let us share who we are and where we’ve been.
AfroRithm Futures Group (ARFG)
is an Afrofuturist consultancy and storytelling collective led by Dr. Lonny Brooks, Ahmed Best, and Jade Fabello. We are a group of curious, inventive optimists who believe in the transformative power of play, and know that all the best futures are possible.
The pair collaborated to bring Afrofuturist storytelling into a new, communal medium, with the intention of sharing their visions of the future with everyone, especially those who are not traditionally advantaged by technology.
Excited by the possibilities, Lonny and Eli got to work iterating on a design, exploration, and storytelling game. They hosted game jams, produced multiple prototypes, and ultimately brought AfroRithm from the Future (ARFTF) to life.
While showing ARFTF gameplay at the Institute for the Future’s 2019 AfroFutures Festival, Ahmed Best hopped on stage and proved himself to be a natural AfroRithm MC. Ahmed engaged the audience and brought out stories from them at an unprecedented level.
The Fathomers worked with the trio to engage new collaborators, including Alan Clark and Paula Te. Together, they improved the game and found new venues to present their work, such as the LA NeueHouse.
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The group joined up with Equitable Games Group to bring ARFTF into homes and schools across the country. Lonny and Ahmed co-founded AfroRithm Futures Group to facilitate this endeavor and broaden AfroRithm purview. Jade Fabello joined the consultancy in 2021 as operations manager and to represent the younger generation.
The AfroRithm team continues to create better futures, working with clients like Google Cloud, the Stanford Design School, SXSW, and more.
bios
He’s most known for playing the first CGI Lead Character in a motion picture, JAR JAR BINKS in the STAR WARS prequels, and is an award-winning actor, director, writer, producer, musician, and choreographer.
He is a Senior Fellow at USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, a professor of Film and Actor Entrepreneurship at USC School for the Dramatic Arts, and a visiting professor at Stanford’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design.
Lonny received his Ph.D. in Communication at UC San Diego and an MA in Library and Information Science at UCLA. He is a co-founder of the AfroRithm Futures Group and the former Chair of the Communication And The Future (CATF) division of the National Communication Association.
Renowned for his scholarship surrounding every shade of Afrofuturism, Lonny has served as a visiting professor for the Stanford d.school.
He has authored and co-authored a vast array of futurist studies and explorations in international publications like the Journal of International Communication, USC Annenberg Press, and Afrofuturism 2.0: The rise of Astro-Blackness anthology.
A former political public speaker for U.S. senate candidates, Jade has shifted his focus outside the system and now primarily writes personal essays about politics, race, art, grief, and love.
He has written for Texas Monthly, Thrillist Magazine, Starwars.com, Study Hall, the Brown Journal of Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, Batshit Times, and more. He is an experienced magazine editor and writing workshop leader, serving as the Senior Print Editor for the Austin fashion publication Spark Magazine. He is also the writer of I love words and you. a newsletter that covers the craft of writing.
