Grace Ng | AI Worldbuilder

The Thesis

Entertainment is shifting from gatekept storytelling to decentralized, participatory worlds. The future belongs to worldbuilders.

For a century, a handful of studios and platforms decided what got made and who got seen. That gatekeeping is ending. Power is shifting to creators and communities, audiences are becoming participants and co-owners, and AI makes building entire worlds possible for the first time. The next Disney won't be a studio that publishes content. It will be a creator, brand, or community that operates a world people live inside. Grace researches and builds that shift, and helps organizations get there first.

What Grace Speaks & Advises On

The Future of Entertainment

How AI is rewriting creation, distribution, and participation, and what becomes possible only because AI exists.

The Rise of Participatory Worlds

Why audiences increasingly want to co-create rather than consume, and how fandom is replacing viewership.

The Worldbuilder Economy

How creators, brands, and media companies become operators of worlds, not publishers of content.

The Build

Playhouse.ai

An AI-native platform for building participatory worlds. A virtual theater where artists and storytellers create 3D animated worlds and become their own studio, so anyone can build the next great entertainment universe without a Hollywood budget.

Grace doesn't just forecast the future of entertainment, she builds working prototypes of it. Playhouse.ai is where the thesis becomes a product: more play, more imagination, and human artistry that flourishes in the age of AI.

Partner or invest →

Playhouse.aiBuild worlds, not content

Selected Work: A Track Record of Firsts

AI Film · Web3 · 2022

CrashPunks: The Animated Series

An award-winning animated short set in a cyberpunk world, co-created with AI, crowdfunded through NFTs, with film assets secured on Bitcoin. The first project of its kind, extended into AR fashion, games, and worldbuilding.

First indie AI filmmaker, 2022

On-Chain Art

CrashPunks NFT Collection

One of the earliest NFT art collections on Bitcoin, a sold-out 9K collection secured via Stacks, with a collector community that became one of the first DAOs on Bitcoin. Original IP now expanding into the metaverse.

Brain-Computer Art

BrainPaint / MindPaint

Interactive brain-art interfaces that turn a viewer's mental state into living paintings, an early experiment in making audiences participants in the work. Exhibited at MIT, Stanford, China Fashion Week, Shanghai Tower, Dubai & Singapore.

In Progress

Music & Interactive Releases

Ongoing work at the edge of AI filmmaking, interactive music, and immersive storytelling, continuing a 12-year obsession with turning passive audiences into active participants.

Speaking

The End of Passive Entertainment

Signature keynote: why every brand, creator, and studio will become a worldbuilder.

What Comes After Social Media

From followers to fandoms, from feeds to worlds: the next platform shift in entertainment.

How Brands Become Worlds

Why audiences become participants, and how organizations stay relevant to the next generation.

Keynote · Fireside · Workshop · Executive advisory · Worldwide & virtual

How is AI changing entertainment, and what becomes possible because of it?
How do we build fandom instead of followers?
What happens when audiences become participants?
How do brands and studios compete with creators?
What does creator-owned IP mean for the future of media?

Selected stages, past & present

The White HouseUnited NationsMITStanfordSlushCeBITNFT.NYCAI on the LotAWE XRSingularity UniversityWhartonChina Fashion Week

Past Speaking Engagements

A track record across the world's stages: from the White House and the United Nations to Slush, CeBIT, and the frontier of AI, web3, and XR.

Conferences & Festivals

SXSWAustin · 2023
Dubai AI Film FestivalDubai · 2023
AI on the LotLos Angeles · 2023
AWE XRSanta Clara · 2023
NFT.NYCNew York · 2022
NFT LALos Angeles · 2022
Web3 WeekNew York · 2022
VRARAMiami · 2022
WISEBeijing · 2019
EUCNicosia · 2019
CeBITHanover · 2018
SlushShanghai · 2018
Lean In ChinaBeijing · 2018
IMI FestivalSingapore · 2017
Future 2050Hangzhou · 2017
Lean Startup ConferenceSan Francisco · 2014
United NationsNew York · 2014
SearchloveSan Diego · 2014
UX FestBoston · 2013
The White HouseWashington DC · 2012

Universities & Institutions

The Wharton School, UPennGuest lecture
Singularity UniversityGuest lecture
Princeton UniversityGuest lecture
MITTalk & exhibition
Stanford UniversityTalk & exhibition
Barnard CollegeGuest lecture
New York UniversityGuest lecture
Parsons School of DesignGuest lecture
Xi'an Academy of Fine ArtsGuest lecture

About Grace

Grace Ng is an AI Worldbuilder exploring the future of participatory entertainment, how AI, interactive storytelling, virtual characters, and audience participation are transforming media from something we watch into something we inhabit.

She is the founder of Playhouse.ai, an AI-native platform for building participatory worlds. In 2022 she became one of the first indie AI filmmakers, crowdfunding an animated short through web3, co-creating it with AI, and securing the film's assets on-chain. That debut won a Film Innovation Award, and she was among the earliest NFT artists on Bitcoin with her sold-out CrashPunks collection.

Her work has been exhibited at MIT, Stanford, China Fashion Week, Shanghai Tower, Dubai, and Singapore, and she has spoken at the White House, the United Nations, and conferences worldwide. She has been named a World Economic Forum Global Shaper, a TimeOut Mover & Shaker, and a Tatler Asia Leader of Tomorrow.

Previously a tech entrepreneur and VC, she co-founded Lean Startup Machine and Javelin, training 200,000+ founders across 64 countries. Today she advises brands, creators, and media companies on how audiences are evolving from consumers into participants, and builds the tools to get them there.

First indie AI filmmaker, 2022Award-winning directorWEF Global ShaperTatler Leaders of TomorrowEarly Bitcoin NFT artist