Imagination age

The Imagination Age is the period beyond the Information Age where creativity and imagination become the primary creators of economic value. (In contrast, the main activities of the Information Age were analysis and thinking.) This concept holds that technologies like virtual reality and user created content will change the way humans interact with each other and create economic and social structures. A key concept is that the rise of an immersive virtual reality—the metaverse or the cyberspace—will raise the value of "imagination work" done by designers, artists, et cetera over rational thinking as a foundation of culture and economics. Some argue that the Imagination Age has already started, given that imagination, they argue, is the most valued skill in our modern society. Emerging technologies like advanced artificial intelligence and automation are driving not only the end of the Information Age, but of traditional industries. The term Imagination Age (as well as Age of Imagination) were first introduced in an essay by designer and writer Charlie Magee in 1993. His essay, "The Age of Imagination: Coming Soon to a Civilization Near You" proposes the idea that the best way to assess the evolution of human civilization is through the lens of communication. The most successful groups throughout human history have had one thing in common: when compared to their competition they had the best system of communication. The fittest communicators—whether tribe, citystate, kingdom, corporation, or nation—had (1) a larger percentage of people with (2) access to (3) higher quality information, (4) a greater ability to transform that information into knowledge and action, (5) and more freedom to communicate that new knowledge to the other members of their group. Imagination Age, as a philosophical tenet heralding a new wave of cultural and economic innovation, appears to have been first introduced by artist, writer and cultural philosopher Rita J.