Now

No name or landmark work is placed here yet. That's because none has been decided. In 2023, the American screenwriters' and actors' unions went on strike, one after another. Generative AI was one of the sticking points. The agreements reached state that AI cannot be credited as a writer, and that digitally replicating an actor's likeness or voice requires their clear consent. But what training data can be used, and how rights and payment for what's produced should be divided, were left for future negotiation. How films move between theaters and streaming keeps shifting too. At the opposite end of this map, audiences in 1895 held their breath at a train projected onto a white sheet. A hundred and thirty years later, the shape of the thing — sitting in the dark, looking up at light — hasn't changed. What changes next can't be written yet. When it can, it will be added here.