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Superstruct: (Re)Building Our Future

Our world is in deep trouble, and as the danger mounts, the Institute for the Future's Ten-Year Forecast team and Dr. Jane McGonigal have a new mission for you! IFTF recently announced Superstruct, "the world's first massively multiplayer forecasting game." Scheduled to begin on September 22, 2008, Superstruct is expected to run for six weeks. The human race has only 23 years left, and it's up to you to save us! The countdown begins in 2019.

Dr. McGonigal is no stranger to games that use future forecasting as a design element. She helped develop World Without Oil, a game that asked players to imagine and document their lives during an oil shock. Like World Without Oil, Superstruct will ask players to project themselves into the year 2019, at a time when a supercomputer simulation dubbed "GEAS" has predicted that the human race has a survival horizon of 23 years. GEAS, or the "Global Extinction Awareness System," has pinpointed five "super-threats" that may bring about the collapse of human civilization as we know it. (Perhaps incidentally, a "geas" is also a vow or binding, often magical or supernatural, that is difficult or impossible to ignore or cast off.)

What does the name "Superstruct" mean, and what does it tell us about the goals of the game? According to the game's FAQ, "superstructing" refers to the building of new structures on top of old structures. The problems uncovered in 2019 indicate that the existing structures - social, commercial, environmental, etc. - are not enough to support the survival of the human race. Superstruct asks players to work towards building new structures and finding new solutions to overcome the "super-threats" identified by the GEAS.

"This is a game of survival, and we need you to survive" states IFTF's mission briefing. Rather than simply projecting or predicting the future, Superstruct aims to "invent the future" through player contributions, survival stories, strategies, and more. "Bring what you know and who you know," IFTF's Superstruct FAQ invites, "and we'll all figure out how to make 2019 a world we want to live in."

While we wait for September, IFTF has invited players to get a head start on the game by sending a description of their future selves and their lives in 2019 to superstruct@iftf.org. Players' responses will be posted on the Superstruct blog throughout the summer.

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The Institute for the Future is hiring five community leaders/game masters for the upcoming future forecasting game Superstruct.

It’s an eight-week position beginning September 8, 2008. You can be a game master from anywhere in the world (outside of US is okay; we will have players from all over the world, although primarily playing in English), and it will require ~ 12 hours of online work per week. You’ll work very closely with me (Jane McGonigal, Avant Game) and Jamais Cascio (Open the Future). This is a non-profit game with no commercial sponsors; the position comes with a stipend of $2500.

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Your job will be to lead a team of players (at minimum, hundreds of players; more likely, thousands of players) in creating a collaborative online forecast of the year 2019. The forecasting will take place through wikis, forums, videos, blogs, Twitter, online comics, photo sets, and whatever else our players use to depict and talk about the future. You'll be reading and watching lots of player-created content, in addition to making your own content. You'll give the players feedback, and you'll synthesize and summarize the most interesting things in a short weekly story. You'll be moderating forums and wikis dedicated to solving a particular future-problem. You'll have to help your community manage a careful balance between "wow, the future might be scary" storytelling to "you know what, we might actually be able to solve this problem before it kills us all" optimism. Because the game isn't just about imagining the future. It's about inventing the future. This game is a kind of working prototype for the year 2019!

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To apply: Send a letter to me at superstruct@iftf.org explaining why you want to join us on the Superstruct team. Mention any previous experience as a writer, or thinking about the future, playing or making games, running online communities, or being an interesting person online. Include a CV or resume if you think it will help explain who you are, but most importantly, in your letter, answer this question: It's the summer of 2019. You are yourself, but 10 years in the future. Describe where you are having for dinner, what you're eating, and what you're thinking or talking about. How did you wind up there, compared to where you had dinner most often in the summer of 2008?

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