold But the smell of snow

Won't stay today And your smile is fine And it's just like mine And it won't go away Because everything is Rosy and gray We'll be right back. Maybe the one who doesn't realize there's a thousand shades of gray Cause I know that's true, yes I do I know it's true, yeah

I know it's true How about you? All them picking up trash and them putting down ropes And they're brokering stocks, the class struggle explodes And I'll play this guitar just the best that I can Maybe I'm not and maybe I am But who gives a damn because Everything is coming up rosy and gray

Yeah, the wind is cold, but the smell of snow warms me today And your smile is fine, and it's just like mine And it won't go away, because everything is rosy and gray Well, I've kissed you in France, and I've kissed you in France and I've kissed you in Spain And I've kissed you in places I better not name And I've seen the sun go down

on Sacré-Cœur But I like it much better going down on you Yeah, you know that's true Because everything is coming up Rosy and green Yeah, the wind is cold But the smell of snow

Warms us today And your smile is fine And it's just like mine And it won't go away Cause everything is rosy now, everything is rosy and everything is rosy and gray I'm not a fool