Near Future Laboratory
Design Fiction Dispatches
“Tomorrow’s News Today”
A dispatch is like receiving a telegram from the future that contains evidence of the world from which it has come. They are like a clue we might find left for us to unpack and interpret — transformations of speculations, prognostications, instincts, intuitions, extrapolations of today's news into a different form, like a music review, a news article, a product review or entry in a product catalog. Each is grounded to current contexts, events, developments, fears, hopes, dreams, dreads, anticipated outcomes whether hopeful or dystopian.

(And sometimes these dispatches may feel speculative to the point of science-fictional or bizarre. Consider that in some sense, science fiction is a form of dispatch from the near future.)

I created these as ways to extrapolate today's contingent realities into possible futures, alternative pasts, and adjacent presents. Each dispatch is a speculation on how current events, trends, technologies, social rituals, and cultural phenomena might evolve. Of course, these dispatches are not predictions, but rather explorations of the potential implications and consequences of our current trajectory.
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A Design Fiction Dispatch image of a speculative fictional ad of the Infinite Instrument
Infinite Instrument
music creative practice generative music AI generative art
A bunch of jelly brains floating around in a pool of jelly, representing the Largely Languid Models
Largely Languid Models
mindfulness cognitive wellness retreat exploration mind-body meditation self-care more...
A Design Fiction Dispatch image of a speculative fictional ad of the On Injury Predictive Forecast Implantable
On Intelligent Injury Predictive Forecast Implantable
implants sports predication implantable health fitness cyborg
A Design Fiction Dispatch image of an opinion column on AI agents
Opinion Column: Do Our Agents Know Us Too Well?
ai design fiction digital twin agentic psychokinetic models identity theft ethical concerns
An image of a Fluke Torque 8080 Turing Clamp designed to suppress LLMs
turing clamp dispatch
turing clamp alan turing design fiction ai-safety values alignment alignment speculative artifacts
A picture of a digital twin decommissioning service kiosk in a city
Dré's Agent Service, Retrofit, Rehab & Decommissioning Service Kiosk
privacy data kiosk service kiosk digital twins decommissioning design fiction
An image of a design fiction artifact titled "dissonance induced cognitive distortion"
Dissonance Induced Cognitive Distortion
ai artificial intelligence mental health speculative design speculative artifact
Alternative text for the cover image
Faraday's Cage: A Bar & Grill
ai design fiction digital detox digital twins general seminar
Heirloom Language Models
Heirloom Language Models
ai vintage data memory language models heirloom bespoke more...