FIRST STEPS: Building a regenerative economy and civilization.
FIRST STEPS: Building a regenerative economy and civilization
Join Jessica Groopman and Raman Frey, co-founders of Regen Bridge, for an energized discussion around where we are and where we need to go in order to build the regenerative civilization our world requires.
What is the metacrisis and how might this differ from the more commonly used understanding of our polycrisis?
What are the root causes of our current predicament and how do these perpetuate themselves?
Jessica and Raman will share a bit from their combined decades of movement towards life affirming paradigms, unpacking the regenerative implementation of pioneering technologies and building communities of purpose and play. They'll share their own theories of change before opening the conversation up for an AMA with the audience.
What is and isn't sustainable about the human systems we have today?
How did our systems evolve and who are the thinkers pointing us towards a flourishing world? What can previous paradigms and existing indigenous civilizations teach us all about becoming responsible stewards of life?
What is the three horizons framework and is this the most useful way to understand our present and hoped for design constraints in assembling our economic and social order?
What does applied behavioral science offer us in terms of changing behaviors and norms at scale?
What are the most subversive and hopeful changes we can make in our own daily lives to ensure regeneration moves from a distant light to an inevitability?
For 15 years, Jessica has conducted research to help organizations around the world analyze how new technologies impact humans, business, society, and the environment.
She is the Founder of the Regenerative Technology Project, a think and do tank which works with organizations to develop long-term tech innovation strategies and practices that align digital tech with economic, societal, and environmental benefit.
Formerly she was Director of Digital Strategy & Innovation at Intentional Futures, a design firm based in Seattle, WA. Jess founded Kaleido Insights, a boutique research and advisory firm based in San Francisco, CA.
She is a regular keynote speaker, moderator, and panelist at emerging technology industry events and has delivered over 50 talks on dozens of topics, to a range of stakeholders from executives, investors, and engineers to marketers, parents, and students. Jess is also a professionally trained voice-over artist.
Her research spans a wide range of technological, cultural, and business trends. She's authored over 50 reports, across dozens of technologies, industries, and demographics. She's written hundreds of articles, contributed to several books and textbooks, run her own podcast, and been featured in dozens of international media outlets.
Since arriving in the Bay Area in 2000, Raman Frey has built companies, organizations and communities that bring people together around meaningful conversations about art, technology, religion, politics and philosophy. He's started a variety of businesses and served as a founder and board member on a number of non-profits, including YBCA and Epicenter Arts.
In 2012 Raman founded Good People Dinners, a Bay Area community that fosters substantive discussions, usually over food and drink. These dinners, corporate salons, summits, unconferences and retreats bring together professional chefs and speakers on a wide range of timely and compelling topics. GP Dinners has produced over 1,100 events and counting, for a long list of clients including Mozilla, CapGemini, Gray Area Arts Foundation, Work on Climate, The Moth Story Hour, The Long Now Foundation, The Arnold Lab at Caltech, UC Berkeley, Heliospace, Nexxworks, Antithesis, Svitla Systems and more.
https://www.gpdinners.com
In the fall of 2020, Raman and his wife Karin purchased a former summer camp in the mountains near Yosemite National Park. Camp Earnest's 21 acres include an apartment, a bunkhouse, several cabins, two yurts, two three season bell tents, two cottages, a dining lodge, a bathhouse with a Finnish sauna and a cedar hot tub, an outdoor amphitheater, a year round creek and meadow and a meditation and movement hall. Camp Earnest hosts an art program of outdoor murals and sculptures that so far includes Asad Faulwell, Ema Harris-Sintamarian, Dario Antonioni and Mark Baugh-Sasaki.
https://www.campearnest.com
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With his friends Jessica Groopman and Lynelle Cameron, in 2025 Raman co-founded Regen Bridge. Regen Bridge builds bridges to accelerate the regenerative era, working with investors, next generation leaders, and organizations creating economic models that enable health and prosperity for human and natural systems. They design convenings to facilitate connection, advise ‘third horizon’ businesses, and help shift the flow of capital towards a regenerative future.
https://regenbridge.org
This is being shown within the Solarpunkification 2026 festival at Mabuhay Gardens in San Francisco. Luma: https://luma.com/8u07vkhv