This document discusses the need to create more optimistic visions of the future through storytelling. It provides several techniques for developing future stories, such as creative deconstruction, future fragments, and collaborative imagining. The goal is to engage communities, bring together diverse voices, and provide tools to build futures agency. Examples include an activity called "The Future Traveler 2040" that imagines a person's life in the future, and "The Gift 2040" which uses narrative elements to make the future more personal and show reasons for technology.
7. • more cynical
• more stressed
• more distracted
• more diverse
Too many people act as if
the future is a destination
waiting for us to arrive.
Inevitable, Unavoidable
In a world where
8. Confessions of a rambling
futurist & storyteller
Critique
Practice
Prototype
9. Tomorrow begins with a story
If we want to imagine a better
future and then build it we need to
change the story we are telling
ourselves about the future we want
to live in. Brian David Johnson
19. Practopia
“A positive, even a
revolutionary alternative, yet
within the range of
realistically attainable.”
Alvin Toffler
The Third Wave
embraces diversity
pulses with innovation
enclaves of stability
art over commerce
democratic and humane
respects the biosphere
22. We need a place to build
community foresight skills
Imaginetic Centers
Where people are
brought together to
speculate freely, even
playfully, about
possible futures
Alvin Toffler
23. GOALS
Engage local communities
Bring together diverse voices
Provide tools for critical imagination
Build futures agency
Use foresight to create insights
25. Challenge the official future
Objectives
Start thinking about the future
Assess trend knowledge
Introduce agency
26. The future traveler 2040
We’re going to explore your community in
2040 through the eyes of a person you
know today.
This could be a family member, a friend or
significant other. It could also be someone
you know socially or professionally. Select
someone you know well enough to be able
to imagine what her/his/their life might be
like in the year 2040.
To get started we need to know a little bit
about your future traveler.
28. The Gift 2040
Objectives
Making the future personal
Introducing narrative elements
Reasons for technology
Graduation
A commercial robot that Hope
will use to begin her own
business