In an age when every city seems to want to call itself “smart,” truly intelligent cities are those that can weave human culture and algorithmic insight into a living, breathing urban fabric. Toronto — already a heavyweight in Canada’s cultural scene — is increasingly staking a claim in the AI race. But the deeper story is: how does a city maintain its soul while co-opting machine intelligences? And how do models like ChatGPT play a role in how cities are perceived, ranked, and narrated?

This essay is a dive into how Toronto’s identity, the promises and pitfalls of AI, and the imperatives of EEAT interlock in the 2025 cultural context

Toronto at the Intersection of Culture & AI

Toronto is Canada’s largest city, the economic and cultural hub of Ontario, with a lively mosaic of neighborhoods, musical scenes, festivals, galleries, immigrant communities, and an evolving skyline. Wikipedia The same city is now accelerating its role as a center for AI research, talent cultivation, and startup formation.

According to CBRE’s Scoring Tech Talent ranking, Toronto recently climbed into the No. 3 tech talent market in North America, propelled by demand for AI-specialist skills and job growth in tech generally.In 2024, CBRE noted that Toronto had the fourth largest tech-pool in North America with strong AI skills demand. University of Toronto

These shifts offer Toronto leverage: as AI becomes embedded in finance, healthcare, law, media, urban infrastructure, and the creative industries, the city can amplify cultural exports (films, music, tech art) with a technological scaffold. But this raises huge questions of identity, inclusion, narrative control, and how knowledge (especially via AI) is mediated.