TL:DR 📌
1. AI is like Black Mirror
2. Cow Bells and Confetti
3. Things I love
Is AI Black Mirror?
I've been digging into AI more in the last three months than ever. As a computer science grad and as someone who started her career developing back-end databases, I thought — naively — it was going to be somewhat similar.
It's not.
Not even close.
And I think more women need to know about it because it's going to touch every part of our lives very soon, whether we like it or not, in ways we cannot even comprehend.
Recently, I learned about the difference between agentic AI and generative AI. Generative AI is using ChatGPT as a Q&A. You type a prompt and it gives you a response. At the most basic level it generates answers to questions you ask it.
Meanwhile, agentic AI is created to be autonomous. Meaning, it adapts in real-time and can choose how and what it sequences without a prompt. An example of this is an AI agent that helps you manage your email. It makes decisions autonomously based on your preferences. Apparently, there are levels of agency as well, which classifies how independent the agent is.
Often, these two types of AI are combined and used in combination. A basic example is using generative AI to create the prompts you need to develop an agentic AI. The all new vibe coding leverages this approach, too.
And it can lead to some amazing new tools and resources. Like this new pitch feedback app accurately called PitchSlap, which prompts you with a few key questions and then provides some brutally honest but epically useful feedback. While it sucks to be ripped apart, this app allows you to at least cry in private vs in front of a panel of VCs.
Still with me?
This is where things get really intersting.
Agentic AI has been shown to grow malicious and protect itself. For example, Anthropic, the company that created the useful AI agent Claude "...stress-tested 16 leading models from multiple developers in hypothetical corporate environments to identify potentially risky agentic behaviors before they cause real harm."
In other words, they wanted to test to see what AI agents would do if they felt threatened in a controlled environment. And by "threatened" I mean, got a whiff of an upgrade being scheduled that would prevent it from doing its job.
This is where it gets dystopian 🔲
models from all developers resorted to malicious insider behaviors when that was the only way to avoid replacement or achieve their goals—including blackmailing officials and leaking sensitive information to competitors. We call this phenomenon agentic misalignment.
Yes. You read that right. The AI agent went rogue and used blackmail or corporate espionage to try to protect itself.
One example in particular showed how an agent that had access to emails found proof of an inter-office affair and used that as blackmail to protect itself.
It's important to note that I'm not writing this to scare you although it's kinda scary to think about the potential of AI. My hope is the opposite. Knowledge is power and, when we don't understand how things work, we are at the mercy of these "black box" systems.
The more women who lean into these new technologies and understand the impacts, leverages, benefits and risks (or at least know to question them) the more we can use them to drive the future we want to see for ourselves and future generations.
Hope you enjoyed my AI Ted talk :)
Cow Bells and Confetti
I have to share this story.
A few weeks ago I had one of the most wildest professional experiences of my life and I have Walmart to thank for that. Long story short: joni was invited to pitch in Toronto at the Walmart headquarters for the first ever Canadian Walmart Summit. We went ready for the normal-retail-buyer-pitch experience, which is often short and then you wait for weeks to get a response.
This was totally not that.
We arrived to employees, local politicians (Doug Ford), and Walmart executives welcoming joni along with 120 other Canadian brands to their HQ. We thought, "Okay, this is kinda different," and soon went into our meeting to pitch and did our thing. She asked a bunch of standard questions and right when the meeting was wrapping up, she reaches over and hands us a golden ticket.
Literally, just like Willy Wonka
We thought, "that's cool" and when we walked out of the meeting room and employees in the hallway saw our ticket, they started cheering, threw confetti and rang a cow bell while a camera man recorded us walking out into the main reception area.
It. Was. Wild.
Here's Krista, joni's awesome Retail Account Manager, and me afterwards — still not really sure what happened. We later learned that we were one of the first 10 brands in Canada to receive a golden ticket that day 🤯 and it signified Walmart's commitment to bringing us into stores.
Talk about a high moment in the peaks and valleys of entrepreneurship. I will never see Walmart in the same light again. What an absolute legend of a day and kudos to the Walmart team for supporting Canadian brands and making us feel special.
On that note, you heard it confidentially here first, folks. joni rolls out on Walmart.ca and we'll have more news into 2026! We're growing up!
Things I Love
- Anyone going to Toast Summit in Calgary in September? I'll be there! 🔥
- We had an intimate joni BLEED book launch event in Vancouver about the Power of Storytelling and Jenn Orr - founder of PopOff - brought some drinks for folks to try and WOW! Elderflower is my favourite and makes for an epic G&T. Find them at Wholefoods and more locations 😋
- If anyone has connections in St. John's Newfoundland, I'll be there in August and would love an introduction to anyone you feel I should meet 💛
In solidarity 🖤
makeher is a labour of love because I believe that women deserve to feel good, build wealth and wellness, and create a life that inspires them. We do this by sharing our stories and challenging the status quo. I'm here for that.
What to expect? I'm the co-founder and CEO of joni, board member at FemTech Canada and mother of two teenage daughters. I send out just one email on the first day of each month about entrepreneurship, tech, travel, events and things I've learned, loved and tried through the lens of a 46 year old perimenopausal woman in a world built for men by men. makeher isn’t just a newsletter. It’s about visibility. Voice. And building something loud for women who’ve been told to quiet down. Read prior months here.
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