2025: Looking forward to the year of distraction
Gadgets, video games, and creative frivolity will rule.
As 2024 slides inexorably to a close, it's time to look ahead to 2025 and make our predictions, or at least our aims, for the year ahead. But before we can look forward, we need to take a quick glance backward.
MBH4H launched earlier this year with a mission to explore human creativity in the era of the burgeoning AI industry. Yet, as this year progressed, we came to the realization that the more we learned about AI in the context of creativity, the less interested we became in the technology. AI is more of a tool than a robot and a little bit meh. It’s also somewhat ironic that AI has also rekindled an even deeper appreciation and love of human creativity in both Ross and I.
Whilst we’re sure AI will continue to develop in 2025—and the industry will continue to attract bucket-loads of capital—we here at MBH4H are only going to be paying it a modicum of attention. We will leave the more in-depth coverage to those who are more knowledgeable and, frankly, more interested. Why write about the potential implications of AI when the likes of Ed Zitron are already doing a far better job—and are more passionate about the subject—than either of us could.
So, if 2024 was the year in which we explored human creativity, 2025 is the year we’re going to celebrate it.
Looking ahead to next year, we’ve decided to broaden our mission somewhat. We aim to surface, curate, and advocate for some of the newer forms of human creativity often hidden far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the internet.
In more specific terms, we want to continue to write about the astonishing talent and sheer level of creativity that goes into the making of video games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (our most-read essay of 2024 by far) and animated movies like The Wild Robot. We’ll feature video game art directors and film cinematographers who work to bring their singular visions to life, regardless of whether they hail from big corporate endeavors (the Nintendos, Disneys, or Sonys of the world), from scrappier upstarts or are brilliant individuals like Billy Basso, the game developer who created Animal Well (arguably the best indie video game of the 2024) almost entirely on his own. Some may consider such creativity as frivolous or too superficial to cover. Not us. MBH4H will treat these (relatively) new forms of creativity with the seriousness and respect they deserve.
Of course, creativity is not confined only to movies and video games, which is why we also intend to feature creatives at companies like LEGO, who incorporate play into absolutely everything they make (including the instruction manuals); comic book artists and writers; authors and book illustrators; musicians, composers, and sound designers; graphic and industrial designers; even podcasters and comedians. And, of course, that newest breed of creative: the so-called content creator.
To use a sports metaphor, 2024 was the year in which it became obvious that people no longer follow teams; they follow players.
Numerous creators have left major media companies and struck out on their own. Curious influencers who entertain, inform, and inspire their own huge audiences, such as Becca Farsace, who recently left The Verge to build her own YouTube channel by taking tech outside; Cleo Abram, another Vox Media alum, whose mission is to make science fun; and worker-owned collectives like Defector and Aftermath, both notably borne of former G/O Media writers.
We’re also fascinated to learn more about established creators in the video games space, like VaatVidya, whose deep and dense video essays explore the hidden lore and secrets in FromSoftware games, and Mark Brown, creator of Game Maker’s Toolkit—perhaps the biggest game design essayist out there, and who in 2024 both celebrated 10 years of his channel and put his money where his mouth is by developing his own PC game.
These individual creators together have a combined audience of millions. But perhaps the most Malenia-level boss of creators is Marques Brownlee. With an audience of over 19MN—and that’s just on his main YouTube channel—MKBHD is a micro-media powerhouse. Brownlee and his team run multiple YouTube channels and a podcast. It’s a fully formed business with multiple revenue streams, including a range of branded products and (after a bit of a shaky launch) a recently released app. Brownlee is a phenomenon, a singular creative talent, and a shining example to us all. That his primary platform is YouTube and not a more “traditional” outlet like broadcast or cable TV is a feature, not a bug.
With so many creative humans out there to discover, be inspired by, and learn from, 2025 has the potential to be a big year and the perfect motivation for us to up our game. It’s exciting. It’ll also be a welcome distraction.
I think we can all agree that 2024 has been a pretty intense year on the political front. As a consequence, I think it is likely that for many of us, 2025 will be the year of distraction. I have already made a start. I have personally dialed back my news content and canceled many of my subscriptions to a plethora of news media channels—many of which I had forgotten I was subscribed to in the first place. And it seems I am not the only one: CNN and MSNBC’s viewership, for example, has declined by about half since the election.
2025 is the year in which I want to be distracted from some of the darker side of humanity and instead focus on all of the bright, creative humans we can find and delight in sharing their work. We’re going to make a stand for the nerds, the weirdos, the geeks, and the misfits that create the art, design, entertainment, music, video games, and technology that regularly blows our minds and gives us hope that in 2025, maybe, just maybe, everything will be OK.