Spend enough time in San Francisco, look into the future of Cyberpunk, and maybe you will find that weird things are beginning to look normal. Car fleets with their own drive? Yawn. Start-up is trying to revive the woolen mammoth? Sure why not. Will you invoke divine artificial intelligence that could exterminate humanity? Ho-Hum.
You can even find yourself, as I did on Wednesday evening, stand in a crowded room in the Marina district and look at the glowing white sphere known as a ball that has scanned eyeballs in exchange for cryptocurrency and something called the world ID.
The event was hosted by World-up in San Francisco, co-founded by Sam Altman Openi, who came up with one of the more ambitious (or ghostly, depending on your) technology projects in recent memory.
The company’s basic playground is this: The Internet is about to overcome swarms of AI realistic robots that almost make it impossible to find out whether we interact with real people on social networks, dating sites, game platforms and other online spaces.
To solve this problem, a World program called World ID – you can think of it as a clear or TSA Precheck for the Internet – allowing users to verify their humanity online.
If you want to register, users stare in a ball that collects scanning their irises. They then follow several instructions in the smartphone application and receive a unique biometric identifier that is stored on their device. They are Baked Personal Data Protection FunctionsAnd the company says it does not store images of users’ irises, only the numerical code that corresponds to them.
In exchange, users receive a cryptocurrency called worldcoin, which they can spend, send to other world ID or trade holders for other currencies. (Wednesday evening was a registration bonus value of about $ 40.)
The event was built by Mr. Altman the world as a solution to a problem that he called “trust at Agi” because artificial intelligence and human systems are approaching, saying that the need for a mechanism that tells robots and people separately becomes more urgent.
“We wanted a way to ensure that people remain special and central in a world where the Internet will have a lot of AI -controlled content,” Altman said.
In the end, Mr. Altman and Alex Blania, the CEO of the world, believe that something like worldcoin, perhaps in the form of universal basic income, will be needed to distribute the revenues from the powerful AI systems. They discussed various ways to create a “real human network” that would combine a system of verifying evidence of humanity with a financial payments system that would allow verified people to trade with other verified people-without relying on government ID or traditional banking system.
“The initial thoughts were very crazy,” said Mr. Altman. “Then we descended to the one that was just a little crazy that became the world.”
The project was launched two years ago at an international level and found a large part of their early traction in developing countries such as Kenya and Indonesia where users sorted Get your balls scanning in exchange for rewards of cryptocurrency. The company received about $ 200 million from investors, including Andreessen Horowitz and Khosla Ventures.
There were some hiccups. The collection of biometric data in the world faced the opposition of advocates and regulatory bodies of privacy and the company was forbidden or investigated in places, including Hong Kong and Spain. Were also Reports of fraud and exploitation of workers Bound to a crypt reward based on a project.
However, it seems that it is growing rapidly. Since it was launched two years ago, about 26 million people have registered, Mr. Blania said, and more than 12 million has received Orb Scans to verify as humans.
The world first remained outside the United States, partly due to the regulatory bodies would deal with their plans. However, the crypto-friendly policy of Trump’s administration gave the opening.
On Wednesday, World announced that he was launching in the United States and opening retail bases in cities, including San Francisco, Los Angeles and Nashville, where new users can scan eyes and get their world ID. By the end of the year he plans to have 7,500 balls in the country.
The company also revealed a new version of its ball, orb mini – which is not really a ball. Instead, it looks like a smartphone with shining eyes, but serves the same purpose as a larger device. And World announced a partnership with other businesses, including Razer, game companies and Match Group, the Conglomerate dating application that will soon allow Tinder users in Japan to verify their humanity using their world ID.
It is not yet clear how it makes money from it, or whether Americans who are aware of privacy will equally eagerly branch their biometric data for several crypto chips as people in the development of parts of the world.
It is also not clear whether the world can overcome basic skepticism about how strange and ominous the whole thing can feel.
Personally, I am sympathetic with the idea that we need a way to recognize robots and people. The proposed repair in the world – a global biometric register, supported by volatile cryptocurrency and under the supervision of a private society – may sound too much like an episode “Black Mirror” to achieve the mainstream. And even in the middle, in a room full of eager early adoptors, I met a lot of people who were reluctant to stare at the ball.
“I do not give up my personal data easily and I consider personal information about my eyes,” one technical worker told me.
The world connection with Mr. Altman also applied for control. During the action, several skeptics pointed out that, on the basis of its position at the top of OpenI, in a sense, it supports a problem-internet full of hyper-conviction-intensive robots-this world is trying to solve.
However, it is also possible that Mr. Altman’s connection could help quickly if he connects to Openai or integrates in some way with his AI products. Maybe a social network that is OpenIai building It will have the “verified people” mode, or perhaps users who contribute to Openai products in a valuable way, will be paid once in a worldcoin.
(The New York Times sued Openai and his partner, Microsoft, who demanded a copyright infringement concerning the content of the AI systems. Openai and Microsoft
It is also quite possible that personal data protection standards can shift in favor of the world and that what feels weird and ominous today can be normalized tomorrow. (Remember how weird it was the first time you saw a clear kiosk at the airport? Did you promise that you will never pass your biometric data, then eventually calm down and accept it as comfort?)
When I was my turn to enter the balls, I removed my glasses, opened my world application, and followed the instructions he gave me. (Look like this, look so, they’ll return a little.) The ball cameras turned for a minute and captured the texture of my iris. The ring around the ball shone yellow and released a happy bell.
A few minutes later I was the owner of the World ID and 39,22 WorldCoin Tokens. (Tokens are worth $ 40.77 at today’s prices and I donate them to charity as soon as I find out how to get them from the phone.)
My Orb scanning was fast and painless, but I spent the rest of the night vulnerable – as I just agreed to participate in a clinical evaluation for some risky new medicine without reading any side effects. However, it seemed that many of the participation had no such reservations.
“What am I still hiding?” She said influenced social media named Hannah Stocking as she got off to take the ball scan. “Who cares?
