Envision the future to prioritize research.

This question, and others that will follow in coming weeks, have been contributed by mediaX faculty and industry affiliates through interviews about priorities for the future.

mediaX invites YOU to consider these questions, refine and explore them, and – importantly – share what you’re working on to create a better future for all. We can do more together than any can do alone, so join the mediaXstanford LinkedIn community to identify critical issues (and solutions) for the future.

Question 9: Meaningful University-Industry Collaboration

How might university-industry collaborations provide leadership for intellectual risk-taking, research design, and knowledge creation?

a. How can practices and insights from creativity and design be incorporated into research, knowledge creation, and technology development?

b. How can the serendipity that creates inspiration for innovation be energized and sustained?

c. How can industry-academic collaborations encourage intellectual risk-taking and wild-card ideas to explore and discover insights to conquer the grand challenges?

Question 8: Empowerment Through Institutions

How might corporations, universities and organizations develop structures, technologies, and decision pathways to productively empower people to make progress towards resolving the societal challenges of today and tomorrow?

Question 7: Protected and Secure Identity

How might the emerging tech of ubiquitous computing, context awareness, and embodiment be channeled to improve lives while protecting privacy and personal identity?

Question 6: Trust Enhancing Technologies

How might developments in information technologies facilitate interpersonal dynamics and interactions to foster and renew trusting and mutually beneficial relationships between people, between people and systems, and among systems?

Question 5: Stories for Sustainability and Growth

In what ways can media and storytelling be leveraged to develop new understandings of the physical world and how humans interact with it, in order to inform and motivate actions towards a more sustainable future?

Question 4: Communication Across Boundaries

How might researchers inform the co-evolution of technology-media-human relationships in ways that assist people in building bridges and facilitating communication between generations and across boundaries of expertise and experiences?

Question 3: Humanized Workflows

How might human science insights guide the development and deployment of technologies to enable work to be done more pleasantly and ultimately with more human-to-human connection and wellness?

Question 2: Insights for Dignity and Wellbeing

How might socio-technical systems anticipate and build in a moral commitment to the human ethical values of diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice for mutually beneficial implementation – for both individual and collective wellbeing?

Question 1: Curiosity to Drive Purpose
How might socio-technical systems be leveraged to cultivate a sense of curiosity, agency, and creativity, facilitate lifelong learning, and create pathways for future personal growth opportunities? 

Questions for the Future have been enriched with results of mediaX research and programs over the past 21 years. Although mediaX programs have already initiated inquiries on some of these questions and organizations around the world are tackling one or more of them, the challenges are still considered open. These challenges are complex and concerted collaboration is needed to develop insights and implement solutions.

In lieu of our in-person event in February, the discussion will now take place on LinkedIn/mediaXatstanford.