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I am fairly surprised to see they opened up in Edmonton, rather than Toronto, Montreal or even Vancouver. Despite that, it's a huge win for UofA - especially w

I am fairly surprised to see they opened up in Edmonton, rather than Toronto, Montreal or even Vancouver. Despite that, it's a huge win for UofA - especially when you have names like Rich Sutton involved. I am quite excited to see the excellent growth of AI/ML expertise in Canada considering the Vector Institute [0] was announced recently as well! [0] - http://vectorinstitute.ai/ http://vectorinstitute.ai/

cperciva 9y ago
In addition to the excellent people already at UofA, Edmonton has the advantage of being much cheaper than Toronto or Vancouver.
- yannis7 9y ago
  ...or London. Far less distractions too.
- raverbashing 9y ago
  And pretty much in the middle of nowhere (Also no worries about cooling hardware in winter, even compared to Toronto or Montreal) Not sure how much HW in DeepMind is self-owned, or used "in the cloud" from GCP (or others), etc
  - sztanko 9y ago
    It is actually almost on the flight path between San Francisco and London: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR,+sfo-yeg,+yeg-lhr http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR,+sfo-yeg,+yeg-lhr
    - gricardo99 9y ago
      quintessential "fly over" country. Being a medium-ish sized metro area, Edmonton doesn't have a lot of direct international flights.
- ehsankia 9y ago
  To be fair, if Google cared about cost of living, they wouldn't keep and keep on building in the Valley so much.
- forgot-my-pw 9y ago
  Living condition in Edmonton is pretty terrible in the Winter. They still have snow up to May sometimes. But on the other hand, this might be perfect for research. Keeps you focused when there's nothing else to do. If it's a great workplace, might as well hang out at work all the time.
  - wmil 9y ago
    Google's domed / canopied campus ideas actually make sense in Edmonton. In Mountain View they're only protecting people from lovely weather.

cperciva 9y ago

In addition to the excellent people already at UofA, Edmonton has the advantage of being much cheaper than Toronto or Vancouver.

yannis7 9y ago
...or London. Far less distractions too.
raverbashing 9y ago
And pretty much in the middle of nowhere (Also no worries about cooling hardware in winter, even compared to Toronto or Montreal) Not sure how much HW in DeepMind is self-owned, or used "in the cloud" from GCP (or others), etc
- sztanko 9y ago
  It is actually almost on the flight path between San Francisco and London: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR,+sfo-yeg,+yeg-lhr http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=SFO-LHR,+sfo-yeg,+yeg-lhr
  - gricardo99 9y ago
    quintessential "fly over" country. Being a medium-ish sized metro area, Edmonton doesn't have a lot of direct international flights.
ehsankia 9y ago
To be fair, if Google cared about cost of living, they wouldn't keep and keep on building in the Valley so much.
forgot-my-pw 9y ago
Living condition in Edmonton is pretty terrible in the Winter. They still have snow up to May sometimes. But on the other hand, this might be perfect for research. Keeps you focused when there's nothing else to do. If it's a great workplace, might as well hang out at work all the time.
- wmil 9y ago
  Google's domed / canopied campus ideas actually make sense in Edmonton. In Mountain View they're only protecting people from lovely weather.