Making A New Reality is a landmark research publication and toolkit examining how emerging media - virtual reality, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, immersive storytelling, and ambient data systems - will reshape humanity's relationship with narrative, identity, and power.
Originally published as a seven-chapter series from 2017–2018 at makinganewreality.org and syndicated at Immerse.news, this definitive 2020 edition updates and expands the research for practitioners, funders, technologists, and policymakers working at the intersection of social justice and the media frontier.
At its core, the work asks an urgent question: Who gets to build the next generation of storytelling technologies and whose realities will those technologies reflect?
Drawing from more than 130 interviews with artists, journalists, technologists, community organizers, and philanthropists, the book maps both the tremendous possibility and the profound risks at this pivotal moment of media transformation.
This project was commissioned by Cara Mertes, then Director of Ford Foundation's JustFilms program, as a global field scan to identify interventions that could tip emerging media toward justice and equality. Kamal Sinclair conducted the original research from 2017–2018 while directing Sundance Institute's New Frontier Lab Programs. The work was subsequently updated and developed into this toolkit with co-author Jessica Clark and editor Carrie McLaren. The publication is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC license, reflecting its commitment to broad distribution and the principle that knowledge about building inclusive futures belongs to the field.
Supported by Ford Foundation JustFilms and Sundance Institute.