Who am i?
Digital Alchemist
Latoya Peterson lives at the intersection of emerging technology and culture. Named one of Forbes Magazine's 30 Under 30 rising stars in media, she is best known for the award winning blog Racialicious.com - the intersection of race and pop culture. She is currently an Expert Narrative Designer at Elsewhere Entertainment, an Activision studio working on a new IP.
Previously, she was a cofounder and CXO at Glow Up Games, a game studio who created a tie-in game for HBO’s Insecure and a unique play-and-watch experience for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival called Hella Iambic. She was the Deputy Editor, Digital Innovation for ESPN's The Undefeated, an Editor-at-Large at Fusion, and the Senior Digital Producer for The Stream, a social media driven news show on Al Jazeera America. In 2018, she soft launched AI in the Trap, a collaborative art project that explores the future of artificial intelligence and predictive policing through a hip-hop lens. In 2016, she produced a critically acclaimed YouTube series on Girl Gamers that was highlighted on Spotify.
Known for bringing a hip-hop feminist and racial justice framework to technological and cultural analysis, Latoya’s perspectives have been widely published in outlets like Wired, Teen Vogue, NPR, ESPN the Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Essence, Spin, Vibe, Marie Claire, Kotaku, The Atlantic, The American Prospect, and The Guardian. She was a contributor to Jezebel.com. Her essay, "The Not Rape Epidemic" was published in the anthology Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape (Seal Press, 2008). She also contributed "The Feminist Existential Crisis (Dark Children Remix)" to the anthology Feminism for Real: Deconstructing the Academic Industrial Complex of Feminism (CCPA, 2011).
She is currently on the advisory board of the Data & Society Institute. She is a US-Japan Leadership Foundation Fellow and a USC Civic Media Senior Fellow. She served on the board of visitors for The John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships, as a Harvard Berkman Center Affiliate, a Poynter Institute Sensemaking Fellow, and one of the inaugural Public Media Corps fellows.
She is also part of the selection committee for the Museum of Play’s World Video Game Hall of Fame.
different careers for different eras
Blogging
From 2006-2015 I participated in a group blogging project. Initially Mixed Media Watch, we rebranded the blog to Racialicious and ran a multinational, multiracial site for the next decade. The site was hacked in 2015, an inglorious end to this major era.
Writer/Commentator
Critical commentary on race , gender, and culture for a variety of outlets, everywhere from the New York Times to CNN. During this period I wrote for dozens of outlets and was named one of Forbes 30 Under 30 for my work in media.
Television Producer
After taking turns as a commentator and host on Al Jazeera English, I joined the staff of Al Jazeera America to help recreate The Stream for an American audience. From there, I worked at Fusion (a joint venture of ABC and Univision) before landing at ESPN's The Undefeated.
Game Developer
I cofounded an award winning indie game studio called Glow Up Games. the first all women of color founded game studio in the US. We released a beta of Insecure: The Come Up Game and a playable experience with The Oregon Shakespeare Festival called Hella Iambic. We were part of the Niantic Black Developers initiative. After closing down the studio in 2024, I joined the team at Elsewhere Entertainment, an Activision studio.
Next Stage?
I still dabble in AI, indie games, and short films. I'm currently working on a book, a screenplay, and a new game concept.