Natural horizon at dawn representing imagination and future possibilities

The Imagination Economy

Where value is created not by producing more —
but by imagining better futures.

The Imagination Economy is an emerging economic paradigm in which imagination, narrative, and future-oriented meaning become primary drivers of value.

As production becomes cheap and abundant, the scarce resource is no longer output — but the ability to imagine futures people want to inhabit.

This site explores that shift.

What Is the Imagination Economy?

The Imagination Economy describes a world in which:

  • Ideas matter more than execution
  • Meaning matters more than efficiency
  • Futures are imagined before they are optimized
  • Narratives coordinate behavior under uncertainty

It builds on insights from:

  • economics
  • cognitive science
  • cultural theory
  • technology and platform design

What happens when imagination becomes the main economic input?

The Imagination Machine

A recursive, incentive-driven system that transforms individual imagination into collective value.

The Imagination Economy system diagram showing a circular model with four interconnected quadrants around a central 'imagination machine' core

What You're Seeing

This diagram maps the complete cycle of how imagination creates value. At its center sits the imagination machine — the engine that converts individual creative sparks into shared economic and social capital.

1. Generation & Framing

Individual imagination begins here. Ideas emerge (1a/ Generation) and are given shape through interpretation and sense-making (1b/ Framing). This is where creative empowerment lives.

2. Shared Narratives

Individual ideas become collective imagination through alignment and shared sense-making. This builds social capital — the network of meaning that connects people around common futures.

3. Artifacts & Attention

Imagination becomes tangible — expressed as creations that attract attention and create ownership. This is where economic value crystallizes.

4. Cognitive Infrastructure

Adaptive AI systems amplify imagination and create recursive intelligence — feeding insights back into the cycle. This is the structural power layer.

System Tensions

The warning markers around the wheel highlight where value can be lost: misalignment between individual and collective goals, asymmetry in who captures value, and drop-offs & friction that prevent ideas from completing the cycle.

Natural forest ecosystem showing how ideas naturally connect and grow
Natural transformation showing seeds growing into plants
Transformation → abundance → new constraints

Why This Matters Now

Generative AI has fundamentally changed the economics of creation.

  • Text, images, audio, and video can be produced at near-zero cost
  • Technical quality converges quickly
  • Output abundance no longer creates differentiation

In this environment:

  • Attention alone is insufficient
  • Novelty decays instantly
  • Value shifts toward durable meaning

The Imagination Economy is about what survives when everything can be generated.

Compelling Imagination (Not Just Novelty)

Not all imagination creates value.

Clever, shocking, or dystopian ideas may attract attention — but they rarely invite inhabitation.

In the Imagination Economy, value comes from worlds that are:

  • Desirable — people want to live there
  • Inhabitable — people can see themselves inside
  • Open-ended — people want to continue them
  • Shareable — people want to extend them with others

Examples of compelling imagination include:

  • experiencing a life you didn't choose
  • living in a place designed for human well-being
  • starting over without being defined by your past
  • meeting your future self once
  • rethinking reputation, identity, and belonging

These are not prompts.
They are worlds.

Natural beautiful landscapes representing compelling futures
Compelling futures feel inhabitable

A Simple Value Model

In the Imagination Economy, value is not additive.
It is multiplicative.

Value = Imagination × Narrative × Discovery
  • Imagination
    Can people project themselves into this future?
  • Narrative
    Can others meaningfully continue and reinterpret it?
  • Discovery
    Can it be found, remembered, and returned to?

If any one of these approaches zero, value collapses.

Natural infrastructure like bridges and pathways
Infrastructure shapes what becomes reachable

Platforms as Imagination Infrastructure

Platforms do not merely distribute content.

They decide:

  • which ideas become visible
  • which futures feel plausible
  • which narratives gain momentum

In this sense, platforms are imagination infrastructure.

They allocate:

  • attention
  • legitimacy
  • continuity

Understanding this role is critical — culturally, economically, and ethically.

From Theory to Practice

The Imagination Economy is not just a concept.

It informs:

  • how platforms should be designed
  • how discovery systems should work
  • how creators should be supported
  • how value should be measured

One concrete instantiation of these ideas is Craisee — a platform built around persistent worlds, continuation, and shared imagination.

But the Imagination Economy is larger than any single product.

What You'll Find Here

This site is a living knowledge space.

Over time, it will include:

  • foundational essays
  • research references
  • conceptual models
  • examples of compelling imagination
  • case studies of platforms and practices
  • vocabulary for thinking about imagination as an economic force

It is intended for:

  • builders
  • researchers
  • creators
  • designers
  • strategists
  • anyone thinking seriously about the future of value

A Guiding Question

As creation becomes effortless, a different question matters more:

What futures are worth imagining — and who gets to shape them?

The Imagination Economy begins there.