[Watch the video interview on Youtube here]
Film Courage: When did you decide you didn’t just want to work in AI, you wanted to have your own company?
Russell Palmer, Co-Founder of CyberFilm AI: I’ll give you a serious answer and a funny answer. The funny answer is I started my career at Microsoft. I’d been there for five years, the plan was to stay for five years. That’s a big resume requirement, minimum five years experience. I was waiting on my green card but this was when Twitter I think was just presented at South by Southwest and took over. The iPhone, the app store, every day there was a new (Instagram and Uber) and all these apps. I just thought it was so amazing that a small group of people with an idea could build a billion dollar company. That’s why I moved here from Canada. We talked about California earlier, so I love the weather, the music, the culture but I was definitely following my American Dream. Once I had worked as a product manager for 5–10 years I thought that I was ready for it. I’d led teams of people.
Then the funny answer is once I started to get a bit tired of working at Microsoft and big tech (you can only work on spreadsheet software for so long) I saw the movie The Social Network and it is still to this day one of my favorite movies. I know it’s not necessarily the right message for how to do things but it just seems so exciting and world changing. I think everybody wants to make an impact on the world and for me it was always going to be in AI. Then once I had worked at this ViV Lab startup with the Siri founder, I sort of saw how easy it can be if you have the right people, the right idea and you don’t give up on yourself. So yeah, that’s what set me on the journey.
Film Courage: At what point did you get involved with Y Combinator?
Russell: I had applied and we didn’t get into the…(Watch the video interview on Youtube here).
About:
Russell Palmer is a technologist and Silicon Valley Product Manager with a background in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, having worked at companies including Microsoft, Viv Labs AI, Samsung Research AI, and JPMorgan’s AI Lab at Stanford Research Park. He co-founded the startup CyberFilm AI in 2021 with his brother Andrew, an indie writer/screenwriter/director/producer/actor, founder of Synapz Productions and an AD on Hollywood productions around Toronto, Vancouver, and Los Angeles (and WGC/DGC/CMPA member).
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