The Future is Now: Our Most-Read Articles and Most-Downloaded Podcasts of the Year

As technology continues to reshape the arts and entertainment landscape, our readers and listeners have shown a clear appetite for understanding these transformations. From AI's role in creative processes to the evolution of virtual reality and streaming, this year's most popular content reveals the questions on everyone's minds.

How is AI changing creativity? Will VR transform live performance? What does the future hold for digital marketing and streaming? This year, our contributors dove deep into the questions shaping the intersection of arts, media, and technology. The following five articles and five podcasts are our most-read and most-downloaded content for 2025*. They capture the curiosity, concerns, and excitement driving our field forward.

ARTICLES

1. AI And Theatre: Playwriting, Stage Design, and Ticketing by Moses Garcia:
   https://www.amt-lab.org/blog/2023/5/artificial-intelligence-amp-theatre-making-past-present-and-future

2. Nightshade: A defensive tool for artists against AI Art Generators by Samantha Sonnet
   https://www.amt-lab.org/reviews/2023/11/nightshade-a-defensive-tool-for-artists-against-ai-art-generators

3. Artificial Intelligence’s Involvement in the Human Creative Process by Mbali Holt
   https://www.amt-lab.org/blog/2024/12/artificial-intelligences-involvement-in-the-human-creative-process

4. A New Era of AI in the Entertainment Industry by Averi Allison, Tatiana Behar Russy, Erin Coughenour, Julia Timmons
   https://www.amt-lab.org/blog/2024/9/a-new-era-of-ai-in-the-entertainment-industry

5. Breaking Barriers in Music Education with Chrome Music Lab by Lydia Killian
   https://www.amt-lab.org/reviews/2019/2/chrome-music-lab

podcasts

1. Cinematic VR for Public Service
   https://amt-lab.org/podcasts-interviews/2025/5/cinematic-vr-for-public-service-with-eric-williams-and-jordan-herron

2. The Impacts of Big Data and AI on the Arts, Our Culture, and Society
   https://amt-lab.org/podcasts-interviews/2025/6/the-impacts-of-big-data-and-ai-on-the-arts-our-culture-and-society

3. The future of Technology in the Performing Arts: VR or Broadcast?
   https://amt-lab.org/podcasts-interviews/2025/8/the-future-of-technology-in-the-performing-arts-vr-or-broadcast

4. Let’s Talk Streaming: Music Industry and Culture Shifts
   https://amt-lab.org/podcasts-interviews/2025/2/lets-talk-streaming-20-the-music-industry-and-culture-shifts

5. Digital Marketing In the Age of AI
   https://amt-lab.org/podcasts-interviews/2025/6/digital-marketing-in-the-age-of-ai-updegraff

Stay with us through 2026 as we continue to research the emerging technologies impacting the arts and arts management. Be curious and stay safe as you navigate the future frontiers.

*Just because our readers read it in 2025 doesn’t mean it was published in 2025. Many of our top pieces are 2-3 years old, as they are only now capturing the attention of arts workers and leaders.

Figure 1. Summary of 2025 page views, podcast downloads and the overlapping content areas for the top 5 articles and podcasts. Source: Claude.ai