Prometheus Protocol: A civic rehearsal for the AI age @ Coimbra
Prometheus stole 🔥 from the gods and gave it to humanity. Things changed quickly after that.
AI may be our era's version of fire: powerful, useful, disruptive, and increasingly difficult to govern.
It's already changing how we work, learn, search for information, make decisions, and imagine the future.
At the same time, public conversations about AI often drift into hype, jargon or apocalypse energy.
This gathering is an experiment in trying something else.
🎭 Part civic theatre, part collective thought experiment, the Prometheus Protocol invites people to explore the weirdness of the AI age together, and make some sense of it.
Expect scenarios, negotiations, awkward trade-offs, shifting alliances, and conversations that go somewhere unexpected.
Rehearsal for a future arriving slightly ahead of schedule.
🧩 Together, we'll explore questions like:
What happens when more and more systems depend on a handful of companies?
Who gains from AI, and who becomes more vulnerable?
What choices still belong to citizens, workers, artists, universities, journalists, and public institutions?
How do we respond when technology moves faster than public conversation?
No technical background needed.
You don't need to be “into AI” to participate.
Bring curiosity, scepticism, and a willingness to think out loud with strangers.
Who this is for
Students, researchers, artists, organisers, technologists, journalists, public servants, sceptics, and anyone curious about how AI might reshape everyday life.
Especially people who suspect the future should involve more citizens and fewer inevitabilities.
What you'll leave with
New ways of thinking and talking about AI without getting trapped in hype or doom
Fresh conversations and unexpected perspectives on power, trade-offs, alternatives
A few ideas about where ordinary people still have room to shape what happens next
At least one new conversation to continue after this gathering ends
After the event
We’ll keep the space open for an optional informal debrief afterwards.
The Prometheus Protocol is also an evolving public experiment: a format designed to travel and adapt after each iteration.
This Coimbra edition is part of the prototype.
Come help us see what it becomes.
About the facilitator
Alexandra Stef – Collective Futures – designs open source protocols and live experiments for collective agency. The Prometheus Protocol is the first in a suite of civic rehearsals being prototyped and designed to travel freely across places and scales.