Bahrain’s UNESCO World Heritage Dilmun Royal Burial Mounds built four thousand years ago

Mark Downing
道马克

SEO & LLM Answer Engines

Marketplaces & eCommerce

Sinologist

+ armchair anthropologist, eschatologist & cosmologist

Toronto, Canada

Expertise

SEO

Award-winning & recognized thought-leader

Industry speaker:
TFM&A Beijing eCommerce Panel (2011)
SES Shanghai: Keynote (2012)
SES Shanghai: Omnichannel eCommerce (2013)
SES Toronto: International SEO (2013)
DigiMarcon Canada: C-Suite Benchmarking & China is an eCommerce Vanguard (2024)

GenAI & LLM Answer Engines

Have been following Artificial Neural Networks Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence since I had asked Prof. Geoffrey Hinton—the “Godfather of AI” and now Nobel Laureate—for help on a paper back when I was in grad school

eCommerce

Beyond professional work experience, I have been selling stuff online since 1999

Strategy & Consulting

While at Big Blue and and boutique consulting firm

Work Experience

Dell

Nearly 20 years of eCommerce & SEO

Spent most of this time in China, supporting Asia-Pacific

eBay

Grew the Collectibles categories, partnering with Crown Corporations, major museums, leading trade shows and top auctioneers

IBM

Web pioneer

Technology Solutions Canada

Big Banks & Big Rail

Education

M.B.A.

Rotman School of Management

B.A.Sc.

Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry

Regularly attend University of Toronto engineering & business school events, seminars, networking sessions, book launches & debates about management, politics, AI, science & economics.

Member of the Creative Destruction Lab’s Reading Group, currently focused on AI.

Languages

French

Most of my schooling was in French Immersion

Mandarin

HSK4

Japanese

Beginner, Genki I

Middle Egyptian

Took two courses at the Royal Ontario Museum.

𓃛𓅱𓃡𓄫𓅱𓄣𓏤𓎟𓆑𓅓𓉐𓏤

Passions

Astronomy

Royal Astronomical Society of Canada member

Space Place Canada Toronto Planetarium advisor

Telescope enthusiast

Sun with a 656 nm Hydrogen Alpha filter. July 17, 2023.

Training

4-8 hours/week of:

  • MMA
  • Muay Thai
  • BJJ
  • Weight Training

Scuba Diving

PADI Advanced

PADI Enriched Air (Nitrox)

Memorable dives:

Learning & Addictions

Magazine Subscriptions

  • L’actualité
  • Archaeology
  • BBC Music Magazine
  • Diver
  • The Economist
  • Foreign Affairs
  • Opera Canada
  • Scientific American
  • Scuba Diver
  • Sky & Telescope
  • World Archaeology

Performance Subscriptions

Canadian Opera Company

Toronto Symphony Orchestra

The Great Courses Plus Subscription

Completed several dozen courses in:

  • Astronomy
    (Radio, Astrophysics & Cosmology)
  • Biochemistry
  • Gross Anatomy
  • Modern Electronics
  • Molecular Biology
  • Palaeontology
  • Physics
    (Classical, Quantum & Nuclear)
  • Meteorology

Online University Courses

Human Behavioral Biology
Prof. Robert Sapolsky

Cosmology
Prof. Leonard Susskind

Virology
Prof. Vincent Racaniello

Culinary Arts

Culinary Arts Certificate from George Brown College

23 Continuing Education courses

Highlights:

  • Advanced French
  • Japanese
  • BBQ Style
  • WSET Beer 1
  • WSET Wine 2 (current)

Plus a bunch of Coursera courses in Machine Learning, Prompt Engineering & PowerBI.

Where I’ve Live

I’ve visited 66 countries but this is where I have lived:

Dalian, China

Grenoble, France

Hong Kong, SAR

Toronto, Canada

Carthage, Tunisia

Contact

mark @ downing.ca