The Format #022

In the past couple of weeks news has been dominated by the big AI companies. Google’s Gemini became a bit too woke, creating images that were racially biased and historically inaccurate (such as a female pope), Anthropic blew people away with their Claude 3 AI model and Elon started a lawsuit against OpenAI with evidence, emails and accusations being thrown both ways.

Beyond all that drama, here are some of the articles we’ve found over the past week that we found particularly interesting:

Tumblr and WordPress to Sell Users’ Data to Train AI Tools

There has been a flurry of content companies ‘monetising their users’ by selling huge amounts of their data to a handful of mammoth AI companies. This isn’t necessarily just structured public data either, it could include private posts, explicit images and password-protected content… but we don’t really know anything since there is absolutely no transparency in whats going on.

Is it time to talk about a model that provides a fair value exchange? 👀

Google DeepMind Unveils AI ‘Genie’ to Instantly Conjure Playable Games

2 weeks ago we talked about how Sora can create photorealistic gaming worlds on the fly. Just a few days later and Google went and one-upped this. Their Genie model can create playable games from a text or image prompt, and although these games are currently slow and pixelated, it opens the door to a whole new realm of creativity. It feels like this is yet another signal that gaming will be the native social interface for Gen Alpha and those who are being raised in a world where these innovations are commonplace.

Brave Integrates On-Chain Solana Wallet for Reward Payments

A privacy-first internet, where users are fairly rewarded for engaging and providing data, all made possible through blockchain technology. Its the dream. At least our dream, and Brave have taken a huge step forward to achieving this by using Solana as part of their on-chain rewards system. They are also taking a privacy-focused approach to their new AI model rollout, Leo. They’re showing how it should be done, bravo!

Sony Files Patent for NFTs to Allow Transfers Between Games and Consoles

Sony’s recent patent is very interesting - interoperable NFT’s that can be carried by users across different hardwares (e.g. VR, tablets, computers, phones), across different console generations and most importantly outside of the Sony ecosystem.

Dapps Will Soon Handle Gas Fees On Behalf Of Clients

If we’re being honest, interacting with the blockchain currently sucks. Its quite far from the intuitive interactions we’ve come to accept as the norm. There are workarounds to make the UX easier (like the magic link we used at the UNTAGGED event), but for most people, the crazy potential utility of blockchain just isn’t worth it for the drop in UX.

Gas fees are a HUGE part of this problem. Good news though… the founder of Uniswap thinks that this could be a problem that will soon be sorted → getting all the utility with none of the UX drawbacks could open the doors to mass adoption and derisk blockchain integrations for more established companies.

Elon Musk Is Right About OpenAI’s Hypocrisy

Although on the surface Elon Musk suing OpenAI may just look like billionaire bickering match, it brings to the surface some very important questions. OpenAI have shifted from being a non-profit organisation working on the responsible development and rollout of AI, to one of the most transformational for-profit companies in existence, fuelling the ‘AI arms race’ with their geurilla product releases and closed-source models. Are ‘Open’AI still working ‘for the benefit of humanity’? It’s a good question Elon. 🤔

OPENFORMAT News

Over the past few weeks we’ve been hard at work, building, talking, hiring, partnering and most importantly, playing. The significance behind playing? We’re eating out own dog food, using OPENFORMAT to build, and then everyone is jumping in and testing it out to really grasp the nuances of the reward systems and all the ways they can influence behaviours (see Rewardle for more on that…).

Revolutionising Education and Rewards Systems. A Partnership with Roster

We’re super excited to be partnering with Roster, they will be using our on-chain rewards system to transform how their educational content is delivered, turning it into a more dynamic, interactive and rewarding learning environment.

BIMA: Web3 Talks Episode 1 with Chris Joyce, Founder & Creative Director at Velvet Badger

As part of her role as Co-Chair of the BIMA (British Interactive Media Association) Web3 Council, Sarah sat down for a chat with Velvet Badger - a creative agency who have helped many luxury and corporate brands to shape and execute a Web3 strategy.

This was the first in a series of talks aiming to help agencies understand how Web3 and the blockchain can be used to solve real problems.

Part 1 of our Rewardle experiment is complete

A few weeks ago Sarah talked a bit about an internal experiment we are carrying out: building an ecosystem of interconnected Wordle clones that give on-chain rewards to players.

Well the first version is live and there has been some serious competition between the OPENFORMAT team. Last week I finished at the top of the leaderboard but Redeye has edged the lead this time (despite the fact I played for 20 minutes straight before taking this screenshot…). If you want to give it a go check it our here. It’s far from perfect, but building it taught us A LOT, and that was the point.

Job Vacancy: Front-End Developer

We’re looking for a talented ambitious front-end developer who is passionate about creating appliance level experiences for people interacting with (our) technology, if you, or anyone you know is interested please get in touch with us at hello@openformat.tech.

What we’re reading…

Sarah and Bruce have been reading Read Write Own: Building the Next Era of the Internet by Chris Dixon, it captures a lot of what we have been discussing for the past few years…

When the great innovation appears, it will almost certainly be in a muddled, incomplete and confusing form. To the discoverer himself it will be only half understood; to everybody else it will be a mystery. For any speculation which does not at first glance look crazy, there is no hope. - Freeman Dyson

And that’s all for this week.

Have a great weekend, Dan and the OPENFORMAT team 👋🏽

Prompt (generated using DALL-E 3): “Create an ultra-realistic depiction of a Genie, with meticulous attention to the textures and physical properties of the scene, set within a naturally lit cavern. The Genie, showcasing an advanced level of detail in facial expressions, skin texture, and clothing dynamics, appears almost photographic. They are in the process of conjuring highly detailed, modern video game consoles and video games from the air. These items should appear with a level of realism that makes them look like they could be touched, featuring accurate reflections, shadows, and materials. The environment around the Genie is filled with realistic magical dust particles that catch the light in a believable manner. The cavern itself is rendered with true-to-life geological features, including rock textures and color variations that you'd expect in a real cave. The lighting is nuanced, with sources that seem to emanate from specific points, casting believable shadows and creating a dynamic range of light and dark areas, enhancing the overall realism of the scene.”