SXSW 2025 Insights: Back to the Futures
Newsletter 022
Dear Writers,
Last week, we went to SXSW in Austin, Texas to showcase Switch-Lit as a finalist for the SXSW Innovation Award. Our showcase was a small booth that combined digital demos and interactive objects, bringing to physical life the vision, values, and surrealist spirit of Switch-Lit.
The SXSW world was a real-life Instagram – an infinite scroll of creative showcases, artificial intelligences, hype beasts, humor, food porn, and eye candy 🤩.
While we ultimately did not take the top prize 👻, the overall experience accelerated deep learning around Switch-Lit’s place in the larger world, the lives of creative individuals like you, and with respect to the future of media publishing 🤔✨.
Random notes and insights from SXSW:
Artificial intelligence was everywhere, everything, and all at once.
All technology is indifferent and unemotional. Any AI boons or ills only mirror the values and intentions of the humans who use it, and not technology itself.
AI algorithms and Large Language Models (LLMs) are currently more biased towards knowledge and data from the Western world (i.e. a musician who wants to use AI to compose a musical scale will be served a Western musical scale unless asking for non-Western scales).
A new wave of content creators will rise and saturate platforms with AI-assisted content creation across all mediums.
Youtube will be the new “Hollywood” with over 12 million full-time content creators on Youtube and a market value of 470 billion USD by 2027.
Acquisition of Youtube channels as content marketing hubs with diverse monetization channels have reached seven-figure deals.
Designing for the rise of neurodiversity (ADHD, autism, dyslexia, etc.) can leverage new opportunities for communication, creativity, and collaboration.
People with ADHD receive approximately 20,000 more negative messages before the age of 12 than people without ADHD.
“Relationships” are at the core of fostering democracy on a local level.
Before policies and facts, storytelling is a vital and overlooked first step for bonding polarized communities and fostering democracy.
The “collective imagination” can serve as valuable R&D (i.e. “Research and Development”) for the future design of cities and communities.
Of the small percentage (~1%) of writers who get published by a major publishing house, an even smaller percentage achieve the most desired level – a film or television adaptation of their work. Therefore, a vast majority of writers develop deep meaning and validation in the process of writing.
People loved our Switch-Lit bookmarks! (Shout out to Switch-Lit writer, fellow creative, and new local friend Caitlin Wharton for this suggestion)
Switch-Lit bookmark. Front side (L), back side (R)
Where does Switch-Lit fit in this world?
The innovation of Switch-Lit is its inclusive game-like storytelling design and use of technology to repair our social fabric and regain a sense of community.
Switch-Lit gives writers, poets, and storytellers across all cultures social connection and creative accountability through collaborative storytelling.
Switch-Lit will explore the use of AI for 1) real-time language translations between writers who do not speak the same native languages, 2) a Switch-Lit AI editor companion to support writers on their respective chapters towards a cohesive final story, 3) AI-assisted visual adaptations of published Switch-Lit stories and/or chapters in progress, and 4) AI-assisted writer matchmaking.
We’ve been developing a Switch-Lit Youtube channel for the past few months, and SXSW confirms how to uniquely approach it with respect to multimedia adaptations inspired by the process (i.e. the collaborative writing experience) vs. multimedia adaptations inspired by the product (i.e. published stories).
The number of “extraordinary relationships” is a potent measurable outcome for Switch-Lit beyond the number of users, finished stories, etc.
Provocative pairings of writers can inspire new categories of stories and poems in the Switch-Lit Library, such as anthologies of the best collaborative stories or poems written by spouses, family members, incarcerated people, hospitalized people, college friends, neighbors, migrants, etc.
Switch-Lit for educators, librarians, local governments, and health professionals presents creative growth opportunities for Switch-Lit.
But first things first…
More stories and poems are being submitted from around the world, and we’re excited to regularly publish, promote, and celebrate these stories in the Switch-Lit Library and other channels 🎉. Stay tuned also for significant updates around opening up Subrosa, our portal for writer matchmaking 🌹…
Thanks for being part of the Switch-Lit community!
– Ken
S••L Founder & Editor
Featured prompt:
Prompt 3
Craft a character portrait of a beloved local radio DJ in the days leading up to a final show.
Did you know?
In 2016, Yousuke Yukimatsu (aka “¥ØU$UK€ ¥UK1MAT$U”) from Osaka, Japan was diagnosed with brain cancer and so he quit his job as a construction worker to become a full-time DJ. He mixes a range of music genres and Internet culture into a cohesive set that catapults rave-rock dance into existential flight.
Listen to his legendary Boiler Room set from earlier this year below 🎛️😑🔥.
”This man mixes oil, water and mercury.”
– @christiancastro5745 (via YouTube)
Don’t give up.
“The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.”
Mary Oliver, poet
“Deadlines and things make you creative.”
Jack White, musician and songwriter
Contact us:
📟 Ping us with any questions, requests, or proposals for Switch-Lit:
editors@switch-lit.com