When the risks of technologies come true

The audio drama pieces about the future are tools for the Futures Frequency workshop to help participants identify and think about different assumptions regarding the future.

Published

February 15, 2021

Welcome to encountering different assumptions about the future.

These audio drama pieces represent exaggerated versions of prevailing views of the future. They’re not intended to be forecasts or descriptions of preferred futures, but rather to help you identify and think about the underlying presuppositions involved. Each piece is a few minutes long.

Audio transcript

Soundscape: machine sounds, the whirring of a car, the sounds of car radio buttons, the sound of emergency vehicles

CAR RADIO:

We interrupt this programme for an automatic warning. Satellite data indicates you are approaching Helsinki. Helsinki is 10 kilometres away. Please make a U-turn as soon as possible.

You are approaching Helsinki. Please make a U-turn as soon as possible.

Repeat: You are approaching a hazardous area. Make a U-turn as soon as possible.

Press 1 for more information.

(beep)

More information on the Helsinki bio plague zone. Following a failed biotech experiment in 2030, the entire city of Helsinki is closed off and uninhabitable. There is a bacterial plague spreading in Helsinki that can move from one living organism to another and is extremely dangerous. The human fatality rate of this bio plague is more than 80 per cent.

(beep beep beep)

Helsinki is now nine kilometres away. Turn around immediately. If you do not turn around, your vehicle will be turned off automatically and you will have to wait for emergency services. Please make a U-turn as soon as possible.

Producer: Emil Johansson, Jaksomedia
Script: Noora Mattila, Jaksomedia
Audio Production: Juha Jaakkola, Jaksomedia
Voice actors: Rebecca Clamp and James Lórien MacDonald

What’s involved?

The audio drama pieces are inspired particularly by an article about myths concerning the future. Further inspiration has been drawn from scenarios drawn from science fiction films as well as the futurist Jim Dator’s four futures archetypes: Continuation, Decline & Collapse, Limits & Discipline and Transformation.

Some of the scenarios in the audio drama pieces may feel more preferable than others, and some may feel more believable than others. But the idea is not to debate probabilities or preferences, rather to identify the future-related assumptions in the audio drama pieces and think about them in relation to your thinking about the future. What are my own assumptions about the future?

Back to Futures Frequency?

projects

Reading list

Continue reading

When the risks of technologies come true

Published

What’s involved?

Back to Futures Frequency?

Futures Frequency

When the risks of technologies come true

Published

Share

Share

What’s involved?

Back to Futures Frequency?

Futures Frequency