Near Future Laboratory Podcast

This is a special episode of the Near Future Laboratory Podcast — a digest of General Seminar 17 which was on the topic of "Solarpunk". So this episode consists of excerpts from that seminar, along with some commentary for context. Thanks to all the wonderful participants from that session, and especially to our extra special guest participant Andrew Dana Hudson who has a forthcoming book on Climate Fiction called Our Shared Storm: A Novel of Five Climate Futures due to drop on April 5th. I mentioned that I would put a link to a Solarpunk Futures proposal the Near Future Laboratory DAO submitted. The proposal is up on IPFS — it's called A Design Fiction Blockchain Solar Punk Public Future Project. I implore you to take a look, and help us figure out how we can develop this further. Creating imaginaries of more habitable plausible possible near futures is vital — maybe even more important than just building tech for climate change mitigation. If you don't have a large public shared imaginary of what a more habitable future might look like, you've lost the game for creating a future. All I see nowadays for the future is dismal ruin. (Thanks Hollywood!) Please support the Near Future Laboratory Podcast over on Patreon — https://patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory — Your support is very much appreciated and helps me know that you value the effort that goes into producing the show! Want to find out more about General Seminar? Looking to bring General Seminar into your team or organization to help flex your imagination muscle and be a better futures thinker? Get in touch! https://generalseminar.com Also, learn more about the Design Fiction mindset and get involved with us! Join the Near Future Laboratory Discord — https://linktr.ee/bleeckerj Please subscribe, rate and share this podcast amongst your friends and colleagues! Thank you for listening.

This is the first of what I hope to be a series of conversations with people operating in the foresight/futures arena and I'm calling it Futurists Talking To Futurists. Radha Mistry and I met late last year when her team posted a role in their growing strategic foresight team. I was intrigued by our conversation and asked if she would come on the podcast to talk about her role, experiences, and insights — mostly because I was trying to understand what "foresight" meant or means now after I had been away for nearly 8 years quite focussed on building and growing my product company OMATA. It was a super fun, casual chat where I could ask naive questions and learn from Radha and her remarkable trajectory in and around architecture, futures, and strategic foresight. I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please consider supporting this podcast. The easiest way to do this is to share it amongst your team, friends, colleagues, family — and rank the podcast on whatever platform on which you're listening. You can also support the podcast over at https://patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory or you can buy me a "coffee" over at https://ko-fi.com/bleeckerj. Your support is greatly appreciated! https://www.linkedin.com/in/radha-mistry-63024440/

This is a special episode of the Near Future Laboratory Podcast — a digest of General Seminar 16 which was on the topic of "The Generalist". So this episode consists of excerpts from that seminar, along with some commentary for context. Thanks to all the wonderful participants from that session. Please support the Near Future Laboratory Podcast over on Patreon — https://patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory — Your support is very much appreciated and helps me know that you value the effort that goes into producing the show! Want to find out more about General Seminar? Looking to bring General Seminar into your team or organization to help flex your imagination muscle and be a better futures thinker? Get in touch! https://generalseminar.com Also, learn more about the Design Fiction mindset and get involved with us! Join the Near Future Laboratory Discord — https://linktr.ee/bleeckerj Please subscribe, rate and share this podcast amongst your friends and colleagues! Thank you for listening.

Ed Finn is Director at Arizona State University's Center for Science and the Imagination and Associate Professor at the School for the Future of Innovation in Society. In our conversation we wonder through a variety of topics including the nature of the imagination and education, Design Fiction, CSI's work on Climate Futures and Climate Fiction and a whole lot more! Please support this podcast at patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory or buy me a coffee ☕ — thanks! Check out my linktree for links to the Near Future Laboratory Discord server, my portfolio site, and newsletter and all the rest.

Katie McCrory leads the Life at Home global team at IKEA, where she oversees the production of the annual global Life at Home Report. Katie bought into the principles of Design Fiction, particularly the focus on the "everyday", and commissioned me to work with her team to bring some clarity and acuity to the global research 2021 results with some Design Fiction, ultimately delivered within the Life at Home Magazine. In this episode, Katie and I talk about the role of Design Fiction in corporate contexts, and a bit "behind the scenes" as to how we effectively and efficiently achieved some impactful and meaningful results and delivered them in the Life at Home Magazine. Please consider supporting this podcast. You can do so over on https://patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory. You can also "buy" me a "coffee" over at https://ko-fi.com/bleeckerj or disintermediate and support us directly by sending $ETH to bleecker.eth.  If you're into this kind of material and the discussions and work surrounding it, consider joining the Near Future Laboratory Discord! General Seminar is entering Season 2 — be sure to check it out and sign up, and you'll definitely want to sign up to the Design Fiction Newsletter. To find out more about me and my work or to talk about work, visit my portfolio site here: https://julianbleecker.com and reach out. https://lifeathome.ikea.com/ https://lifeathome.ikea.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/IKEA_LifeatHome_Magazine2021.pdf https://lifeathome.ikea.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Data_LifeatHomeReport_LAHR21.pdf https://shop.nearfuturelaboratory.com/products/design-fiction-a-short-essay-on-design-science-fact-and-fiction https://julianbleecker.com https://ko-fi.com/bleeckerj https://buttondown.email/designfiction

The artist known as DEAFBEEF began an as art project in 2020 at the start of the COVID 19 pandemic and has drawn attention during the 2021 NFT boom. His work experiments with generative practices, minimal and even near-obsolete technology, and creative emergence. Please consider supporting this podcast. You can do so over on https://patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory. You can also "buy" me a "coffee" over at https://ko-fi.com/bleeckerj or disintermediate and support us directly to bleecker.eth. If you're into this kind of material and the discussions and work surrounding it, consider joining the Near Future Laboratory Discord! General Seminar is entering Season 2 — be sure to check it out and sign up, and you'll definitely want to sign up to the Design Fiction Newsletter. To find out more about me and my work or to talk about work, visit my portfolio site here: https://julianbleecker.com and reach out.

General Seminar N°14 was on Web3!  Yeah!  What the heck is that anyway??  Well — that's why we have General Seminar; to discuss the things we're somewhat confused about..the things on the edge of meaning. General Seminar. Listen in on some of the outcomes of Seminar and tune in to our design fiction excavations. We started with a simple brief: what is travel in a Web3 universe? What is the refrigerator in a Web3 universe? DISCUSS! Please support the Near Future Laboratory Podcast over on Patreon — https://patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory — Your support is very much appreciated and helps me know that you value the effort that goes into producing the show! Want to find out more about General Seminar? Looking to bring General Seminar into your team or organization to help flex your imagination muscle and be a better futures thinker? Get in touch! https://generalseminar.com Also, learn more about the Design Fiction mindset and get involved with us! Join the Near Future Laboratory Discord — https://linktr.ee/bleeckerj

Jaymo a/k/a Jay Springett is a writer, podcaster, strategist, currently specializing in the distributed web, metaverse, and world running. He works with individuals and organisations to create cohesive worlds. Hybrid environments made up of people, places, technologies and the cultures they create together. You can find him and his work at thejaymo.net. Here are some links to some of the material, references, and topics we covered: Interdependence Ep. 22: This is All Happening Right Now: Solarpunk, cultural fracking and the real Jurassic Park with Jay Springett Permanently Moved Podcast Headless Brands Essay “The indifference Engine” (also The Indifference Engine - An Ecological Characterisation of Bitcoin) Olalekan Jeyifous "Olalekan Jeyifous Is Imagining an Afrofuturist Brooklyn"

Mieke Marple is an artist and writer, and creator of the Medusa Collection, a set of 2,500 unique NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain. It’s a large scale artwork + restorative history + fundraiser that dedicates 25% of all sales to Steven Van Zandt’s national education non-profit TeachRock.org Mieke and I talk about art, running a traditional art gallery, and her motivations to move to digital and specifically crypto art. Please consider supporting this podcast over on Patreon or buy me a coffee! Thank you for ranking this podcast, and for your support! LINKS [Mieke Marple] (https://miekemarple.com/) [Medusa Collection] (http://medusacollection.io/) [Teach Rock] (https://teachrock.org/) [Become a Patron] (https://www.patreon.com/nearfuturelaboratory) [Near Future Laboratory Discord]( https://discord.gg/PHbDruNGN5)

A discussion with Nick Foster, Head of Design at X (a/k/a The Moonshot Factory). Please consider supporting this podcast, or if you want — buy me a Coffee! You may also be interested in the Design Fiction Newsletter as well as the Near Future Laboratory Discord, high-signal / low-noise channel discussing design, technoculture, and futures. Thank you for listening! Julian