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Exploring the Intersection of Innovation & Imagination

Monika Bielskyte

travels from South Africa

Monika Bielskyte is a nomadic futurist and futures designer with expertise in immersive media, edutainment, and bleeding edge technological innovation.

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5 out of 5 stars

Monika is one of the most inspiring speakers it's been my pleasure to hear. Apart from being an orator of genius and utterly captivating in her delivery, her insights on a wide range of future scenarios are fascinating and completely thought-provoking. I can't recommend her more highly.

John Gordon - How To Academy See all references

Why you should book Monika Bielskyte for your next event

  • She’s an expert in the field of innovation, with extensive knowledge and experience in the immersive media space (XR/AI/UX) and edutainment. Her talks cover a wide range of subject matter at the intersection of science and technology and its feedback loop with social, cultural, and political realities across the world.
  • Her work is centered on challenging and offering alternatives to dystopian/utopian stereotypes through her platform @ProtopiaFutures. She explores radically hopeful and inclusive futures centering Queerness, Indigeneity, Disability, and previously marginalized cultural perspectives.
  • Monika has worked with some of the biggest names in the media, technology, and consulting industries, including Universal, Google, Nike, DreamWorks, BBC, McKinsey, Telefonica, Intel, Aston Martin, and Xerox PARC. Her impressive client list is a testament to her expertise, creativity, and ability to deliver results.
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About Monika

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Keynote

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References

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Unlock the Future with Monika Bielskyte, Founder of Protopia Futures. A nomadic explorer turned futurist, Monika crafts inspiring visions, challenging binaries in innovation. Her global impact spans collaborations with Universal, Google, and governments, resonating in academia and industry. With a focus on Disability/Neurodivergence, Indigeneity, and Queerness, Monika's Protopian futurism embraces a life-centric approach, transforming technology into inclusive tools. Elevate your event with a speaker who reshapes narratives, navigating the complex interplay of culture, innovation, and humanity.

Why you should book Monika Bielskyte for your next event

  • She’s an expert in the field of innovation, with extensive knowledge and experience in the immersive media space (XR/AI/UX) and edutainment. Her talks cover a wide range of subject matter at the intersection of science and technology and its feedback loop with social, cultural, and political realities across the world.
  • Her work is centered on challenging and offering alternatives to dystopian/utopian stereotypes through her platform @ProtopiaFutures. She explores radically hopeful and inclusive futures centering Queerness, Indigeneity, Disability, and previously marginalized cultural perspectives.
  • Monika has worked with some of the biggest names in the media, technology, and consulting industries, including Universal, Google, Nike, DreamWorks, BBC, McKinsey, Telefonica, Intel, Aston Martin, and Xerox PARC. Her impressive client list is a testament to her expertise, creativity, and ability to deliver results.

Keynote Speaker Monika Bielskyte brings a wealth of experience, having traversed over 100 countries. Her firsthand encounters with diverse cultures form the foundation of her talks, seamlessly connecting the intricacies of human priorities with the unfolding future. Born in the Soviet Union and raised in liberated Lithuania, her journey reflects a unique perspective shaped by the collapse of physical boundaries and the digital world’s emergence.

When you book Monika for your event, you secure more than a speaker; you engage a visionary who started her career on movie sets and progressed to the forefront of technological innovation. Her multicultural and multidisciplinary background, coupled with an unwavering focus on the relationship between future fictions and real-life scenarios, distinguishes her voice in today’s foresight industry.

Monika’s impactful collaborations span global media, tech giants like Google, and esteemed organizations such as the WEF. Her insights resonate across industry corridors and academia, from The Royal Society to CERN, offering a broad perspective on diverse social and political worldviews shaping innovation trajectories.

Monika Bielskyte challenges binaries, elevating global narratives and celebrating human expression’s plurality. Her Protopian futurism uniquely centers on previously marginalized perspectives, emphasizing a life-centric approach beyond the conventional human-centric focus. As you contemplate your next event, consider Monika as the catalyst for transformation, offering culturally-informed tools that support human ingenuity, societal infrastructures, and biosphere regeneration.

Book Monika Bielskyte for your event, and invite your audience to reimagine content, spaces, and technologies with a heightened awareness of Disability/Neurodivergent insights. Addressing sensory overload and fostering inclusive design, Monika’s current work propels organizations into a future where innovation isn’t just a buzzword but a tangible, transformative force.

See keynotes with Monika Bielskyte
Keynote by Monika Bielskyte

Keynote topics

Monika’s mission is centered on transforming futurist content+design+tech conversations to create meaningful impact worldwide, inspire and unite people, and make the learning of novel perspectives engaging.

Monika’s keynotes are delivered with captivating visual material custom designed for each topic. Her presentations challenge tech hype cycles, rendering complex insights compelling for everyone, not just industry insiders.

Her main speaking topics include:

  • Protopian Futures Design Framework as an Alternative to Techno-Utopianism.
  • Science Fiction Bias in Technological Development & Scientific Research.
  • Future of Inclusive Cities & Regenerative Urbanism.
  • Life-Centric vs Human-Centric Design.
  • Generative AI Tools for Future Readiness.
  • AI Futures & its Ideological Foundations.
  • Futures Literacy in the Age of Disinformation Warfare.
  • Beyond the Metaverse Hype: Future of XR/UX/UI.
  • The Potential of Edutainment (Education + Entertainment).
  • Disability & Neurodivergence Led Innovation.

She has been a featured keynote and panel speaker/moderator on 6 continents at broad-audience conferences as well as industry specific events (within tech, science, media), as well as a workshop lead for closed-room gatherings of C-level executives and a visiting lecturer at some of the most prestigious academic institutions.

Watch Monika Bielskyte in action

Design Is [Protopian]

See keynotes with Monika Bielskyte

References

Monika is a human switchboard of aesthetics and moods. Her capability of analyzing human emotions and translating them into clear arrows between action and look is a rare quality. Every brainstorm with her yields unique research angles and deeper understanding of nearly every combination of humanities, art & tech.

Omer Shapira

Senior Engineer, Omniverse @ NVIDIA

Hanging with Monika is like mainlining insight into possible futures at a zillion miles an hour. AR, VR, MR, how to not be confined by current thinking...she'll drop a dizzying array of ideas and supporting artwork that will take days, if not longer, to parse and comprehend. She's my homie.

Sebastian Marino

CTO at Evercoast

Mx. Bielskyte is a VR visionary, a unique and important thinker and industry motivator. She possesses a special combination of skills: design sensibility, drive for excellence, and a rapidly expanding network that is a virtual "who's who" of the VR and AR industries.

Anu Kirk

Vice President of Product at Osso VR

Monika is one of the most inspiring speakers I had my pleasure to hear. Apart from being an orator of genius and utterly captivating in her delivery, her insights on a wide range of future scenarios are fascinating and completely thought-provoking.

John Gordon

Founder, How To: Academy

Visionary, innovative and a clear voice. What amazes me most is Monika's world view of technology, its place in our lives and her vision to use emerging tech to bring cultures together. Hers is a truly unique voice, a leader in her generation.

Spencer Hunt

COO Ascendant Studios, formerly 20th C Fox, Paramount, Skydance

Monika is one of the more fascinating people I met while working at Apple. Monika drew connections between art and science in speaking about the future of virtual & mixed reality technologies. Her deep, conceptual understanding of a bleeding edge space made esoteric concepts relatable and highlighted the experiences they could power. She compelled me to think in different ways about the medium, to explore the possibility of creating content that could expand our understanding of ourselves & the world we live in. Monika is the future. The world needs her to blow our minds and broaden our thinking.

Ben vonWurmb

Recruiting, Apple, formerly Airbnb, Hulu, Beats

Monika is an explorer who revels in the prospect of connecting the oncoming waves of technological innovation to the deeply human. Whether working with virtual reality, artificial intelligence, gestural interfaces, or other emerging media, Monika understands how beautiful and empowering these new futures can be. Her vision and drive send her constantly seeking the threshold of cultural literacy around new technologies, to shape how these disruptions are expressed in the aesthetics of tomorrow. She can immediately see how her vision overlaps with those she might work with and has cultivated a varied and talented network of creative collaborators across the globe and throughout design and technology industries.

Ben Cerveny

Flickr co-founder, formerly ARUP, Samsung, Frog / Capgemini

I've never met someone like Monika who has touched and won trust & acceptance with so many different people across this planet. Based on her nomadic journeys, Monika is able to see patterns that many cannot immediately see. With everyone longing for human connection and not really understanding how to satiate that desire, her stories truly awaken us for the better and allow us to look to the future with hope, creativity and optimism. Monika will truly bring ground-breaking creativity and wisdom to your organization.

Kevin Bethune

Author, MIT Press, Art Center trustee, formerly Nike, BCG

Monika's talk acted as the pivot point for my personal mental transition from what I thought was the be-all-end-all form of media in film, to something much more. Monika is an incredible mind who cannot only convey a broad view of the potential future, but she can do it with clarity, and in such a way that the layman can quickly understand everything that futurism, VR, and immersive media entails.

Alexander Zahn

Manager, Netflix, formerly Sony Pictures

Monika's energy, experience, vision, creativity, soul and impact made her week of meetings, speeches and panels across the BBC one of the highlights of my time driving innovation there. She challenged, guided, inspired, entertained and educated a huge range of people from different teams. We see the world differently as a result.

David Boyle

Author of PROMPT, formerly EMI Music, MasterClass, BBC

Monika always impresses me by having her finger on the pulse within the tech innovation space, always traveling around the world meeting with the brightest minds around. She was the first to have meaningful VR conversations back in the day, and has been a leader in bringing top VR talent to the forefront.

Josh Gold

EVP Meta VR/AR apps & content, formerly Warner Bros, RYOT, GoPro
Non-binding request for Monika Bielskyte

Send a simple request. You’ll get a quick reply with fees and availability

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
Monika Bielskyte
Monika Bielskyte

5 out of 5 stars

Monika is one of the most inspiring speakers it's been my pleasure to hear. Apart from being an orator of genius and utterly captivating in her delivery, her insights on a wide range of future scenarios are fascinating and completely thought-provoking. I can't recommend her more highly.

John Gordon - How To Academy See all references

Keynote topics with Monika Bielskyte