Boozhoo News River Readers,

It’s exciting to see last week’s Indigenous Tech Conference still generating media coverage, specifically the Indigenous Venture Challenge covered by Future of Good, as well as a new Insight’s article from us!

Read our feature below, and you can always find our ‘News & Insights’ page over at Animikii.com! 

Thanks for reading News River, and as always - here’s the news,

This week’s stories include: 

• Patient and kind capital: Indigenous investors opt for new Shared Earnings Agreements

• Treating data like land — data sovereignty in the AI age

• Love Data Week: Where's the Indigenous Data? Reframing Data Stewardship 

Matriarchs talk about data

The big picture: The inaugural Indigenous Tech Conference held in Vancouver last week convened a panel of impactful Matriarchs to talk about Indigenous Data Sovereignty. Angie Saltman, Ja’-elle Leite and Sara Wolfe each have decades of experience navigating technology, records and data management in sectors such as health care, energy, construction, and media. 

Why it matters: Their perspectives and stories about supporting data stewardship in a good way - offer unique insights on the practical implementation of IDSov principles alongside nations and organizations.   

Key points: 

• As a former birth worker, Sara grappled with how to support client privacy yet also collaborate and contribute to vital insights and research, like measuring impact or supporting the creation of Indigenous knowledges.

• When it comes to implementing proprietary software, it can be tricky, as Angie shared “there's a certain amount of IDSov that won’t exist because of those terms and agreements.” 

• And change management is never easy to take on because capacity is already maxed. That’s why Ja’-elle and her team work with communities to train their own champions to own the stewardship role once solid foundations have been implemented. 

• .

What they’re saying: "We believe and respect OCAP and the CARE principles - but we also see them weaponized on a daily basis through gatekeeping and fear mongering” Ja’elle Leite.

“It’s imperative to understand why this is so important across spaces, including Elders and youth, and those faces yet to come… How are seven generations benefiting the most, not just us?” Sara Wolfe. 

Read the full Insights article here: Matriarchs talk about data.

Curated Articles:

Patient and kind capital: Indigenous investors opt for new Shared Earnings Agreements

Two Indigenous-led businesses received angel investment at the inaugural Indigenous Tech Conference, signalling the start of a reciprocal, values-based way of providing entrepreneurial capital. The winners of the Indigenous Venture Challenge, apparel company Red Rebel Armour, and software company KnowledgeKeepr were announced at the Indigenous Tech Conference in Vancouver on Tuesday, and will enter into what’s called an Indigenous Shared Earnings Agreement (SEAL). Traditional venture capital investments are “designed for a narrow set of businesses – those that can demonstrate rapid scale and outsized returns,” wrote the Indigenous Venture Challenge. 

Want the federal government to hear your thoughts on AI? New consultation launched

A number of human rights groups and advocates have launched what they call a "people's consultation" on the use of artificial intelligence, which will be delivered to the federal government as it mulls its first national AI strategy. The feds, led by AI Minister Evan Solomon, are examining the increasing use of artificial intelligence as they develop legislation on the issue. But over 160 signatories of an open letter, including a number of civil libertarians, unions and academics, have criticized the federally-convened AI task force — saying that its membership skews too heavily towards the tech industry and AI proponents.

Saskatchewan Indigenous Storytelling Month returns with Humboldt events in February

Saskatchewan Indigenous Storytelling Month is set to return this February, marking more than two decades of sharing, preserving, and celebrating Indigenous stories across the province. Humboldt will once again play host to local events. The month-long initiative has been running for over 23 years through the Library Services for Saskatchewan Aboriginal Peoples (LSSAP), an organization that has advocated for Indigenous services, programs, and staffing in public libraries since 1991. According to Saskatchewan Indigenous Storytelling Project Coordinator Jessica Generoux, the project grew from a need to raise awareness of Indigenous cultures and ensure storytelling traditions continue to be shared with future generations.

Love Data Week: Where's the Indigenous Data? Reframing Data Stewardship

For Indigenous Peoples, data is not just information, it is a living extension of identity, land, language and community. This session explores Indigenous data sovereignty as a vital response to ongoing data extraction and management. Participants will examine where Indigenous data currently resides, how it is managed, and what it means to return authority and stewardship to Indigenous communities. Through key frameworks such as the CARE and OCAP principles, this session reframes “Where's the Data?” as a question of power, place and relationship. This event is hosted online.

Treating data like land — data sovereignty in the AI age

Artificial intelligence front and center at North America’s largest Indigenous tech conference. Artificial intelligence in Indigenous communities was at the forefront at North America’s largest Indigenous tech conference. In a world of generative AI used to write better emails or generate funny photos, Indigenous Tech Conference gathered in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada to discuss how AI can be used to create true impact in Indigenous communities. “We don’t need more widgets in the world,” said Ryan St. Germaine, Metis, a founder and CEO of Indigenous Tech Conference. “Technology needs to be pointed towards the challenges of our time.” Some of those challenges are data sovereignty and language revitalization.

Breakthrough Nation with Karen Restoule: Bobbie Racette 

Karen Restoule speaks with Bobbie Racette about building a scalable tech business that creates jobs and income. Successful founders build companies that work in the real economy. Bobbie Racette is one of them. Racette is the Founder and President of Virtual Gurus, a talent-as-a-service platform that connects remote assistants with businesses across North America and has delivered hundreds of thousands of hours of work for a diverse community of professionals. Her leadership reflects a practical model of tech entrepreneurship grounded in execution and scale, turning disruption into durable economic participation and building a business that extends opportunity beyond conventional markets. This conversation explores how Indigenous women are exercising economic leadership by building and scaling technology-enabled businesses that deliver real work, real income, and real impact.