Why we are building Diorite
Our founding note from 2023: a partner for the mountains that shows its thinking, earns its place in your pack, and respects the terrain.
Elena and I formed AI Outdoors LLC on April 13, 2023, the spring after a storm on the Grand Teton sent us back to camp soaked and humbled. We kept talking about that night. What we really wanted was a partner that reads everything a careful guide reads before a big day, then explains its thinking like a friend would.
We don't know yet exactly what it will look like. We do know what it has to believe.
Four things we promise each other
- Respect the mountain, and the people who explore it
- Show our reasoning, every single time
- Earn the weight: every feature has to help you decide
- Go outside, because the best ideas start at the trailhead
We're a tiny team split between Boulder and Chamonix. Some of us are engineers who climb, some are guides who code. All of us have turned around on a day we wish we'd never started.
The goal isn't to get more people to the summit. It's to get more people home, with good decisions behind them.
It'll take time to get this right, and we'd rather be slow than careless. If that sounds like something you'd like to help build, we're hiring.
Written by
John Kole
Co-founder & CTO. Built forecasting systems for a national weather service.
