Generative AI and Collective Memory: Navigating Truth in an Age of Digital Narratives
Prompt Society | World XR
Session 358
Proposed by Salar Shahna, president of the World XR Forum, this session explores how generative AI is transforming access to historical storytelling and audiovisual memory on a global scale.
Today, the power of generative AI is both unprecedented and unstoppable. As synthetic media proliferates—with all the risks of manipulated or misleading content—we are faced with a crucial challenge: how to ensure that this new creative power is used to amplify truthful, inclusive narratives, rather than distort them.
Until now, only a few countries with powerful film industries have had the means to tell and project their stories to the world. Generative AI changes this landscape. It opens a door for smaller nations, marginalized communities, and independent creators to craft emotionally rich and historically grounded narratives—with a level of realism and accessibility that was previously unattainable.
The session gathers voices from diverse fields to address this critical transition:
Natasha Mahfar, a writer and creative producer, shares her experience crafting a fiction set during wartime—a deeply human story limited, until now, by the cost of traditional production.
Professor Yuxing Han from Tsinghua University, expert in hyper-realistic imaging and immersive technologies, contributes an academic lens on how such tools can be ethically applied and validated in historical and educational contexts.
Together, they will examine how creative communities, universities, and global institutions like ITU/WSIS can co-design programs that both protect the integrity of historical narratives and support creative autonomy.
The session will also introduce The Prompt Society, a new Geneva-based initiative anchored at Downtown Studio, dedicated to fostering responsible and interdisciplinary use of generative AI in storytelling, across cultures and technologies



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C1. The role of governments and all stakeholders in the promotion of ICTs for development
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C2. Information and communication infrastructure
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C3. Access to information and knowledge
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C4. Capacity building
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C9. Media
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Goal 10: Reduce inequality within and among countries
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Goal 16: Promote just, peaceful and inclusive societies
- Objective 1: Close all digital divides and accelerate progress across the Sustainable Development Goals
- Objective 2: Expand inclusion in and benefits from the digital economy for all