Presentations

As part of this course, you will have to Present on a Digital Future of your choice.

Digital Futurology Presentation

In your presentations, you will make a prediction about a development that will apply to or take place in a digital phenomenon of your choice.

  • Slide1: “I predict that [development X] will happen to [digital phenomenon Y] in [about Z time].”
  • Slide2: Explain digital phenomenon Y:
    • in 280 characters or less, plus one image
  • Slide3: Current status of Development X (in digital phenomenon Y)
    • in 280 characters or less, plus one image
  • Slide4: Reason why you believe Development X will happen (in Z years):
    • in 280 characters or less, plus one image
  • Slide 5: Whether you think it is a good or bad thing that Development X will happen to phenomenon Y (and why).
    • in 280 characters or less, plus one image
  • Slide6: “If you would like to know more about this, I suggest following/reading/watching [online resource/person]

A sample format for this presentation will be downloadable here from Block 2 on.

Further Details

Only one image/slide!

Presentations will be short! 5-7 minutes, incl. 2 minutes for short comments/questions and handover.

Hand in the presentation as a Powerpoint or PDF via Brightspace at the latest on Monday, November 27 (2023). You’ll present on either 6 or 13 December.

I Can’t Predict the Future!

Yes, you can! You’ve probably done it a couple of times already, just today.

Of course, predicting the future accurately, especially further away in time, is pretty hard.

You may think you don’t have the knowledge to accurately predict digital developments because, after one course, you can hardly be called a digital culture specialist. However, it seems, from research by Philip Tetlock and colleagues, that being a specialist is not an accurate predictor of making accurate predictions.

If you’re interested in this research, including concrete tips on what does work to make accurate and insightful predictions, you can start with this Harvard Business Review article or this (transcript of) NY Times podcast interview with Tetlock.

If you like predicting the future, you can even specialize in Futurology or Future Studies. In fact, it is an established interdisciplinary field. For those of you taking the AI and the Humanities course, we will be using another futurology technique, scenario planning, in my class on the AI Revolution.