Making the most of blockchain technology and AI looks like a match made in heaven. How this can change the face of modern innovation is the subject of this discourse.
Artificial intelligence is one of the most important technologies in our world. Since its inception back in the 60s, the area has advanced so much. Most of our current devices use it and it helps our lives, and occasionally manages it, too.
Blockchain Technology, on the other hand, is a newcomer. A technology that’s barely a decade old and whose main use is handling digital currencies. While everyone saw AI as a worthy goal, blockchain has more than its share of detractors. However, Blockchain’s potency goes beyond crypto, and it could literally change our lives.
Fusing Technologies
It’s not uncommon for two separate or complementary independent technologies to work seamlessly. Most devices we use in our daily lives use several types of technology, after all. The union of different technologies has opened new doors, making our lives better and occasionally saving them.
This is why, even before blockchain reached mainstream status, developers were already looking into its alternate uses. Back in 2015, some tech gurus were already dreaming about it. At the same time, entrepreneurs were taking the first steps towards using these technologies together. And just a year later, IBM was joining in the fray.
While those efforts made ripples rather than waves, interest in these two technologies has only grown. Recently, talk of how blockchain can revolutionize different industries has grown, in many cases joining it with AI.
Synergies we have – and how they could be exploited
Now, in order to use two technologies together, it’s necessary for them to have some form of synergy. That is, there has to be a realistic goal that can be attained by merging them. Most of our industries, for example, mix the known knowledge of robotics with physics or chemistry to create products enmasse.
Neither blockchain nor AI are physical constructs, and therefore most of their uses together will be in a non-tangible realm. What is obvious is that their effects and impact are tangible in the real world.
Data, data, data…
One of the main needs of Blockchain AI is data. While earlier systems were programmed to respond in a way to certain inputs, machine learning and “real” AI have done away with this. The arrival of neural networks gave us the chance to make machines learn and act more closely as humans would.
However, there’s one tiny problem. A neural network is only as strong as the data ran through it. And the more complex the decision, the more data we need. This implies that both the storage space and bandwidth required for revolutionary AI projects is huge.
Moreover, most companies using AI today get their data from their users, and only their users. Apple, for example, knows why people use iPhones, and what apps are most common for them. They don’t know, however, why some prefer Android. Or what makes Android attractive to people that Apple doesn’t have. That information belongs to Google, not Apple.
This is problematic since it effectively divides our data sources and limits our access to them. Apple isn’t going to release their usage records, not even anonymized. Neither will Google, or Microsoft, or Twitter. It’s all private, their own data to use for whatever they desire.
AI, the markets, and you… or your data
Blockchain can help change this. Using the ledger technology to record interactions that people – real people – have with software and devices can help us see the bigger picture. A massive database could be built, containing data from different devices, programs, demographics, anonymized and available for everyone.
This might seem frivolous at first, but there are implications behind it both for AI technology and the market.
On the AI side, to help our AI get closer to humans we need data from millions of them. We need it to understand how the data impact us and merge it to create an impactful outcome. Blockchain could well provide us with both the data and the means to store and process it. In fact, blockchain could be the technology that helps usher in a new era for AI.
This would also have massive repercussions on the markets. The reason Amazon is so big and seems to always hit the mark with their enterprises isn’t just that they’re good. Sure, they offer great service – but it goes beyond that.
Every single thing Amazon offers is backed up by the almost absurd amounts of data they have access to. Usage and interest data for dozens of millions of customers. They know, at every minute, which trends are leading their customers’ interests. And they act on them.
Just as well, Facebook is the leader of social networks for this same reason. They may have good ideas and revolutionary plans, but in the end, their lead comes down to data.
This means that, for anyone else, entering the market is an uphill battle. Great ideas are great, but good ideas without market data amount to buying a single lottery ticket. Good ideas with market data backing and helping you shape your offering amount to buying most of the tickets. You simply get a much better chance at success.
Other uses for your data, blockchain, and AI
Data management is the biggest current proposal for a marriage of these technologies. However, these uses go beyond just markets, and well into our daily lives.
There are already projects trying to bring these two technologies together to aid with healthcare. These projects use largely the same model proposed above. That is, they depend on lots of data to help diagnose patients.
Other projects go further. One that is already available, called Augur, aimed at predicting market behavior by collecting data from millions of investors.
Some other proposals do the opposite, leading development inwards instead of outwards. Specifically, the blockchain could host ledgers and track every single choice an AI makes, no matter how small. This ledger could be used to diagnose any existing problems in its decision-making process and repairing it.
Last Words
Blockchain is still a new technology, and we’re barely starting to see its uses. However, among all fields, AI seems to be the most promising one. Particularly with machine learning, expectations for blockchain are huge. If these expectations come to pass, our world will be effectively changed by these new technologies.
Perhaps we already have reached the discovery that will shape our century. However, many of us might just not know it yet.
