In early October, Hack Seasons Convention was held in Singapore, a world gathering of technologists, buyers, and innovators to debate the way forward for blockchain and Web3. A spotlight of the occasion was a fireplace chat titled “Media 3.0 Presentation: Storytelling on Chain with Joe Rubin and Neal Stephenson.”
Moderated by Rebecca Barkin, co-founder and CEO of Lamina1, the session featured Joseph Lubin, co-founder of Ethereum and founder and CEO of ConsenSys, and Neal Stephenson, creator and co-founder of Lamina1. The dialogue centered on how blockchain expertise is remodeling media, inventive expression, and the narratives that form fashionable tradition.
The dialogue started with an summary of latest developments at Lamina1, an interactive media platform owned by each storytellers and followers. Lamina1 lately introduced a partnership with ConsenSys’ Linea blockchain and can launch a brand new mental property (IP) venture “Artefact” on the Linea community.
As IP more and more spans a number of codecs and is accelerated by AI, questions round possession, management, and validation are taking middle stage. Neil Stephenson has researched the social and cultural influence of rising applied sciences over time and highlighted present tendencies in AI because it pertains to content material creation. He identified that the AI trade is extremely centralized and dominated by a small variety of corporations with the sources to coach fashions at scale. This centralization creates dependence on opaque methods and limits transparency and accessibility. Within the context of content material creation, some AI advocates have recommended lowering the affect and compensation of creators, however the authors emphasised the potential for AI for use to profit creators moderately than to their detriment.
Joe Lubin echoed his issues in regards to the centralization of huge expertise and framed the event of the Web3 ecosystem as a response to those constructions. He defined that for hundreds of years, societies have operated below top-down command and management, with authorities and intermediaries managing property rights and privileges. Though such constructions are efficient in constructing civilizations, they are often detrimental to the vast majority of contributors. Within the realm of user-generated content material, present fashions might be described as authority-generated. Joe Rubin emphasised that the appearance of decentralized belief, first operationalized via blockchain by Satoshi Nakamoto, laid the inspiration for a brand new mannequin of decentralized, user-driven civilization. This strategy will not be meant to interrupt up present corporations, however moderately to allow a extra decentralized and community-oriented system. Lamina1’s integration with networks like Linea goals to empower customers and foster a golden age of community-value user-generated content material.
Joe Rubin additionally expressed a deep dedication to supporting the humanities, music, and the broader creator economic system via decentralization. He emphasised the significance of mental property in enabling artists to develop into impartial and self-reliant. Conventional methods typically favor organizations with authorized sources over creators themselves. Leveraging expertise could make IP configuration extra granular, configurable, and speedy, particularly from a copyright and licensing perspective. This shift strikes past a scarcity-driven mannequin to an period of abundance facilitated by automation, AI, and robotics. In such a system, creators can focus extra on creativity and content material era, and group mechanisms can reward participation and contributions.
The dialogue then strikes on to the origins of the time period “metaverse”, typically relationship again to Neal Stevenson’s novel “Metaverse”.snow crash“,” he mentioned, providing his ideas on how digital developments have unfolded since publication. The creator defined that the e-book was written within the late Eighties and early Nineties. On the time, the Web existed, nevertheless it was largely unknown to most of the people. When the novel was revealed, two main technological occasions occurred in the identical yr. World Vast Internet creation and sport launch.doom” Each occasions performed a transformative position in making laptop graphics broadly accessible. Though the online offered a platform for exchanging photographs,Doom” Demand for extra highly effective computer systems has elevated and entry to immersive digital experiences has expanded.
Neal Stephenson has identified that within the early days of the Web there was a “hippie grad” section marked by an idealistic imaginative and prescient of common entry to info. This era was ultimately adopted by centralization and consolidation, typified by the Web2 platform. In his novel, components of the Metaverse are managed by centralized companies, whereas different components stay open and freely accessible. One of the crucial essential however unanticipated results has been the rise of social media algorithms that monitor person habits and manipulate content material to maximise engagement, with far-reaching social penalties that even Neal Stephenson didn’t foresee within the Nineties.
Joe Rubin mentioned that the dystopian parts depicted within the novel had been by no means the principle focus for individuals growing new expertise or on the lookout for enterprise capital. What stood out as an alternative was the creator’s vivid depiction of our on-line world, which offered a compelling imaginative and prescient of the capabilities of computing expertise that was starting to mature.
Audio system shared their views on the potential of rising applied sciences. They emphasised the significance of leveraging the perfect facets of those instruments to profit humanity and create a constructive influence on society as digital innovation continues to advance.
Lamina1 unveils “Artefact” on Linea, combining storytelling and fan participation
The dialog turned to Lamina1’s future plans because it prepares to publish its first authentic IP “Artefact” straight on the Linea blockchain. The venture combines a narrative world with a system designed to encourage fan participation and engagement.
Neil Stephenson shared that the brand new IP developed primarily based on concepts he beforehand explored throughout a chat in New Zealand. He pointed to the bizarre state of affairs during which many individuals are growing AI, whereas others are warning of its potential risks. In nature, evolution happens via competitors, and no entity enjoys particular privileges with out dealing with challenges. Neil Stephenson recommended {that a} comparable aggressive framework may very well be utilized to AI, permitting methods to evolve by testing their capabilities in opposition to one another. He additional thought-about a situation in which there’s a centralized, impersonal AI, versus an AI that’s deployed in a decentralized method by human communities. AI makes use of expertise to profit itself and its group. This idea served as the idea for Lamina1, a collaborative world-building venture that allowed artists and sport designers to begin constructing their sport universes.
The panel dialogue ended by giving attendees a preview of the brand new IP, giving them an early glimpse into the story world and its interactive options.
