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Happy Sunday, Rocket Networkers!!!
Before You Dive Into Events...you might want to know that Paris Hilton made TIME's AI List. The Guy Who Builds the Chips Didn't.
Ask a hundred people to name the most influential person in AI, and most of them land on Jensen Huang. His Nvidia chips power basically every frontier model on the planet. TIME asked itself the same question and came back with Paris Hilton.
Not a joke… The 2026 TIME100 AI list dropped August 26, and within hours the reveal post had over a million views. Almost none of them were congratulations.
Huang made the list three years running. This year he got swapped out for Nvidia's sustainability chief. Demis Hassabis, a man with an actual Nobel Prize, lost his spot to DeepMind's "Chief AI Readiness Officer."
Zuckerberg, Pichai, Nadella? Gone. Musk was the only Magnificent Seven CEO who survived the cut, joining Sam Altman and Anthropic's Amodeis on the list.
Meanwhile, the new additions read like a Hollywood call sheet: Paris Hilton (for her deepfake-legislation advocacy, to be fair), Ben Affleck, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Bernie Sanders. One AI engineer joked he'd bite his own cat if anyone on the list could explain a loss function. (I can’t explain it either, so that’s why I’m not complaining about not being on the list. 😂)
Wild? Sure. But everyone's missing the main point: the outrage and the list are answering two different questions.
TIME made a judgment call about what "influence" means in 2026. Read generously, the list is a thesis: the people who matter most in AI right now aren't the ones building its capabilities; they're the ones wrestling with the fallout. Energy. Labor. Policy… Who owns your face.
And that's a defensible take! Deepfake laws and creator-rights fights will shape how billions of people actually experience AI, whether or not the people behind them can explain a loss function.
The problem? TIME never said any of that out loud. No explanation or definition of influence. Just editorial hooks wearing a title that promises "The 100 Most Influential People in AI."
Readers showed up expecting a map of who's driving the technology and got a map of who's responding to it.
Okay. NOW to the events… still deciding and will be attending some of the events below, but for sure Houston AITX Community Monthly Meetup: Teaching agents to pay, and Startup Circle Houston — The Ion…
Also, we have a few seats left for the first Founders Anonymous coming up on Sept 9th! Apply to join!
cheers,
- oleg 👊
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P.S. Know a Texas company doing something insane? hit reply.
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At Rocket Network, we do the dirty work for you, curating Houston's tech scene so you spend less time scrolling and more time building. Want to be featured or sponsor? Hit reply.
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We are using emojis to guide subscribers in our event list 📅📍
🚀 - must attend
🔥🌶️ - something hot
🤓💻 - good for developers and other technical folks
🦄💰- venture capital and investing-related
⚡- energy-related
♻️- renewable energy and sustainability-related
🏥 - health care related
🎖️🪖 - veteran or military related
🏅 - sports tech related
₿ - web3 related
HERE ARE OUR PICKS FOR HTX THIS WEEK
Monday, August 31
The AITX crowd takes on agent payments. How you let an AI agent actually spend money, and what breaks when you do. Free.
Sixty-second pitches, then open networking for digital health, medical devices and AI in medicine. 21 and up, one drink at the bar.
Tuesday, September 1
The far west edition. Coffee, founders, no agenda.
Blue People’s Tech and Tequila Talk. Most founders build first and hope freedom shows up later. This one starts at the end and works backwards.
Heath Butler on whether your idea is actually viable before you go looking for money. Investors will ask the same questions, so you may as well hear them first.
Houston’s Unity developers finally get an official group. Unity 7, XR workflows and ArcGIS on the agenda. Free parking in HCC lots 13 and 14.
Wednesday, September 2
Southwest side edition. Same format, different room.
Lenny Saizan on what actually happens when you sell or buy a company. The unglamorous mechanics most founders learn too late.
Sunil Kadimdiwan wires Power BI to an MCP server and points Claude at it. A live look at what MCP does to a data stack.
Thursday, September 3
West side edition, inside The Cannon.
A facilitated table, not a panel. Emerging founders, established entrepreneurs and corporate intrapreneurs on what building actually takes.
The big one this week. Chuck Yates on building Collide, and Charles Jessup on rolling AI out to roughly 100,000 people at Raytheon. What broke, what surprised them. Free, free parking, 45 minutes of open networking.
Friday, September 4
The flagship is back in the Ion lobby. Start with the why, not the job title.
Weekly Friday morning for people actually putting AI to work. Networking, then a focused session on one practical topic.
Wade Pinder gives the tour. New to Houston, or never actually been inside? This is the way in.
Bring an idea or a company and find out what Rice research you could license.
The weekly founder roundtable runs right after Joey. Bring your ask.
⚠️Hosting a tech meetup or startup event? Submit it via the RocketNetwork Event Submission Form to boost your visibility!
MONEY ON THE TABLE
(This section doesn’t exist on the web. It’s for subscribers only. Feel free to forward — your friend just has to subscribe to get it weekly.)
Slush 100 €500,000 handed to one team on stage in Helsinki, zero equity taken. The largest equity-free prize any startup competition has ever paid. Open to anything founded in 2023 or later that has raised under €10M and is still seed or earlier. You do need a Startup Pass to be selected, so factor that in. Closes September 7 - APPLY |
Fast Forward 2027 Accelerator $25,000 in unrestricted funding, three months of mentorship and a Demo Day in front of hundreds of social impact investors. For tech nonprofit founders in the US. Closes September 7 at 11:59 PM PT - APPLY |
Skip’s $10,000 Grant One $10,000 grant, open to any US entrepreneur or small business owner over 18. No revenue floor, no industry filter, and the application is genuinely short. Skip has paid out to more than 2,000 businesses so far. Closes September 18 - APPLY |
TWU StartUP Grant $5,000 for Texas woman-owned startups, funded by the state legislature. You do not need any affiliation with Texas Woman’s University to apply. The money goes toward one specific project you name in the application, so have quotes ready. Opens September 1, closes September 23 - APPLY |
Entreprenista Evolve Grant $5,000 to one woman founder, from Entreprenista and IT Cosmetics. You need a US business, woman-owned or woman-led, at least a year old and doing $100,000 or more a year. Closes November 30 - APPLY |
The Amber Grant Three $10,000 grants every month for women-owned businesses, plus three $50,000 grants at year end drawn from the monthly winners. One application covers all of them, including the startup track if you are still pre-revenue. There is a $15 fee - APPLY |
America’s Seed Fund (NSF) Up to $2 million in non-dilutive funding, and the NSF takes zero equity and zero IP. Deep tech across AI, energy, medical devices, robotics and semiconductors. They fund about 400 companies a year and accept project pitches year round, so there is no deadline to miss - APPLY |
Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation Up to $300,000 unrestricted over three years, plus a DRK partner sitting on your board for that whole stretch. For social enterprises with real proof they move the needle for underserved communities. Applications open year round - APPLY |
Claude for Startups Free Claude credits and priority rate limits if you are venture backed. Name your investor when you apply. Rolling, and worth doing before your next burn conversation - APPLY |
FEATURED EVENTS
Startup Circle Houston EVERY FRIDAY AT THE ION
FEATURED JOBS
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That’s a wrap for now, RocketNetworkers,
Stay tuned, and keep grinding!
Disclaimer: The content in this newsletter is for informational purposes only and does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by any sponsors. All opinions and information are those of the author and not of the sponsors or affiliated organizations.
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