Is technology a cure all for experience designers in a hunt for quality? Katrina Lat says no – but the answer’s a bit more complicated…
Technology has become one of the default ways to signal innovation.
Clients ask for AI.
Boards ask for XR.
Creative teams look for the latest tools.
But does more technology actually create better experiences?
In her WXO Campfire ‘‘High Tech, Low Tech, No Tech: Lessons Learned From 900+ Immersive Experiences’, Katrina Lat – experience researcher, designer and founder of Meow Wolf’s Immersive Experience Institute – shared findings from analysing 996 immersive experiences across theatre, escape rooms, installations, exhibitions, museums and attractions. The results challenge one of the industry’s biggest assumptions.
1. Technology Doesn’t Predict Quality
The common assumption is simple:
More technology = better experience.
Lat tested that assumption by plotting the technological sophistication of 996 immersive experiences against her quality ratings.
There was almost no relationship.
Some of the highest-rated experiences relied on VR, AI or complex digital systems.
Others relied almost entirely on performers, physical space and clever design.
Technology wasn’t the common factor.
Quality was..
Examples
Technology-heavy
Minimal technology
- Dolores Meta Maze in the Netherlands
- The Forbidden Corner in the UK.
All were among Lat’s highest-rated experiences despite taking completely different approaches.
The lesson isn’t that technology doesn’t matter.
It’s that technology alone tells you very little about whether an experience will be good.
2. Judge Technology By The Job It Does
If technology doesn’t predict quality, what should experience leaders evaluate instead?
Lat’s answer is simple.
Ask what the technology actually contributes.
- Does it create a world that couldn’t otherwise exist?
- Does it increase participant agency?
- Does it deepen emotional engagement?
- Or is it simply replacing an analogue interaction with a more expensive digital one?
Technology should never be the reason an experience exists.
It should be the best way of delivering the experience you’ve already designed.
Examples:
Body Proxy depends entirely on immersive technology. Without it, the experience simply wouldn’t exist.
By contrast, many low-tech experiences achieve equally strong outcomes through storytelling, performance and participant interaction.
Technology isn’t valuable because it’s impressive.
It’s valuable when removing it would fundamentally change the participant experience.
3. Every Technology Choice Creates Trade-offs
To prove her point live, Lat turned the Zoom room into a small experiment. She asked attendees to raise their hands using Zoom reactions. Then she showed the 12 nominees for Experience of the Year (Large) at the recent WXO World Experience Awards, and asked who had seen at least one. The number dropped quickly. WOne of the most useful ideas from Lat’s research is that technology should be evaluated like any other design decision.
Every new layer introduces both opportunities and costs.
Technology can create:
- richer interaction
- new forms of participation
- impossible worlds
But it can also introduce:
- operational complexity
- maintenance requirements
- accessibility challenges
- additional points of failure
Those trade-offs deserve as much attention as the creative possibilities.
That’s particularly important because technology often appears attractive in pitches long before teams have considered what it will cost to operate reliably.
For experience leaders, the question isn’t simply:
“What can this technology do?”
It’s:
“What will this technology require?”
In the talk, she placed these four pillars across two axes: internal versus external, and immediate versus emergent. Agency is what the participant can do. Universe is where the work takes them. Resonance is the way it lands. Artistry is how it is made.
The Bigger Lesson
Lat’s research doesn’t argue against technology.
It argues against treating technology as a proxy for innovation.
Across almost 1,000 immersive experiences, the strongest work wasn’t defined by how much technology it used.
It was defined by how deliberately every design decision served the participant.
That’s a useful shift for anyone commissioning, funding or designing experiences.
The question isn’t:
“How can we add more technology?”
It’s:
“What experience are we trying to create—and is technology the best way to achieve it?”
About this Experience Report
This Experience Report is the product of a recent WXO Campfire.
WXO Campfires are online gatherings where WXO members from multiple sectors, specialisms and countries come together to discuss the future of the Experience Economy. Case studies, frameworks and toolkits are shared, with attendees able to put questions to guests in an intimate setting as well as discuss and reflect on the session with their peers
As well as the ability to attend live Campfires, all WXO members receive the on-demand recording and full transcript, along with any supporting presentations, decks or frameworks.
Members also receive an Experience Briefing straight after the Campfire ends. Each Experience Briefing summarises the session in an easily-digestible format, and is designed to be read in under five minutes. These come together to form an easy-to-scan directory of the current landscape of the Experience Economy,
Recent sessions have covered such topics as the rise of functional multi-sensory experiences, designing for anticipation, ROX and the role of tech, the emerging Chinese immersive market, designing for inclusivity, experience design as protest tool and how to map local experience ecosystems.
Guest speakers have included Joe Pine (The Experience Economy), Alain Thys (The Transformation Architects), Katherine Templar Lewis (Kinda Studios), Laura Hess (REMARKABLE), Tom Middleton(Senzomi), Barbara Bouza (Walt Disney Imagineering), Charlie Melcher (The Future of Storytelling) and Abigail Taylor-Sansom (SCAD).
You can check out listings for forthcoming Campfires here.
For more information on how to join the WXO, head here.
