Augmented Humanity Powered by Blockchain & AI Ecosystems

As laid out in one of my previous articles The hunt for the blockchain killer (d)app the numbers to invest in blockchain technology are starting to add up and are promising to deliver real world return of investment - if applied to the right problem and use case.

The immediate areas to focus on are simple, repeatable solutions that can take advantage of the inherent trust, traceability and immutability of hyperledged networks and blockchain technology.

With that in mind we can miss the big picture where proactive investment and timing is everything for disruptive technology in order not to miss the boat and taking a chance of being disrupted (as laid out here).

Often it is not inherently obvious when superior, disruptive technology and new successful business models are gaining momentum - commencing first at a slower pace only to later accelerate explosively and rapidly at a point of no return, displacing the status quo and cannibalizing traditional businesses and technologies.

Companies that did not recognize early enough that they will be disrupted by technology enabled changing business models:

From a technology perspective:

• Distributed computing - a feat delivered by the likes of Cassandra and Hadoop
• Encryption technologies - have been around for decades

but,

• Blockchain removes the single point of failure by leveraging the entire network validating the blocks of information
• This technology also democratizes access and collaboration across members (more so in public blockchains vs perssion based private versions)

Furthermore,

• Hybrid scenarios are going emerge and ultimately have the upper hand by moving the needle beyond simple use cases of block chain contract tracking, tracing, digitization and securing data with immutable records:

@Melanie Swan of Kingston University, London laid out in here paper "Blockchain Thinking" future use cases where distributed ledger technology in combination with artificial intelligence, big data and peer to peer networking can be leveraged as a consensus builder across devices and be the glue when interacting with human operators, voice interfaces and mobile screens.

Interestingly and very fittingly this paper is written from a philosophy angle enhanced and complemented by technology rather than technology driving the use cases.

The paper explores how blockchain computing can emulate non linear human thinking that is influenced by specific circumstances in the real world and analog inputs and then processing vast amounts of information and presenting it back to a human operator or even more fascinatingly to a network of machines that are tasked to act on our behalves.

In the latter scenario machines, orchestration and service bots (see "Smartbots for a Connected Future" ) would seed the information in a consensus based peer to peer network of machines and e.g. have multiple connected homes interact in harmony and autonomously negotiate e.g. a Groupon deal for a restaurant nearby for this neighbourhood.

What if this technology could be leveraged to negotiate deals for cities - even country trade deals? It is not likely that cities and countries would surrender their data and power to bots and machines, but there are several use cases of AI supported decision making.

Glancing into the future ecosystems of people, AI enhanced devices and AI bots are very likely and will be interacting in perfect harmony with each other in a centralized/ decentralized and security authenticated environment enhanced by blockchain technology. 

Quirks are going to be worked out where well meaning machines might negotiate deals that are not in the best interest of the human operators.

Imagine a scenario of a personal assistant device that is acting independently to get you the best deals across interconnected homes and cities going rogue selling your pictures on social media outlets and forwarding your processed voice records to the likes of Cambridge Analytica for points and discounts.

There are even conspiracy theories that the Bitcoin code is too perfect having been developed a human - officially the reference Bitcoin implementation has been published by the infamous Satoshi Nakamoto who's real identity has not been identified as of now.

Would it be possible that the reason for the bitcoin code to be so perfect, is the fact that the code wasn’t created by a single extremely skilled developer or even a team of skilled developers, but by a self aware AI network?

Scary thought, but I'd rather focus on the brighter side of AI, blockchain and hyperledged networks that can complement and enhance decision making and outsource AI prone tasks of crunching through massive, decentralized terabytes of data providing input for business decisions, security and personal benefits by by providing more personalized, contextually aware, and simpler user experience, powered by AI and secured and verified with Blockchain.

While blockchain technology is still relatively new - AI has been making big leaps recently with conversational and contextual AI setting new boundaries of whats possible in "augmented humanity" as per @rwang0 in

The benefits for combining blockchain technology with AI, peer to peer and big data are:

• Enabling new business models: catering to the strengths of real time analytics and variety of data stored in big data clusters, storing pre processed data that has been analyzed through deep learning methods, continuously updated by new data that is fed to the system and focused on user and company benefits including efficiencies, tailored experiences and decision support in the context of "Now"
• Compliance: Driving greater awareness and compliance of operational guardrails of the business so that regulatory policies, procedures and best practices are followed
• Immutability: Protecting the customer experience interacting with IoT and AI enabled devices and personal assistants through an immutable profile to drive trusted commerce with audit trails for improving quality, accuracy and confidence
• Trust: Enabled by digital identity management enforced through distinct distributed ledger profiles reducing risk, driving a tailored customer-focused experience and securing the system of connected machines, blockchain participants and enterprises with evidence of tampering and data breach notification
• Veracity: The underlying data is independently verifiable through blockchain technology identifying customers, auditors and regulators further reducing compliance effort and costs

I still get a kick of listening to the demonstration of Google placing a haircut appointment at a hair salon talking to a real person blending the digital and physical world with conversational AI, big data and smart assistants so effortlessly:

Industry regulation and Blockchain guard rails to my earlier point are certainly necessary so we don't have machines and services going rogue with unintended consequences, but this is an amazing window into the future how this technology put to good use can enhance our lives going forward.

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Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this post are my own personal views and don't necessarily represent the views of current or previous employers.

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