Announcing: $3.5M+ Future Vision XPRIZE
The worlds largest sci-fi film competition. Create a 3-minute sci-fi trailer depicting an optimistic, abundant future for humanity. The grand prize winner gets $2.6M+
In 1966, a science fiction show changed the world.
Not because of its ratings (it was nearly cancelled after two seasons). Not because of its special effects (laughable by today’s standards). But because it inspired a generation of scientists and engineers, and offered people HOPE about the future.
Star Trek didn’t just entertain – it architected the future.
Star Trek showed us a world where humanity had overcome scarcity, united across borders, and ventured into the cosmos not as conquerors, but as explorers. Where technology amplified our humanity rather than diminishing it.
The scientists and engineers who built our modern world—the smartphones in your pocket, the GPS guiding your drives, the voice assistants in your home—grew up watching that show. They weren’t inspired by dystopian warnings. They were inspired by visions of Abundance.
Here’s the problem: Where are those visions today?
Hollywood continuously delivers us dystopian films about insane AIs and killer robots: Terminator, Black Mirror and Ex Machina. We’ve become masterful at imagining everything that could go wrong. But we’ve forgotten how to dream about what could go right.
And here’s what keeps me up at night: the stories we tell today will shape the world we build tomorrow.
Our brains are neural nets—100 billion neurons, 100 trillion synaptic connections—trained every day by the stories we consume. If we only tell our children stories of dystopian futures, what kind of tomorrow will they create?
As King Solomon wisely said: “Without a vision, the people will perish.” We need to give humanity a vision worth building.
What I’m Doing: “FUTURE VISION XPRIZE”
Today, I’m thrilled to announce The Future Vision XPRIZE: a $3 million+ global competition calling on creators worldwide to imagine and portray humanity’s most compelling, optimistic future through short sci-fi film trailers.
This is not merely another film competition. This is an intentional cultural intervention.
Check out this 60 second video on the Future Vision XPRIZE
We’re partnering with:
Roddenberry Foundation & Rod Roddenberry (son of Gene Roddenberry)
Salesforce (supporting AI Human Collaboration)
Ark Invest (investing in the future of exponential tech)
Range Media Partners (Hollywood’s production powerhouse)
Google (providing cutting-edge AI creative tools)
Republic (allowing people to invest in the winner)
And we’re asking a simple but profound question:
What does a world of Abundance actually look like on screen?
Not in a white paper. Not in a TED talk. But in the visceral, emotional language of cinema that has the power to move hearts and change minds.
Why Film? Why Now?
Because we’re living through the most consequential technology shift since the printing press.
Anyone with imagination and a laptop can now create Hollywood-quality visuals. The barriers between “I have an idea” and “I made something beautiful” are collapsing.
This means we’re about to see an explosion of independent storytelling. A Cambrian explosion of visions about our future.
The question is: Which visions will dominate?
If we do nothing, the answer is clear. Dystopia sells. Apocalypse gets clicks. Fear spreads faster than hope.
But here’s what I believe deep in my bones: there’s a hunger for something better.
People are tired of doomscrolling. They’re tired of Black Mirror and black pills. They want to believe in a future worth building. They just need someone to show them what it looks like.
That’s what this competition is designed to do.
What We’re Building
Over the next seven months, we’ll engage thousands of creators around the world—filmmakers, animators, AI artists, dreamers—and challenge them to imagine Abundance.
Not as a naive fantasy. But as a compelling, realistic, inspiring vision of what we could build if we dared to dream.
The best entries will premiere at our Moonshot Gathering finale in September 2026, judged by some of the most visionary minds in technology and entertainment: Astro Teller (Google’s Captain of Moonshots), Cathie Wood (CEO of Ark Invest), Rod Roddenberry, and Anousheh Ansari (CEO, XPRIZE).
And here’s the kicker: every single submission will carry a small but important message:
“This vision of the future is brought to you by creators who believe humanity’s best days are ahead of us.”
The Stories We Tell Matter
I’ve spent my career betting on exponential technologies: space exploration, longevity, AI, quantum computing. But all of that is downstream of something more fundamental: belief.
Before we landed on the Moon, we had Star Trek showing us the stars. Before we had video calls, we had sci-fi showing us face-to-face conversations across vast distances. Before we had voice assistants, we had stories where computers were helpful companions, not overlords.
Science fiction is the blueprint. Engineering is the execution.
So if we want a future of Abundance—where technology lifts all boats, where humanity thrives, where we solve our greatest challenges and unlock our greatest potential—we need to see it first.
We need artists and storytellers to paint that picture so vividly, so compellingly, that a generation of builders wakes up and says: “I want to make that real.”
Join Us! Register or Tell Your Friends
The competition launches today, March 9, 2026, and entries are accepted through August.
Register for the competition and learn more here: FutureVisionXPRIZE.com
Create your 3-minute trailer & a 12-page (or less) film treatment.
Submit by August 15, 2026. It’s free to enter.
Open worldwide. All tools welcome.
Our mission is to create an engine of positive storytelling: of films that depict a hopeful, compelling, and Abundant future for humanity.
…and, if you’re not a filmmaker, tell your friends who are!
The Future Is Written by Those Who Dare to Imagine It
Gene Roddenberry imagined communicators, and we built smartphones. Arthur C. Clarke imagined satellites, and we built GPS. Isaac Asimov imagined helpful robots, and we’re building AI assistants.
What will today’s storytellers inspire us to build?
That’s the question we’re asking. That’s the movement we’re launching.
And I can’t wait to see what humanity dreams up.
Because the best way to predict the future is to inspire it.
And that’s exactly what we’re about to do.
This is our modern Star Trek moment. Let’s create it together.
Onwards and upwards,
Peter
P.S. Ask yourself: If you could show the world one vision of humanity’s Abundant future, what would it be? I guarantee you, thousands of creators are asking themselves that same question right now. And soon, we’ll all get to see their answers.
It’s inspiring to imagine a future of abundance, but the bigger question is how we get there. What about stories that explore that journey -- call them Bridges to Abundance? You could offer a companion challenge inviting short trailers about the transition: peaceful economic shifts in an AI world, new democratic systems, universal access to AI productivity, or new forms of global cooperation. It’s valuable to imagine a future of abundance. It’s equally important to imagine the path that gets us there.
I’m still waiting for flying cars.