Digital Native
Nation

Digital Immigrants Leading
Digital Natives

Medium as
Message
When the primary
means of storing
and distributing
information
changes…

Medium as
Worldview
…our worldviews
change!

Comparing the Mediums
Dynamic Linear Fluid Interactive
Open-Ended Sequential Fragmented Linked
Ephemeral Permanent Transitory Iterative
Intimate Abstract Vicarious Virtual
Now Historical Future Time-Morph
Messenger Content Impression Experience

Symbolic
Realistic
Conceptual
Convergent
Hacked/
Moded

Brain Wiring
Oral
Non-linear, Holistic,
Intimate, Relational
Print
Linear, Sequential,
Rational, Concept
Broadcast
Fluid, Fragmented,
Emotional, Image
Digital/Interactive
Non-linear, Holistic,
Systems Thinkers

New media NEW DESIGN
New perceptions New culture
New worldview New structures
New understandings New relationships
New psychology New language
Then What? Revolution!

Low cost High cost
On demand On command
Tailored Mass Appeal
Interactive One directional
Mass amateurization Exclusive
Collective enterprises Star products
Aha! Ta Da!
Active Passive
Focus on the whole Focus on a concept/
image

Design
Capabilities
are a
Commodity
Design
Thinking is a
Premium

Modeling
vs. Drawing
Simulation
vs. Analysis
Data Rich
vs.
Concept
Only

The Design Subculture
is going Mainstream

Rapid
Prototyping

Design
Economy

2008

2018

The Difference is Nature not Nurture
Workview and Worldview

Peering into the Digital Future

Maps of
unexplored
worlds are
more about
Art than
Geography

Where we are NOW

Early Cinema Remediated Theater

Before the dawn of
the digital age we
presented our
brilliantly crafted
predictions using a
Early digital technology that was
born at the turn of
the LAST century.
remediates
multiple
communication
technologies

The PowerPoint presentation
Became the communication medium of choice.
With this powerful new tool of the digital age we
were able to fill up page after page with
•Bullet points
•Cutesy clip art
•Impossible to read font styles
•In too many colors
•Indecipherable charts and graphs
•And long quotations that we were apt to read
verbatim to our audiences.

Midway Mania
The Laugh Floor
Digitizing the
theme park

Our digital
playground
Innoventions

The limits of remediation

We suffer
TECHNOLUST

We are constantly disappointed

The next step
Set the new
medium
free

Digital as medium AND message
From: Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information by David Byrne

Looking for digital landmarks

Rearrange & Recombine

Connect

Constant Change

Who are the digital explorers?

Digital Generation 1.1
James Moore: Concept Designer
Walt Disney Imagineering
Graduate: Ringling &
Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy

Seeing design through a digital lens

Digital Generation 2.0
Allie Tankersley, age 12
Aspiring Actress
Social Networking Queen

Real Digital Babies

How will
Digitality
change
designers?

Digital design is mass mind

To be digital is to be holistic

Digital
lives in the
future

What will a digitally designed
world look like?

Designers will be King

Learning in
a design
world

Fear of the amateurs

Designers
for life

End of zero sum

Welcome to the brave new world!

Joe Tankersley
joe.tankersley@disney.com
Rex Miller
rex@rexmiller.net