14 ms·

What's the grift here, get as much voluntary biometric data as possible before regulatory pressure shuts the whole thing down?

nwoli 3y ago
Am I the only one who doesn’t think its a grift? I get that we wanna put negative pressure on altman becuase of the hypocrisy of openai, but I kinda would like to participate in world coin if possible. UBI sounds nice and I give up more personal data using any other service so idk, it doesn’t actually bother me tbh
- veave 3y ago
  I agree with you. They are clear about what they ask of you and what they give you. I wouldn't accept, but people should be able to accept if they want.
  - croes 3y ago
    It isn't clear what they give you. You know neither it's worth nor it's usefuless nor it's lifetime. And I doubt that many people exactly know what they give and what happens to that data or what negative effects it could have if that data is stolen. Otherwise people wouldn't fall for (crypto) scams.
    - veave 3y ago
      It's crypto - quite clearly you don't know what its worth is or will be. That's the entire point.
      - croes 3y ago
        So it isn't clear what the really give, could be the equivalent of OneCoin.
- SonicScrub 3y ago
  The grift here is that there is no way in you are ever going to see a cent of that promised UBI. I hope giving away your biometrics was worth that slim hope. I'd personally go for the lottery ticket if I wanted to some have fun with massively improbable odds. I still won't ever see a cent, but at least it's less creepy
- pavlov 3y ago
  Where is the money going to come for a UBI? Presumably it would be distributed as Worldcoin airdrops. Either those airdrops will quickly reduce the value of the coin towards zero because nobody’s going to trade real money for WorldHyperInflationCoin… Or, Sam Altman will somehow create Worldgov too that will fund this brave new Worldcoin UBI. Doesn’t seem terribly likely. Maybe it’s an AI Underpants Gnome thing where step #2 is “posthuman superintelligence will solve it!”
- croes 3y ago
  We put negative pressure on anybody who tries to build a global database of mankind's iris scans, no matter if it's a government, an agency or a company.
- piuantiderp 3y ago
  Call it the Universal law: Any coin used for UBI, will lose value against Bitcoin.
- wahnfrieden 3y ago
  Lots of shitcoins before have handwaved at some UBI solution in the future. World coin has no plans. They have a public roadmap, which is different from a plan. Every shitcoin has a roadmap to build hype and satisfy desires without needing to deliver.
akira2501 3y ago
It's a grift^2. It's simply pretending that language models masquerading as AI are so absurdly powerful that human identity itself is now threatened and requires an additional verification layer to prove that you are actually human. Like the language model product, I think they're purely trading on hype. I'm not sure what having my retinal scan gets you if you can't actually replicate an eyeball matching that scan.
- rgrieselhuber 3y ago
  I think it's more of a compliance test than anything else. They already have all the facial recog data they would need, or could easily source it.
  - at-fates-hands 3y ago
    This just gives them another vector to prove its actually you. Matching finger print data with facial recog is about as close as you can get to foolproof identity analysis I would think. I know both can be faked, but for a majority of the population, having these two markers would be almost impossible to claim it wasn't you.
    - rgrieselhuber 3y ago
      This is what government ids are already for. Instead of creating new systems to strip away privacy rights, spend more time enforcing laws and prosecuting identity theft. Tying identity to biometrics makes it involuntary at some point down the road, which is obviously the real intention.
- rngname22 3y ago
  It's absolutely the case that there will be a need for human verification, in fact it already is a core part of identity verification, it's one reason we have a liveness check. The rise of LLM and generative image and video absolutely poses threats in the form of criminal impersonation and scams, in terms of maliciously intentioned catfishing, in terms of manipulation of public discourse, and last but not least to the enshittification of online discussion. Online discussion spam filters have been decent at removing low effort commercial shilling and automated trollposting, but LLM poses a real threat in that regard. If you don't want a 14 year old troll to be able to set an automated script to spam post 50 new convincingly written Reddit posts every hour about how horrible Playstation 7 is and how much better Xbox Series 15 is to /r/Games, then you care about human verification or spam detection that takes into account the new abilities of LLMs. All that being said Worldcoin doesn't look like the best answer.
rgrieselhuber 3y ago
I remember being in awe when I visited Universal Studios a few years back and they casually asked everybody to fingerprint themselves on the way in. Most people did it without even thinking about it. When I told them I was not going to participate, they said "you have to" to which I replied "I most certainly do not." They let me in after that. It almost felt like an IQ test.
- noduerme 3y ago
  This really happens at theme parks now? What the hell?! [edit] The last time I was at Universal Studios, I was 17. A couple friends and I spent a few hours running around the park in camouflage at around 1am, stoned out of our minds, before being caught and escorted out. They let us go with a warning. Can you imagine what they'd do now?? The 90s were awesome.
  - rgrieselhuber 3y ago
    I couldn't believe it myself.
  - romafirst3 3y ago
    They would let you go with a warning unless you were black.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
- andsoitis 3y ago
  Biometrics / fingerprinting at Universal Studios: https://www.universalstudioshollywood.com/web/en/us/faqs/biometrics https://www.universalstudioshollywood.com/web/en/us/faqs/bio...
  - robocat 3y ago
    How are biometrics used at Universal Studios Hollywood? Biometrics are gathered on a guest’s first visit when using Multi-Day, Annual Pass or Season Pass tickets. On subsequent visits these biometrics are referenced to ensure that it is the same guest using the ticket.
duskwuff 3y ago
An even more cynical possibility is that it isn't even about the biometric data. If you treat that part as a distraction, the rest of it looks exactly like a typical cryptocurrency "airdrop" pump-and-dump scheme -- give away a bunch of your tokens to build hype and set a (bogus) price target, then start selling the tokens for liquid currency.
- luma 3y ago
  The organization behind it is, of course, keeping 10% of the coin for themselves. Tracks very well with your theory.
  - tromp 3y ago
    Where can one find this information? Is it on their website?
    - downvotetruth 3y ago
      https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/06/1048981/worldcoin-cryptocurrency-biometrics-web3/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/06/1048981/worldcoi...
soupbowl 3y ago
I am still waiting for regulatory pressure to protect my privacy and data. This biometric data will be a gold mine I am sure.

nwoli 3y ago

Am I the only one who doesn’t think its a grift? I get that we wanna put negative pressure on altman becuase of the hypocrisy of openai, but I kinda would like to participate in world coin if possible. UBI sounds nice and I give up more personal data using any other service so idk, it doesn’t actually bother me tbh

veave 3y ago
I agree with you. They are clear about what they ask of you and what they give you. I wouldn't accept, but people should be able to accept if they want.
- croes 3y ago
  It isn't clear what they give you. You know neither it's worth nor it's usefuless nor it's lifetime. And I doubt that many people exactly know what they give and what happens to that data or what negative effects it could have if that data is stolen. Otherwise people wouldn't fall for (crypto) scams.
  - veave 3y ago
    It's crypto - quite clearly you don't know what its worth is or will be. That's the entire point.
    - croes 3y ago
      So it isn't clear what the really give, could be the equivalent of OneCoin.
SonicScrub 3y ago
The grift here is that there is no way in you are ever going to see a cent of that promised UBI. I hope giving away your biometrics was worth that slim hope. I'd personally go for the lottery ticket if I wanted to some have fun with massively improbable odds. I still won't ever see a cent, but at least it's less creepy
pavlov 3y ago
Where is the money going to come for a UBI? Presumably it would be distributed as Worldcoin airdrops. Either those airdrops will quickly reduce the value of the coin towards zero because nobody’s going to trade real money for WorldHyperInflationCoin… Or, Sam Altman will somehow create Worldgov too that will fund this brave new Worldcoin UBI. Doesn’t seem terribly likely. Maybe it’s an AI Underpants Gnome thing where step #2 is “posthuman superintelligence will solve it!”
croes 3y ago
We put negative pressure on anybody who tries to build a global database of mankind's iris scans, no matter if it's a government, an agency or a company.
piuantiderp 3y ago
Call it the Universal law: Any coin used for UBI, will lose value against Bitcoin.
wahnfrieden 3y ago
Lots of shitcoins before have handwaved at some UBI solution in the future. World coin has no plans. They have a public roadmap, which is different from a plan. Every shitcoin has a roadmap to build hype and satisfy desires without needing to deliver.

akira2501 3y ago

It's a grift^2. It's simply pretending that language models masquerading as AI are so absurdly powerful that human identity itself is now threatened and requires an additional verification layer to prove that you are actually human. Like the language model product, I think they're purely trading on hype. I'm not sure what having my retinal scan gets you if you can't actually replicate an eyeball matching that scan.

rgrieselhuber 3y ago
I think it's more of a compliance test than anything else. They already have all the facial recog data they would need, or could easily source it.
- at-fates-hands 3y ago
  This just gives them another vector to prove its actually you. Matching finger print data with facial recog is about as close as you can get to foolproof identity analysis I would think. I know both can be faked, but for a majority of the population, having these two markers would be almost impossible to claim it wasn't you.
  - rgrieselhuber 3y ago
    This is what government ids are already for. Instead of creating new systems to strip away privacy rights, spend more time enforcing laws and prosecuting identity theft. Tying identity to biometrics makes it involuntary at some point down the road, which is obviously the real intention.
rngname22 3y ago
It's absolutely the case that there will be a need for human verification, in fact it already is a core part of identity verification, it's one reason we have a liveness check. The rise of LLM and generative image and video absolutely poses threats in the form of criminal impersonation and scams, in terms of maliciously intentioned catfishing, in terms of manipulation of public discourse, and last but not least to the enshittification of online discussion. Online discussion spam filters have been decent at removing low effort commercial shilling and automated trollposting, but LLM poses a real threat in that regard. If you don't want a 14 year old troll to be able to set an automated script to spam post 50 new convincingly written Reddit posts every hour about how horrible Playstation 7 is and how much better Xbox Series 15 is to /r/Games, then you care about human verification or spam detection that takes into account the new abilities of LLMs. All that being said Worldcoin doesn't look like the best answer.

rgrieselhuber 3y ago

I remember being in awe when I visited Universal Studios a few years back and they casually asked everybody to fingerprint themselves on the way in. Most people did it without even thinking about it. When I told them I was not going to participate, they said "you have to" to which I replied "I most certainly do not." They let me in after that. It almost felt like an IQ test.

noduerme 3y ago
This really happens at theme parks now? What the hell?! [edit] The last time I was at Universal Studios, I was 17. A couple friends and I spent a few hours running around the park in camouflage at around 1am, stoned out of our minds, before being caught and escorted out. They let us go with a warning. Can you imagine what they'd do now?? The 90s were awesome.
- rgrieselhuber 3y ago
  I couldn't believe it myself.
- romafirst3 3y ago
  They would let you go with a warning unless you were black.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
andsoitis 3y ago
Biometrics / fingerprinting at Universal Studios: https://www.universalstudioshollywood.com/web/en/us/faqs/biometrics https://www.universalstudioshollywood.com/web/en/us/faqs/bio...
- robocat 3y ago
  How are biometrics used at Universal Studios Hollywood? Biometrics are gathered on a guest’s first visit when using Multi-Day, Annual Pass or Season Pass tickets. On subsequent visits these biometrics are referenced to ensure that it is the same guest using the ticket.

duskwuff 3y ago

An even more cynical possibility is that it isn't even about the biometric data. If you treat that part as a distraction, the rest of it looks exactly like a typical cryptocurrency "airdrop" pump-and-dump scheme -- give away a bunch of your tokens to build hype and set a (bogus) price target, then start selling the tokens for liquid currency.

luma 3y ago
The organization behind it is, of course, keeping 10% of the coin for themselves. Tracks very well with your theory.
- tromp 3y ago
  Where can one find this information? Is it on their website?
  - downvotetruth 3y ago
    https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/06/1048981/worldcoin-cryptocurrency-biometrics-web3/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/06/1048981/worldcoi...

soupbowl 3y ago

I am still waiting for regulatory pressure to protect my privacy and data. This biometric data will be a gold mine I am sure.