The Metaverse - A Stack of Reality Layers – Episode 57

Layers of Reality: Exploring the Metaverse Stack

When the headset comes off, does the world you were just in disappear—or does it linger somewhere between your senses and memory?

n our latest episode of Modem Futura, Andrew Maynard and I explore the metaverse as more than a corporate buzzword or sci-fi dream. We approach it as a continuum of realities — a multi-layered “stack” that spans the physical and digital, each tier more immersive than the last.

From our own immersive sessions with the Apple Vision Pro, we reflect on that strange moment of re-entry—when the headset comes off and the world feels slightly less real. It’s a feeling that raises existential questions about presence, identity, and how AI-generated worlds are shaping the boundaries of human experience.

In this episode, we trace the metaverse’s origins from Neil Stephenson’s Snow Crash to today’s spatial computing revolutions. We ask what happens when digital spaces become persistent and indistinguishable from physical ones—and why futures thinking is essential for guiding that transition responsibly. From procedurally generated AI environments to the idea of “digital sustainability,” we discuss how these technologies will reshape privacy, ethics, and our collective sense of reality.

Ultimately, this conversation is about our tethers to truth. In an age of deeply immersive AI systems and blended realities, how do we find our totem—our anchor that keeps us grounded in what matters most? We believe that intentional design, transparency, and care must guide how we build these new worlds before they begin to build us.

Subscribe and Connect!

Subscribe to Modem Futura wherever you get your podcasts and connect with us on LinkedIn. Drop a comment, pose a question, or challenge an idea—because the future isn’t something we watch happen, it’s something we build together. The medium may still be the massage, but we all have a hand in shaping how it touches tomorrow.

🎧 Apple Podcast: https://apple.co/4p7ZZcr

🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2C5LiGRYCdZgr5JijtK7LI?si=0FbAEihfTD6QXX5FN-2nag

📺 YouTube: https://youtu.be/iCAtutBmN5w

🌐 Website: https://www.modemfutura.com/

Atlas, Higher Education, and How We Really Feel About AI – Episode 55

Generated by ChatGPT

How We Really Feel About AI

Artificial intelligence isn’t just reshaping industries—it’s reshaping emotions. In our latest episode of Modem Futura, Andrew Maynard and I unpack Pew Research Center’s new international survey on how people view AI across 25 countries. The results are striking: while AI dominates headlines, 61 percent of respondents have heard “little or nothing” about it—and in the U.S., more people are concerned than excited.

We explore what this says about the bubbles we all inhabit. In our professional worlds, AI feels inescapable—a “black hole” pulling every conversation toward it. But outside these circles, many remain unaware of how deeply algorithmic systems already shape their lives. This disconnect raises profound questions about agency: if people don’t understand a technology that governs so much of modern life, who’s really steering the future?

The conversation also turns to trust. Europeans report more faith in their governments to regulate AI responsibly than Americans do—a difference that mirrors the EU’s proactive stance on ethics and guardrails. In contrast, U.S. policy remains fragmented, driven more by economic competition than by social cohesion. That tension—between speed and safety, innovation and inclusion—is at the heart of our discussion.

Dangers of Atlas (it's more the world he's holing... its all of your data!)

We then zoom in on universities. As public institutions, we argue they must act as transparent laboratories for AI exploration—spaces where successes and failures alike can be shared openly. The path forward isn’t boosterism; it’s honesty. We can’t earn public trust without showing our messy work. Adding to this - we explore OpenAI’s newly released Atlas browser and its privacy implications - and stumble upon a very shocking realization while recording - that private student data is easily exfiltrated when using LMS platforms such as Canvas while in this browser. What started as a curious road test of OpenAI’s new Atlas browser turned into a genuinely alarming discovery. As we installed and explored Atlas, the first surprise was how quickly the “privacy” pitch unraveled. Despite promising user control, Atlas behaved much like any other data-hungry app—prompting unusual permissions and positioning itself between us and the open web. That sparked a bigger question: if your browser is the main keyhole to the internet, what happens when an AI system sits in the keyhole, quietly learning from everything you do? (including sending and processing private user data - think ANYTHING that comes and goes from your activity on the web). The situation quickly got worse as I was unable to get Atlas to show me any particular websites security certificate. Specifically, at the time of testing (I hope they patch this soon) I could not see the sites SSL/TSL or HTTPS certificate (this is the little lock icon in most browser URL's) that tells you and the browser that your connection to the sites servers are "safe" via web-standard encryption protocols. You know, for things like your bank account info, passwords, and any other data you want to send or receive. The takeaway? Treat ATLAS like a red hot security hole for you and any organization or persons connected to you via the internet. Think twice before using this browser - as EVERYTHING you do on the web is potentially egress'd (fancy word for taken) – so until there are transparent safegaurds in place, the safest assumption is that anything you open in an AI browser like Atlas could be seen, summarized, and stored beyond your intent.

And because no Modem Futura episode is complete without a bit of speculative play, we end with Futures Improv, where we imagine AI zombies, memory economies, and spaghettified timelines—all to remind ourselves that foresight and humor often travel hand in hand.

If you care about how humanity and technology co-evolve, this episode offers a grounded yet playful map of where we stand—and where we might go next.

Subscribe and Connect!

Subscribe to Modem Futura wherever you get your podcasts and connect with us on LinkedIn. Drop a comment, pose a question, or challenge an idea—because the future isn’t something we watch happen, it’s something we build together. The medium may still be the massage, but we all have a hand in shaping how it touches tomorrow.

🎧 Apple Podcast: https://apple.co/4nuRsit

🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/04NLQcVfJpoM444bQQfQ42?si=b9adf3740a0944fe

📺 YouTube: https://youtu.be/tYoLRZH5iH8

🌐 Website: https://www.modemfutura.com/

Futures Futures Futures - ShapingEDU GCSS23

In February I was invited to present a handful of lectures and workshops to the ShapingEDU community at the ShapingEDU Global Community Solutioneering Summit 2023. The event was split over several days, starting with a virtual component where I presented a short lecture on Becoming A Citizen Futurist.

“
What could we accomplish together that we couldn’t accomplish alone?

For this event, we chose the theme of Education As Jazz. The Smithsonian Institute eloquently summarized the importance of jazz: “Often acclaimed as America’s greatest art form, jazz has become accepted as a living expression of the nation’s history and culture, still youthful, difficult to define and impossible to contain, a music of beauty, sensitivity, and brilliance that has produced (and been produced by) an extraordinary progression of talented artists.””

— Shaping ShapingEDU GCSS23

February 16 - Virtual Component

Lecture on Becoming A Citizen Futurist: Preparing for Uncertainty (a few select slides shared below)

February 23 - In Person Conference Event

Lecture on Educating for Sustainable Futures: Scanning the Futures Horizon (select images from presentation)

February 24 - In Person Workshop

Workshop on Strategic Foresight (Becoming a Citizen Futurist). This workshop focused on using the Axes of Uncertainty as an introductory foresight tool. This session was also followed up by an extended Q&A session of “Ask a futurist” where I fielded a wide range of questions from the conference participants. (A few select slides shared below)

Futures Thinking: Exploring the adjacent possible (new book chapter)

“There has never been a time of greater promise, or greater peril ”

— Professor Klaus Schwab

How can the educational system shift to a proactive–participant model in exploring the adjacent possible ushered in through the inherent uncertainty of the Fourth Industrial Revolution? How can we look to historical patterns of disruption to gain insights into the challenges of preparing for future uncertainties? How can all of this lend itself to a more sustainable futures? Find out in the ‘exciting’ new book chapter referenced below that was published in Uncertainty: A Catalyst for Creativity, Learning and Development (edited by Beghetto and Jaeger)

We (Punya Mishra, Ben Scragg, and I) invite you to read along through our recently published book chapter and join the conversation around this growing field of inquiry in educational futures and futures thinking.

[APA Citation]

Leahy, S.M., Scragg, B., Mishra, P. (2022). Creatively Confronting the Adjacent Possible: Educational Leadership and the Fourth Industrial Revolution. In: Beghetto, R.A., Jaeger, G.J. (eds) Uncertainty: A Catalyst for Creativity, Learning and Development . Creativity Theory and Action in Education, vol 6. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98729-9_17

Abstract

In this chapter we explore the unknown possibilities that lie in the shadows of disruptions and innovations known as the adjacent possible. We frame the challenges educational leaders face when trying to prepare for an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world that is propelled into the Fourth Industrial Revolution imbued with rapidly changing and unevenly distributed technological proliferation. Throughout our chapter, we offer strategic mindsets in design and futures thinking to combat the growing challenges of preparing educational systems that are rife with existing deep and complexly interwoven wicked problems for uncertainty. We propose that looking to the past, we can discover insights into meta-patterns and the ways we failed to predict the futures that emerged from previous discoveries and innovations. Using this frame, we discuss the potential of combining the interconnected mindsets of futures thinking and design, not to predict the future, but to prepare our educational systems for the uncertainty of the future.