Interviews, Catalysts, and Team Profiles
When we see people doing things we admire, we recruit them for (a) interviews, (b) our Catalyst community, and (c) our team!
Catalysts are a key part of the NewMo network, helping us stay accountable to our values. To learn more about Catalysts (or nominate a new Catalyst), check out the Catalyst FAQ. (Note: Not everyone we interview is a Catalyst.)
Our advisors, team, and creative contributors are also really great :)
Modern Magical Realism on Twitter: The Exquisite Modalities and #invisiblenetworks of @ctrlcreep
By posting vignettes and encouraging their Twitter followers to do the same, @ctrlcreep has created a community of surreal, self-aware writing....
Catalyst: William Bryant Miles
williambryantmiles is a theatre innovator, co-creator of the production company Show:UP!, and a native of Brooklyn....
Catalyst: Helena Puig Larrauri
Helena Puig Larrauri is an expert in digital peacebuilding, currently experimenting with ways to depolarize conversations on social media....
Web Producer: Eeman Abbasi
Eeman Abbasi is a writer and co-founder of Traversing Tradition, examining modernity through a Muslim lens. She also does some web production for NewMo....
Senongo Akpem’s African Storytelling Diaspora: Cross-Cultural Design and Art on the Internet
Senongo, author of 'Cross-Cultural Design,' is a design strategist and creator of Pixel Fable, an interactive archive of stories from his Nigerian heritage....
Innovation in an Ebola Epidemic: Interview with Ka-Ping Yee
Ka-Ping Yee is a software engineer who spent months working on Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo, developing tools for Doctors Without Borders. Here are some things he's learned....
Book Review: The Metamodernist Movement
A review of the "metamodernist” school of "Hanzi Freinacht" — an optimistic worldview that hopes to address sustainability, inequality, and alienation....
Catalyst: Whitney Beltrán
Whitney Beltrán, a.k.a. “Strix,” is an award-winning narrative designer and co-creator of feminine horror game 'Bluebeard's Bride.'...
Catalyst: Ajit George
Ajit George is both director of operations for an educational non-profit in India, and a writer of speculative fiction games....
Catalyst: Shanna McIntyre
Shanna McIntyre is founder and chief data officer at Delos Insurance, an insurance tech startup that's using satellite data, AI, and climate modeling to make disaster predictions more accurate....
Catalyst: Louis Evans
Louis Evans is a science fiction writer in New York City. His work has been published in Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Interzone, Escape Pod, and other markets....
Catalyst: Ann Ravel
Ann Ravel is former chair of the Federal Election Commission and an expert in online disinformation and digital political advertising....
Catalyst: Midori
Midori is both a multidisciplinary artist and a globetrotting educator delivering sexuality, BDSM, and personal empowerment workshops....
The Economics of Culture, Values, and Meaning: Interview with Tyler Cowen
Tyler Cowen is an economist at George Mason University and creator of the 17-year-old blog Marginal Revolution....
Catalyst: Dan Gerbang
Dan Gerbang is a performing artist. Audiences have said: "Amazing! So fun! What’s wrong with you?"...
Production: Michael J. Seidlinger
Michael J. Seidlinger is a writer, editor, founder of the small press Civil Coping Mechanisms, and co-founder of literary arts partnership The Accomplices. He also helps NewMo with production....
Catalyst: Rob Cameron
Rob Cameron is lead organizer for the Brooklyn Speculative Fiction Writers and managing editor of the SFF podcast Kaleidocast.nyc....
Events & Marketing: Brooke Daily
Brooke Daily is an event producer and artist working with organizations like DanceSafe and Organ House. She also helps NewMo with events and marketing....
Catalyst: Terry Johnson
Terry D. Johnson teaches bioengineering and says, "By teaching, I hope to give students the tools that they will need to repair me as I get older."...
Catalyst: Jericha Senyak
Jericha Senyak is an interdisciplinary artist, an accountant, and an arts accountant working to make financial literacy easy for artists....
Catalyst: Jane Hu
Jane Hu is a fine art, performance, and travel photographer who has also done lots of work in digital media strategy....
The Mega-Diverse Coral Reef Future of Humanity: Interview with Anders Sandberg
Anders Sandberg is a computational neuroscientist at Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute, where it’s his job to think about the future of humanity....
Catalyst: Rose Broome
Rose Broome is an entrepreneur and political organizer who founded HandUp, a direct donation system for people experiencing homelessness. She's also an alumna of the NewMo core team....
Catalyst: Hakan Seyalioglu
Hakan Seyalioglu is a cryptographer and game designer whose most recent game is about Nicaraguan sign language....
Catalyst: Tom Stahl
Tom Stahl is an award-winning travel, landscape, and architecture photographer who believes we must radically alter our relationship to nature....
Catalyst: Jessica Outlaw
Jessica Outlaw, M.S., is a culture and behavior researcher in immersive tech and spatial computing and founder of the Outlaw Center of Immersive Behavioral Science....
Catalyst: John Law
John Law is a legendary culture-jamming artist: co-founder of the Cacophony Society, member of the Suicide Club, and co-founder of Burning Man....
Catalyst: Dorothy Santos
Dorothy R. Santos is a Filipina American writer and artist whose academic interests include digital art, computational media, games, and biotechnology....
Advisor: Jonathan Stray
Jonathan Stray is a computational journalist who has worked at ProPublica, the Associated Press, and more. He's also a researcher at the Partnership on AI....
Catalyst: Zarinah Agnew
Zarinah Agnew is a neuroscientist and radical activist who devotes lots of time to supporting co-living spaces and advocating for prison justice....
Advisor: Nick Pinkston
Nick Pinkston is an entrepreneur with a history in hardware and the Maker Movement, plus he's a political organizer....
Founder: Lydia Laurenson
Lydia Laurenson founded The New Modality and sometimes does other stuff....
Advisor: Ben Aldern
Ben Aldern is an entrepreneur and data scientist who cares about how the biosphere will flourish over the next 100 years and beyond....
Catalyst: Michael Middleton
Michael T. Middleton currently serves as the creative director for SeedBolt Studios, where he drives world building, character design, and creative development projects....
Catalyst: William Winters
William Winters is an organizer and strategist in both the world of progressive politics, and the sex-positive community....
Catalyst: Misha Bonaventura
Misha Bonaventura co-produces Bonobo Tribe, an adult sex-positive community, and works broadly towards consent culture....
Catalyst: David Jay
David Jay is the founder of the world's largest asexual community, one of the first people to take advantage of California's law enabling third parent adoption, plus an amazing movement-builder...
Catalyst: Jun Axup
Jun Axup is a biotechnologist, entrepreneur, investor, artist, musician, and community-builder....
Catalyst: Abraham Burickson
Abraham Burickson is artistic director of Odyssey Works, an art collective whose work the New York Times calls “a beautiful inefficiency."...
Catalyst: Alexandros Pagidas
Alexandros is a Greek philosopher and entrepreneur whose work is notable for its idealism and ambition. His interests include morality, spirituality, heroism, beauty, and how to live....
Catalyst: Todd Masonis
Todd Masonis founded a tech startup and then Dandelion Chocolate, a highly transparent and values-oriented chocolate company....
Catalyst: Elaine Wherry
Elaine Wherry grew up on a Missouri goat farm, became an experienced tech founder, and then co-created a chocolate factory....
Catalyst: Anna Lewis
Anna Lewis is a biotech researcher and a fellow-in-residence between Harvard's Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics and the Center for Bioethics....
Catalyst: Samo Burja
Samo Burja's research focuses on the institutions, and the social and material technologies, that provide the foundation for healthy human societies....
Catalyst: Sarah Henry
Sarah Henry's freelance design projects range from digital governance platforms, to mobile apps for the classroom, to experimental artificial intelligence, to digital art....
Catalyst: Benjamin Wachs
Benjamin Wachs is often described as a core member of Burning Man’s Philosophical Center and is the founder of the Institute of Magical Historicity....
Catalyst: Jason Porath
Jason Porath created "Rejected Princesses" and "Tough Mothers," two book-series celebrating the lives of little-known women with illustrated histories of their lives....
Catalyst: Alana Corbett
Alana Corbett is an experience designer and curator who works across technology, music, and art. She's also the head of programming for Today at Apple....
Catalyst: Benja Juster
Benja Juster is an immersive artist and creative producer with a bottomless appetite for culture....
Catalyst: Jim Pugh
Jim Pugh co-founded the Universal Income Project, a nonprofit devoted to the expansion of economic security and human dignity....
Catalyst: Alexander Rose
Alexander Rose is an expert in combat robots, an industrial designer, and the executive director of The Long Now Foundation, which is building an all-mechanical 10,000 Year Clock....
Catalyst: Jessica Carew Kraft
Jessica Carew Kraft is an independent journalist trained in cultural anthropology, a certified California Naturalist, and an advocate of rewilding....
Catalyst: Jane Friedman
Jane Friedman is the editor and publisher of The Hot Sheet, the essential industry newsletter for authors, and a tireless advocate for writers....
Catalyst: Michael Garfield
Michael Garfield is a "paleontologist-futurist" – a multimedia artist whose work grounds conversations about the future in a deep study of Big History....
Catalyst: Andrew Taggart
Andrew Taggart is a philosopher focused on "the most basic question: how to live."...
Catalyst: Valerie Beltran
Valerie Beltrán is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist specializing in trauma (EMDR), polyamory, and adolescents, and also has an interest in how tech can expand consciousness....
Designer: Jenna Van Hout
Jenna is a visual designer who has worked with non-profits, political campaigns, Fortune 500 companies, startups, financial institutions, and everything in between....
Interviewer: Alicia Chen
Alicia Chen is an aspiring data scientist, mental health researcher, and NewMo interviewer....
Editor: Michael Coren
Michael Coren is a technology and business journalist who has swum from Alcatraz to San Francisco and has a special interest in climate change....
Catalyst: Cathy Reisenwitz
Cathy Reisenwitz is a widely-published writer whose personal newsletter is aptly titled Sex and the State....
Editor: Katie MacBride
Katie MacBride is an Associate Editor at Anxy Magazine, and her writing has been published in Rolling Stone and many other fine places....