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ThursdaySep 24 2026Better Futures Club
WebsiteBetter Futures Club is a weekly event (alternating Tuesdays and Thursdays) focused on imagining and making better futures.
Imagine an artist community, a think tank, and a research center in the same building. People in all of those fields working alongside each other imagining and creating different futures together. Cross pollination and inspiration. Liberal Arts and STEM and R&D. Photographers, physicists, authors, astronomers, musicians, makers, mathematicians, designers, developers, fashionistas, climatologists and all manner of imaginative optimists.
All Better Futures Club events are covered by the Contributor Covenant Code of Conduct (https://www.contributor-covenant.org)
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Social Beer: Sept GatheringWebsite
Heading to the west side for this one. An IRL gathering of the Portland Startups Slack community. Whether you're already part of the Portland Startups Slack community or not, please feel free to swing by, have a beverage, and connect with other startup and tech folks here in Portland.
Tomorrow
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FridaySep 25 2026Silicon Florist: Watch party
WebsiteIt's Friday evening. You're wiped. But you're still in the mood for something entertaining.
Well, unfortunately, this ain't it.
But it is an opportunity to join folks from the Portland startup community for a little watch party — all from the comfort of your own keyboard.
Next two weeks
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MondaySep 28 2026Code & Coffee - Beaverton–
Fly ChaiWebsiteCode & Coffee is an inclusive, informal co-working session: drink your beverage of choice, bring your laptop, and hang out with your peers! Have engaging conversations, or focus on work or projects. This is a great opportunity to learn from others, share your knowledge, and possibly collaborate on side projects, online courses, or even your day-to-day work.
---- Schedule ----
You're welcome to drop in anytime during the event. We understand that everyone may have external commitments and challenges - join us when you can!
We have informal unscheduled introductions - practice your personal elevator pitch, or take things slower to build your confidence.
---- Venue ----
Fly Chai allow us to informally and freely use their space. If within your budget, we'd appreciate your help to sustain our use of the venue, by purchasing something tasty, whether Chai or otherwise.
Find us at tables with a Code&Coffee sign - or a clump of laptop-users!
Wifi and power outlets are available. Our meeting area should be accessible - please let us know if not.
---- What to expect ----
Smaller events than you may be used to, with a mixed crowd week-to-week. We expect this is likely due to us meeting weekly, at a less central location.
These may result in what you're looking for:
A smaller, less intimidating, lower pressure, cozy atmosphere. A mix of regular and new faces. A simpler schedule - every week, same time, same place - that you can drop into when you like. Being closer to you than other events.Whether those are generally or partly to your liking, we hope you'll consider dropping by sometime!
---- Getting to the venue ----
Look for the venue on the meetup Google map, or alternatives like OpenStreetMap.
-- Driving --
There are limited parking spaces on a lot outside the venue (4+1 accessible), with more in the surrounding area.
-- Transit options --
Beaverton Central (Red/Blue MAX), then walk~ 8 minutes
Beaverton Transit Center (Red/Blue MAX, bus, WES) then walk ~11 minutes
For a shorter walk to the venue, take a bus from Beaverton Transit Center (52 to Farmington/Hall, 76 to Watson/Broadway, 57 to Canyon/Watson)
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TuesdaySep 29 2026Better Futures Club
Website
Better Futures Club is a weekly event (alternating Tuesdays and Thursdays) focused on imagining and making better futures.
Imagine an artist community, a think tank, and a research center in the same building. People in all of those fields working alongside each other imagining and creating different futures together. Cross pollination and inspiration. Liberal Arts and STEM and R&D. Photographers, physicists, authors, astronomers, musicians, makers, mathematicians, designers, developers, fashionistas, climatologists and all manner of imaginative optimists.
All Better Futures Club events are covered by the Contributor Covenant Code of Conduct (https://www.contributor-covenant.org)
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ThursdayOct 1 2026This Is *Not* a Talk About AI (It's About Fire, Anthropology, Technology and Humanity–
KilnWebsiteWhen AI begins to feel uncanny, dangerous, or too powerful to contain, our cultural imagination reaches quickly for Frankenstein.
The comparison is everywhere in the current news cycle: a creation escapes its maker, technology accelerates beyond human control, and the world discovers too late that it has built something it cannot govern. The fear is not foolish. AI is moving rapidly into the systems that shape work, education, media, public services, and democratic life.
But Frankenstein offers a more interesting warning than the one we usually tell. Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel was shaped by fascination with galvanism, the early electrical experiments that made dead muscle appear to twitch. Its central horror is not simply that Victor Frankenstein creates something powerful. It is that he creates it and then abandons responsibility for what follows.
In This Is Not a Talk About AI, digital anthropologist Ali Maaxa, Ph.D. asks what changes when we stop treating AI as an alien force with a destiny of its own and start recognizing it as a human-built infrastructure. A system does not simply “take over.” It receives power through human decisions: whose data it uses, who funds it, what it is allowed to access, which institutions treat its outputs as legitimate, whose labor maintains it, and whether people can challenge its decisions.
The story begins long before AI.
Neanderthals made birch-bark tar with controlled fire to bind stone tools to handles and hunting shafts. The Gutenberg Bible made authoritative texts reproducible at unprecedented scale and turned interpretation into a public struggle. Electricity extended the human day and television reorganized public attention. The internet promised open connection before becoming an infrastructure of platforms, surveillance, ranking, and concentrated control.
Each technology changed not only what people could do, but what became normal. Each produced new anxieties, new gatekeepers, new forms of dependence, and new struggles over who should set the rules.
AI belongs in that longer history. It is not “just like” fire, print, or electricity. It is faster, more networked, more opaque, and increasingly able to generate language, classify people, and act through connected systems. It also has a body: chips, data centers, electricity, water, land, extraction, invisible labor, public subsidies, and communities asked to absorb costs that rarely appear in a product demo.
For more than 20 years, Dr. Maaxa has studied how people around the world encounter, repurpose, resist, innovate with, and make meaning around emerging technologies. As a researcher funded by Mellon, Peacock, REACH, Wilgus, and NEH, an author of books and articles, and a professor at UNC, Duke, William & Mary, Virigina Tech, PSU & Pierce, she has produced leading work on global digital cultures. A leader in AI innovation and incubation, she has spent the past decade working across New Relic AI, AWS AI, Meta AI, startups, and accelerators, bringing new technologies into public and professional life while advocating for responsible, accessible, deeply ethical use.
This is neither an AI sales pitch nor an apocalypse sermon. It is a lively intervention into an overblown public conversation.
It asks:
What is AI actually doing now?
Which human relationships, forms of labor, judgments, and institutions is it rearranging?
Who gets to build and govern it?
Who pays for its infrastructure?
Who can inspect, interrupt, challenge, or repair what it does?
The answer is not to pretend risk has disappeared. It is to recover agency as a shared public practice.
A technology is not the same thing as a culture of use.
The question is not only what AI can do. It is what kind of public we are becoming while we learn to live with it.
Learn more, book me for a keynote or interview, or get involved: https://notanai.site
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SaturdayOct 3 2026Mentorship Saturdays @ Roseline Cafe & OnlineWebsite
Thanks to Roseline Coffee for providing a physical location! Find inside the hotel and to the right, likely on the couches
Coffee, bagels and people working on their careers and code! We have 2-5 mentors every month ready to help people get started in the industry, get help with a particular problem, or get career advice. We offer resume reviews, portfolio reviews, and sometimes mock interviews (time permitting).
Or call in (audio only)
+1 872-240-8681,,882162595# United States, Chicago
Phone Conference ID: 882 162 595#
Thanks to Capital One Café for providing a physical location!
Discord https://discord.gg/nSCxgbcG7U
Share
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MondayOct 5 2026Code & Coffee - Beaverton–
Fly ChaiWebsiteCode & Coffee is an inclusive, informal co-working session: drink your beverage of choice, bring your laptop, and hang out with your peers! Have engaging conversations, or focus on work or projects. This is a great opportunity to learn from others, share your knowledge, and possibly collaborate on side projects, online courses, or even your day-to-day work.
---- Schedule ----
You're welcome to drop in anytime during the event. We understand that everyone may have external commitments and challenges - join us when you can!
We have informal unscheduled introductions - practice your personal elevator pitch, or take things slower to build your confidence.
---- Venue ----
Fly Chai allow us to informally and freely use their space. If within your budget, we'd appreciate your help to sustain our use of the venue, by purchasing something tasty, whether Chai or otherwise.
Find us at tables with a Code&Coffee sign - or a clump of laptop-users!
Wifi and power outlets are available. Our meeting area should be accessible - please let us know if not.
---- What to expect ----
Smaller events than you may be used to, with a mixed crowd week-to-week. We expect this is likely due to us meeting weekly, at a less central location.
These may result in what you're looking for:
A smaller, less intimidating, lower pressure, cozy atmosphere. A mix of regular and new faces. A simpler schedule - every week, same time, same place - that you can drop into when you like. Being closer to you than other events.Whether those are generally or partly to your liking, we hope you'll consider dropping by sometime!
---- Getting to the venue ----
Look for the venue on the meetup Google map, or alternatives like OpenStreetMap.
-- Driving --
There are limited parking spaces on a lot outside the venue (4+1 accessible), with more in the surrounding area.
-- Transit options --
Beaverton Central (Red/Blue MAX), then walk~ 8 minutes
Beaverton Transit Center (Red/Blue MAX, bus, WES) then walk ~11 minutes
For a shorter walk to the venue, take a bus from Beaverton Transit Center (52 to Farmington/Hall, 76 to Watson/Broadway, 57 to Canyon/Watson)
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WednesdayOct 7 2026Talk Tech Together: Strategies for Digital EmpowermentWebsite
Celebrate National Digital Inclusion Week at Multnomah County Library!
Join a gathering of community members and digital inclusion practitioners to discuss interests, needs, and concerns related to technology literacy/education, internet connectivity, and device access. At the event you'll be able to choose from suggested discussion topics or submit your own ideas. Envision the programs, resources, and connections needed to build a future where emerging technologies bridge gaps in access.
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Assistive Tech User Research with Cindy Merrill (Hybrid) - CHIFOO / PDX A11Y UXWebsite
Assistive Tech User Research
Join us as Cindy Merrill shares her work making technology more accessible to people with disabilities. Cindy conducts remote moderated research with people who use assistive technology, including screen readers and screen magnifiers. In this presentation, she'll discuss real-world insights from her research and share proven best practices for planning and conducting effective user research with people who rely on these essential tools.
This event is co-hosted by CHIFOO (pronounced ‘ky – FOO’), the Computer Human Interaction Forum of Oregon, and PDX A11Y UX, the Portland Accessibility & UX Meetup.
Bio
Cindy Merrill is a Lead UX Researcher at Pluribus Digital, a consulting firm specializing in modern digital experiences for the federal government. With more than 20 years of experience in user research across government and industry, she is passionate about making technology more accessible and easier to use. She has conducted numerous research studies on websites, consumer products, and automotive systems while working at Intel, Jaguar Land Rover, Cvent, and various consulting firms.
Event is in person and online
We are in person at the Multnomah County Central Library (Large Community Room 1A) and online via Zoom for remote participation (Zoom link will be posted a few days before event). Introduction starts at 6:00 pm, and we need to leave the room by 7:45pm.
Accommodation requests
If you have any accommodation requests, don’t hesitate to contact us before the event to discuss.