SXSW 2025 and the future of what won’t change

by Maira Genovese, Founder & CEO

Digital Archaeology And The Rise Of Newstalgia At Sxsw 2025

During one of the SXSW 2025 sessions focused on tools for building the businesses of the future, panellists Kate Baucherel and John Gauntt – experts in emerging technologies and culture – got an intriguing question from the audience: We talk a lot about what will change in the future, but why don’t we reflect on what will stay the same?

The conversations in the hallways and streets of Austin reflected this sentiment. On one hand, there were discussions about inevitable changes and the challenges brought by technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI). On the other, there was also an understanding that fundamental aspects of human existence and experience will likely remain central to sustaining relationships and even the survival of our species.

When it comes to inevitable changes, despite having some clarity about emerging challenges, the truth is that we are still collectively trying to understand which issues should be prioritised. This uncertainty stems from the mistaken assumption that these impacts will be the same for everyone – ignoring key contextual elements, which only leads to confusion and doubt.

Take AI, for example: context is crucial. In his talk at the festival, professor and writer Scott Galloway emphasised that we are analysing the impact of this technology through the wrong lenses – focusing on the rise and dominance of superintelligence and job replacement. According to him, the most significant transformation lies in the role AI may play in human autonomy and decision-making, potentially turning us into observers of our own future. “It won’t replace you, but it will make you passive,” Galloway stated.

On the other side of the debate, one thing remains certain: despite these transformations, technology cannot replace human interaction, nor the aspects that define us as social beings reliant on community connection. And nothing is as inherently human as building a community – a process that demands genuine interest in others, consistency, the sharing of vulnerabilities, active listening, and, above all, seeing the world through an empathetic lens, from the perspective of those around us. Deep within our most primal instincts, connection is both a desire and a fundamental necessity.

The new concepts of past and future

At this intersection between the new and the familiar, there is still room to challenge the boundaries of these concepts. Bruce Sterling, a key figure in science fiction and speculative literature, encouraged the SXSW audience to reflect on the possibility of using new technologies to reconstruct imaginary futures from the past. According to him, we are already practicing a kind of “digital archaeology” – not only bringing back what has been forgotten but also bringing to life what never actually came to be. Discussions touched on the use of AI to recreate machines designed in the 1960s that were never built and to make functional objects that only ever existed on paper – proposals that blur our perception of what change and permanence really mean.

This discussion ties directly into the rise of the newstalgia movement, which has been widely debated throughout SXSW. In an oversaturated world, the search for comfort in elements of the past – reinterpreted in new formats – reflects the exhaustion of the present. It revives emotions and ideas through vintage aesthetics and narratives. For younger generations, this movement has served as an escape from modern anxieties, allowing them to connect with experiences they never lived, fostering a new creative space, and, of course, reigniting emotional engagement.

The truth is, as technology becomes more sophisticated, the concept of future becomes increasingly ambiguous, making predictions more complex. Perhaps this is why it is so important to also focus on what remains – on human nature, on our essential characteristics, and on how we weave society together. During their talk, Baucherel and Gauntt reflected on our obsession with futurism, reinforcing that between the ability to anticipate change and the ability to control what happens, there is an enormous gap. “Once a prediction comes true, the prediction itself no longer matters.”

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**Article originally published at B9.