Episode N°093 of the Near Future Laboratory Podcast with filmmaker, director Gary Hustwit, the creative punk mind behind documentaries Rams, Helvetica and Objectified. We dive into his journey in independent filmmaking, his DIY ethos, and his bold ideas about storytelling in a digital world. Gary shares his approach to creating generative cinema—films that evolve and change with each viewing. We explore what it means to push against the boundaries of trad filmmaking, trad distribution, and the creative process. A deep and inspiring conversation about art, risk, and ways of imagining harder.

Design has long ceased to be seen as a discipline of aesthetics and functionality. It looks for possibilities, using imagination as its inspiration to find opportunities to create more habitable worlds of tomorow. This exhibition is devoted to themes of the distant and near future possibilities.
An exhibition of Near Future Laboratory's Work Kit of Design Fiction at the GRASSI Museum of Applied Arts in Leipzig, Germany. The Work Kit of Design Fiction is exhibited, providing a hands-on experience for attendees and a grounded approach to imagining futures. The exhibition is divided into three chapters and is devoted to themes of the distant and near future. Included in these themes are proposals from the fields of art and design, which use speculative methods to make different futures visible and tangible. Symbiotic, post-human, and interspecies relationships are the focus. We question the role and responsibility of humans within the ecosystem. The emphasis is on cooperation with microorganisms, cohabitation with animals and...

An expert panel discussion on the evolving relationship between human agency and technology, exploring the implications of AI systems on society and the role of ethics, imagination, and policy in shaping viable futures. Held at The British Academy, London in collaboration with Google DeepMind, the Science, Technology, and Social Values Lab at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, and the AI Policy and Governance Working Group.
Moderated by Prof. Alonda Nelson, this expert panel will wander into the questions, hopes, fears, dreads, dreams, and desires of our evolving relationships amongst our own human agency and that of the technologies being deployed right now. We will consider how we might careful balance the ways by which AI systems may augment our capabilities, while preserving transparency and accountability, and maintaining a meaningful alignment with the values and norms that undergird the cultures we wish to inhabit.

"Cybernetic Serendipity: The Computer and the Arts" stands as a pivotal moment in the intersection of technology and creativity. A prescient, groundbreaking collection of art + technology, it captures an extraordinary moment when artists, musicians, poets, and engineers were first exploring the creative potential of computers and cybernetic systems. The exhibition and catalog remind us of the remarkable and oftentimes untapped ability of technology to extend human inventiveness and creativity, probing the boundaries of possibility.
A cursory review of the catalog reveals a spirit of prototyping and experimentation. Many of the projects in here (from the late 1960s!) are the kinds of things that we might see today in the context of Design Fiction, speculative design, and the kinds of art+technology practices that are now becoming more common. The catalog is a historical document, a contemporary manifesto, and a guide for the creative potential of human-machine collaboration. It is a reminder that the most interesting possibilities often lie not in...

A conversation with Troy Campbell who describes his journey from graduate school to becoming a professor and the Chief Scientist at On Your Feet, and launching his practice Hiduke House. We talk about concepts like identity, memory, and mindset activation, and how they can be utilized across consumer, organizational, and personal contexts. Troy talks about how he fuses behavioral science with artistic practices like storytelling and applied improvisation. We also get into specific methods, such as using portals for easing transitions when imagining into possible futures, the kinds of warm-up activities that help foster creativity, and the importance of grounding ideas, understanding imperfections, and leveraging narrative to communicate effectively. Throughout we wonder about the interlinks between structured approaches and expansive creative exploration and how these in the right proportions can achieve meaningful, impactful, and wonderfully unexpected (innovative) outcomes.

Design Fiction creates material artifacts that serve as evidence of possible futures, originating from science fiction's concept of diegetic prototypes. Like Star Trek's Tricorder, these objects tell stories about future worlds and their values. Design Fiction finds practical applications in product design, policy development, and strategic planning.
Speculative Design was developed to a degree at and through the Royal College of Art's Design Interactions program, which came out of the Interaction Design program. It (Speculative Design) functions as a kind of challenge existing systems, largely to ways of being. For example, projects like United Micro Kingdoms use provocative scenarios to question technological progress and social structures. While Design Fiction works within existing systems to explore futures, Speculative Design aims to disrupt and critique them. These are rough categorizations and its important to note that there is extensive generative cross talk between these two practices and their practitioners. The debate about which and why is largely academic, and the practices themselves...

I created this Design Fiction artifact in the form of a newspaper from a future in which AI is a normal, ordinary, and everyday aspect of our lives. I did this for a workshop for a group that wanted to have a world building around which they could begin to feel into a world and make strategic assessments and have a basis for meaningful conversations that were not just populated with hype and perfect outcomes.
What is the value and purpose of this kind of Design Fiction artifact? Can we understand it as an augmentation of the typical analytic-minded trends and forexasting mechanisms that the business-oriented person values? What are we to do with these kinds of things given that they do not (always) lead immediately to clear decisions or solutions.
Look at this project as a Design Fiction artifact that imagines into or from a world where artificial intelligence is mundane, woven seamlessly into the fabric of everyday life. We...

A podcast conversation recorded while I was at Innovation Land Summit in Colombia. In it, we discuss the intersection of research, creativity, and practical implementation in driving innovation within organizations. There is a necessity to be explicit about the role of imagination, which I see as a kind of muscle that requires regular exercise to stay strong. Imagination is that which allows us to envision and develop new ideas, strategies, products, services, and brand evolutions. Through the lens of practical examples, such as the collaborations Near Future Laboratory has done with IKEA and the creation of innovative analog-digital devices, the our discussion gets into how imaginative thinking can lead to meaningful change. Of course 'Design Fiction' is centered as a method for organizations to forecast and strategically plan for the future, focusing on everyday, ordinary experiences as a foundation. Educating organizations and the broader community to adopt and integrate creative methodologies, helps ensure that innovation is not an accidental...