Bambi in Africa. This original idea and concept blossomed into something that influenced and sculpted the childhoods of many, myself included. It became Disney’s, ‘The Lion King.’
For me, it, and other Disney films, nurtured something important and essential for anyone with an idea — imagination. So in a way, it could be argued that Charlie Fink the guy who came up with the idea of ‘Bambi in Africa’ during his time at Disney laid down fertile soil for an idea like Bubbled to grow.
Fink is a former Disney, AOL and AG Interactive executive who writes about VR, AR and new media for Forbes. In the 90s, Fink was EVP & COO of VR pioneer Virtual World Entertainment. He is now a consultant and frequent speaker on these topics at conferences like CES, SXSW, AWE, ARiA NYU, ARiA MIT, Digital Hollywood, VR Toronto (keynote), VR Voice Entertainment Summit (keynote), and “On The Lot” by VRS (keynote).
In short, he knows AR. We had a chat about the AR cloud a few weeks back.
He is absolutely right, of course.
Web 2.0 — The Old Internet
From the dotcom boom, a number of companies emerged that became so large that they eclipsed the original purpose of Tim Berner-Lee’s vision for the internet being “a collaborative medium, a place where we could all meet and read and write.” John Battelle and Tim O’Reilly outlined their definition of the “Web as Platform”, where software applications are built upon the Web as opposed to upon the desktop. The unique aspect of this migration, they argued, was that the “customers are building your business for you”.
Google and Facebook are perfect examples of how in web 2.0 a user is invited to contribute to the site’s content by commenting on published articles or creating a user account or profile on the site, which may enable increased participation. By increasing emphasis on these already-extant capabilities, they encourage the user to rely more on their browser for user interface, application software (“apps”) and file storage facilities.
These companies, along with others like Apple and Microsoft have made it extremely easy to navigate what we call the ‘internet’ but what in reality are — siloed platforms owned by these centrally governed companies; all of whom have investors to answer to.
The monopoly of the internet by these monolithic companies is virtually absolute. They control the app store markets they facilitate; any innovation that occurs off platform they acquire, any new markets that surface they will dominate. Augmented reality cannot be the same.
Decentralized Web 3.0 vs. Business as Usual
Fink’s observation is correct — if the AR cloud is to be centralized. Gatekeepers, like Apple and Google are the guys you have to cosy up to if you want to succeed in building and delivering a centralized AR cloud as they are providing the toolkit for you to build, store and deliver your vision, via namely arkit and arcore — however, decentralization hands the keys back into the hands of the community. It removes the ‘Business as Usual’ scenario, where the centralized web giants continue in dominating a market which has become rife with:
- Indiscriminate use of personal data
- Curtailing of content creator benefits
- Fake news
- Inappropriate content
Decentralization is the movement of departments within a organization away from a single point of administration.
Decentralization, when enacted out using distributed ledger technology (Blockchain) enables the consolidation of functions usually performed by set departments within a large organisation, to be performed by a smart contract, digitally. This means tasks like data storage, decision making and content management are not managed centrally but rather, autonomously run; managed by pre-programmed smart contracts more commonly known as ‘cryptocurrency.’
What does this mean for the end user?
Users get to interact directly with each other, without the interaction taking place on a platform centrally controlled by a company seeking ways to monetise the information they share. Content they create can be monetised and sold directly P2P, without the need of a 3rd party platform hosting the content on centrally held servers and charging a 70/30 revenue split.
Apps, known as dApps (Decentralized Apps) when built on the blockchain are interfaces that allow a user to access a specific set of functions using a blockchain’s protocol via a platforms unique set of smart contracts aka cryptocurrency. The only barrier to access is whether or not the user holds the cryptocurrency needed to unlock the function of the platform — not third parties and their fees.
Blockchain, Protocols and Underpants Gnomes
The ‘Underpants Gnomes’ comment references the infamous episode in South Park where a group of gnomes have been stealing underpants as part of a bigger plan, broken down into three phases:
Phase 1: Collect Underpants
Phase 2: ?
Phase 3: Profit
When the gnomes are pressed on the question mark and asked how, exactly, they get from underpants to profits, they don’t have a good answer.
Again, Fink highlights one of the biggest issues with a lot of projects in the blockchain space. Many are building really innovative, decentralised infrastructures that have the potential to solve real world issues but without taking steps to identify, describe and develop a business case that serves real world business needs and have the potential to realise profit via a dApp.
The Bubbled Platform
Phase 1 — Collect Underpants
Level 1 is the Bubbled platform that identifies and enables holders of the smart contract BBL to purchase unique geo-locations on the blockchain and create a new type of fungible digital asset. Holders of this virtual land can then register (or not) for the BFAR (http://bfar.org.uk) to support the code of conduct, starting the building of a framework of governance for AR content placed in real-world locations. Using decentralised storage protocols such as IPFS enables AR content to be uploaded locally based on the creators geo-location and pulled by other users locally that want to access that content.
Key features of a decentralized AR cloud:
“We use content-addressing so content can be decoupled from origin servers, and instead, can be stored permanently. This means content can be stored and served very close to the user, perhaps even from a computer in the same room. Content-addressing allows us to verify the data too, because other hosts may be untrusted. And once the user’s device has the content, it can be cached indefinitely.”
IPFS also addresses security problems that plague the HTTP-based Internet:
Content-addressing and content-signing protect IPFS-based sites, making DDoS attacks impossible. And to help mitigate the damage of discontinued websites, IPFS also archives important public-record content, and can easily store important, public-record content.
Phase 2 — ?
There is a need for decentralised business entities to translate the activity that occurs within the crypto-universe into a profit making and therefore ‘taxable supply’ in the fiat-universe. This is level 2.
Identifying a present or future market opportunity that can allow a solution to be built, creating a credible and profit making business. There are already steps being taken to enable businesses to start advertising in AR; however these solutions will be centralised.
The Branded and cLand dApps are solutions which allow real-world companies who want to take steps to share branded content in this new medium. They provide an interface to let these businesses connect to virtual landowners and AR content providers creating a new marketplace.
The decentralised community are governed by the BBL smart contracts and can directly monetise their activity within the crypto-universe in fiat terms, based on their efforts on the Bubbled platform.
No more trying to find a bank to convert their ROI from flipping crypto on exchanges; we enable a way to monetise directly in the fiat world without paying any 3rd parties for your efforts. The Bubbled AR viewer and SDK enables apps to update and provide a window to a ubiquitous metaverse for their existing community; AR developers have access to an ever-growing community on a global platform to create their own decentral solutions. The Blocklord dApp is one such solution, an ethereum-based game which uses the Bubbled platform to identify parcels for a blockchain based version of ‘Monopoly.’
We also only connect these businesses to actors who subscribe to a global code of conduct as members of BFAR, helping form a layer of protection against potential legal action in this rapidly emerging, yet wholly ungoverned market.
Phase 3 — Profit
Our company, which facilitates the interface of these decentralised applications realise revenue from a subscription-based business model payable by the subscribing businesses seeking to connect to owners of decentralized virtual spaces and creators of AR content. This is level 3 in the diagram.
We are still in the early stages of AR and the decentralization of web 3.0, but with AR predicted to be the next trillion dollar industry and the growth of the cryptocurrency market cap from $20bn in January 2017 to $450bn January 2018 — it is clear to see we are at the beginning stages of the evolution of visual communications and a new type of currency.
If you are an AR app developer, AR content producer or interested in owning your own virtual space you can participate and contribute to the decentralized ecosystem here:
Become a verified BFAR member: http://bfar.org.uk
Participate in our Bounty Campaign and earn free BBL: https://www.bubbled.io/bounty/
Play Blocklord and contribute to our presale: https://www.blocklord.co
Bubbled is an AR platform whose framework is solving issues of ownership and governance within real-world spaces hosting augmented reality content. Join our Telegram and follow for updates on our Token Generation Event.
If you are keen to learn more about Bubbled or partner with us, please let us know.
