Building PyData Kampala | Ernest Kabahima | Give Me 5 Season 2 Episode 4

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:00][music] [music] >> Hey Ernest, thank you for giving me five.

[00:00:13]Hello.

[00:00:14]Where are you joining us from?

[00:00:17]Um I'm joining in from Kampala, Uganda.

[00:00:20]My name is Ernest Birahima once again.

[00:00:24]Awesome. Thanks Ernest.

[00:00:26]So, tell us about your journey to open source software and why it matters to you.

[00:00:33]Uh journey into open source began as early as 2019.

[00:00:38]But before that, my roots uh even did back earlier. That's where I had spent several years learning and working as a full stack and a freelancer. During that period, I took part in very many developer growth programs that shaped my career city and technical foundation.

[00:00:57]Uh programs were mainly designed to support people who were curious.

[00:01:04]Uh like Google, Grow with [music] Google, and also part of the Andela community. So, those programs taught me the value of peer learning, collaboration, and lifting others as you grow. But as my skills evolved, my curiosity also expanded into open source software.

[00:01:22]And I discovered uh uh scientific computing ecosystem and then I joined the PyData community first as a developer, uh so I uh volunteer at uh PyData Global, where I experienced energy, the inclusivity of a global open source community.

[00:01:42]And uh this experience opened uh different opportunities for me, where I was part of the PyData Impact Scholarship Program.

[00:01:52]I participated actively with it from 2022 to 2024. But through that program, I learned from incredible mentors. I may not mention them.

[00:02:05]As we collaborated with uh very many contributors.

[00:02:10]And then also I joined in to uh bigger community building roles as uh that was part of the NumPy hackathon >> [music] >> organized by Num uh by NumFocus under the [music] Impact Scholarship Program.

[00:02:28]That shaped my experiences around open science and practical data skills.

[00:02:34]But uh one of my major milestones was founding PyData together with a couple of my friends.

[00:02:42]And I currently serve as a lead today, overseeing most of the activities with an amazing team of dedicated volunteers.

[00:02:51]They do give their time, their creativity, their passion uh welcoming and uh supporting mm people I'm supporting participants.

[00:03:02]I'd love to hear from just from you, especially from your experience organizing PyData, from, you know, uh having been the developer growth program, um and being a PyData global volunteer, and your participation in NumPy hack. So, I want to I'm curious to hear what your hot take is on AI.

[00:03:26]>> On open source, my hot take on AI, especially for open source science, is I still believe um AI has a great potential if we maybe [music] focus it on scientific discovery.

[00:03:43]Cuz it has great potential, but only if it remains uh open wide.

[00:03:49]I do believe closed AI slows down science, and without transparency, without >> [music] >> we cannot verify results, we cannot uh reproduce experiments, we cannot build on top of each other's work.

[00:04:00]And then second thing, I mean, my second thought [music] would be also is uh open wide.

[00:04:07]I'd say open wide to code open >> [music] >> uh science. Why? Because if researchers cannot inspect, fine-tune, [music] or validate models, then those models cannot be considered scientific tools.

[00:04:19]They're just like [music] black boxes or anything else.

[00:04:23]And then also I still believe open I still believe AI uh is here to amplify human intelligence. Then just keep it. Why?

[00:04:31]Because models uh >> [music] >> empower people to experiment, improve, and innovate.

[00:04:39]So, my hot take would be if we close AI, or if we uh do keep it with the vendors, we are closing the gap, or we are we are it's a bottleneck. But if we open it, then [music] that's a catalyst to scientific progress. That's my take on AI.

[00:05:01]Mm. Thank you for that, Ernest.

[00:05:03]Um uh we've come to the end of our time today.

[00:05:09]Uh I want to wish you well, and I want to thank you so much for giving [music] me five one more time. Thank you. Give me five.

[00:05:34]Give me five is a NumFocus production.

[00:05:36]Support open source software today by donating at numfocus.org.