Nathan Reiff

What is Friend.tech? The Social-Token Driven Decentralized Social Network

Crypto platform Friend.tech, launched in August 2023, has some enthusiastic supporters hailing it as the first real success story in the social crypto space. In the first two weeks after its launch, the platform reportedly gained more than 100,000 users and made about $25 million. This was followed by reports of its early demise, which was in turn followed by a sudden surge in popularity. Social token-driven platforms allow users—including individuals as well as brands and businesses—to create...

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Deepfake Pornography: Is Consent Over Your Image a Lost Cause?

In early September 2023 U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler said that deepfakes pose a “real risk” to markets. Deepfakes, fake videos or images generated by artificial intelligence (AI) but appearing at first glance to be authentic, can be made to represent high-profile investors and even regulators like Gensler, seeming to show these influential figures saying things that are likely to sway elements of financial markets. Creators of the deepfakes in these cases stand to b...

How to Use Yieldflow: the DeFi Protocol for Passive Growth of Digital Assets

Centralized exchanges, once the primary hubs for trading and storing crypto tokens, have fallen out of favor among many investors in recent years. The collapse of high-profile exchanges like BlockFi and FTX played a big role in this shift, as crypto enthusiasts realized that centralized platforms could leave them exposed to significant risk—if a centralized exchange goes down, it’s possible that investors could lose all of their tokens housed there, particularly in cases in which the tokens have...

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Who is Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum Creator?

Earn a free on-chain certificate touting your knowledge of Ethereum by taking Decrypt U's free course, Getting Started with Ethereum. As of September 2023, Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency in the world by total value, with a market capitalization of over $229 billion. Despite the fact that Ethereum’s value is lower than that of rival Bitcoin, though, there is a good argument to be made that Ethereum is more important for the crypto and blockchain spaces overall than its larger comp...

What Is PepeCoin (PEPE)?

Launched in mid-April 2023, PEPE is an example of a memecoin, though one of a different variety than the oft-popular doge or Shiba Inu tokens. Memecoins—cryptocurrencies based on internet memes and usually popularized and promoted by influencers or major figures in the space like Elon Musk—have drawn both investor attention and eyerolls over a perceived lack of seriousness. But the potential for investors to score big with memecoins is real, nonetheless. Below, we look more closely at PEPE. Note...

Who’s Who in Global Crypto Regulation

Greyscale scored a coup in its quest to get its spot Bitcoin ETF approved; on August 29, 2023, the crypto asset manager won an appeal against the Security and Exchange Commission's blocking the process. Grayscale Wins Appeal Against SEC to Convert Bitcoin Trust to ETF Indeed, the speed at which cryptocurrencies have proliferated has far outstripped the ability of governments and bureaucracies to assess and regulate them, and regulators are only now beginning to catch up. It has only been in the...

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What is Worldcoin? Sam Altman's Eye-Scanning Global ID 'Orb' Project Hits Regulatory Roadblocks

Worldcoin, a digital identification platform that proves your "personhood" (i.e. that you are not a bot), is ramping up following its July 24, 2023 launch by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. As of August 31, 2023, the company claimed that 2.3 million users had already signed up. But it has not been a smooth ride: just five weeks after its launch, a number of nations have launched investigations on the legality of Worldcoin, including France, Germany, Kenya and the UK. Kenya suspended Worldcoin on August 2...

How AI Could Lead To Discriminatory Hiring Practices

The topic for this article was chosen by Decrypt readers via Snapshot vote! To help shape future Decrypt content, vote here. To learn more about AI and earn a free on-chain certificate, take our free Getting Started with AI course. Decrypt will cover the gas fees for the first 10,000 mints. With the recent dramatic uptick in artificial intelligence (AI) platforms and technology, disruptors are keen to find new ways that AI can automate a host of tasks previously performed by humans. Indeed, AI h...

Famous Pop Stars and Their Views on Music AI, from Grimes to Drake

Get a free on-chain NFT certificate by taking our new course, Getting Started with AI and Music! Decrypt will cover the gas for the first 50,000 mints. Artificial intelligence (AI) has touched a host of different industries and art forms, and music is no exception. AI is already capable of creating endless songs for use as background or soundtrack music. It can complete a symphony by Beethoven or produce a brand new track by a bygone group like the Beatles. Generative AI in the music business co...

Zuck v. Musk and Other Famous Feuds in Web3 History

In just the last two years, Web3 has been on a rollercoaster ride of fortune. Hailed as the future of the internet as well as the crypto and blockchain spaces all at once, Web3 had a difficult set of expectations to meet even from the beginning. By the summer of 2023, many prominent voices inside and outside of the Web3 space have criticized the project heavily. One popular website, “Web3 is Going Just Great,” purports to keep a running total of all of the scams and fraud in the crypto space wit...

AI-Driven Generative Art: Art That Responds to Input

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) has attracted widespread attention in recent years with the advent of the chatbot ChatGPT and similar AI systems. Today’s generative AI tools are algorithms designed to create new content—from music to conversation to novels to computer code to video games and much more. Supporters of generative AI say it makes the creative process accessible to anyone who can use the AI tools. And while there is a good deal of conversation—and concern—about the potential...

Future Directions: AI as a Catalyst for Innovation in Music

As previous chapters of this course have attempted to show, generative artificial intelligence (AI) is a powerful force in the creative world. When it comes to music, AI is already capable of empowering non-musicians to create and alter their own songs, of completing a symphony by a composer who has been dead for 200 years, of shapeshifting one singer’s voice into another, and of producing a literally endless song, among many other things. Still, it’s clear that we are only beginning to see how...

Ethical and Legal Considerations of AI-Generated Music

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) has rapidly progressed to a point at which it is capable of creating all types of media, including visual art and music. While there is certainly much more to come in this area as AI continues to improve and artists develop new ways to harness (or push back against) this technology, even now it is crucial to consider a host of ethical and legal issues that arise in the world of generative AI and the content it produces. First, a quick note about the way th...

Where is AI-Generated Music Most Likely to End Up?

Music created by artificial intelligence (AI) is likely to continue to proliferate in the years to come. Some experts believe it could even displace human-made music in some scenarios. There are a host of settings and platforms that include music, though, and AI’s impact on some of these could be greater than others. Music is found on the radio, in concerts, on streaming platforms, in television, movies, commercials, podcasts, and much more. Which of these areas is most likely to see an influx o...

Human vs. AI-Generated Music: Quality and Limitations

Artificial intelligence (AI) technology has advanced to the point where AI systems can be used to create new musical works and songs. As AI becomes more ubiquitous in the process of making music, artists and listeners both will have to address a looming question: do humans or machines make better music? Before digging into this question, we must first acknowledge that taste in music, like all art, is subjective. Certainly there is no way to reach a consensus about which human artists create the...

Creativity and Collaboration: Human-AI Interaction in Music

The world of artificial intelligence (AI) is full of possibility, but it also invites hesitation and even fear. Setting aside existential concerns for the time being, many people are worried that AI will take over their work, leaving them unemployed and increasingly unemployable. While there are certain industries and professions that may have more to worry about in this area than others, some parts of the AI world are less clear. AI systems designed to create art and specifically music-generati...

Machine Learning for Music: Algorithms and Applications

In order to create music—or to produce any creative output at all—an artificial intelligence (AI) system must first know the basic patterns and elements of music. The most common way that AI does this is through machine learning, a process in which the AI system takes in a huge amount of data (in this case, it could be examples of recorded music, or sheet music, or something similar) and analyzes it. By analyzing this data, the system learns about the common patterns and rules governing the musi...

AI in Music: History and Current Landscape

Artificial intelligence (AI) is already transforming the world around us in countless ways, from automating tasks typically done by humans to creating new images and even helping scammers find new ways to cheat people out of their money. It was only a matter of time, then, before AI began to impact the world of music. AI’s influence in music can already be felt (or, more accurately, heard), and AI will likely continue to transform the way that music is created, talked about, and even treated leg...

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What is MiCA? What the EU Crypto Governing Framework Means for You

Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) is a set of regulations in the European Union that governs the issuance and provision of services pertaining to cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, and related assets. It is a landmark regulation in that it is the first such legislation worldwide, and when it takes effect in the coming years it could have a significant impact on the crypto space in Europe. Of course, because cryptocurrencies are not confined to central authorities and spaces like traditional currencie...

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What Is Maximal Extractable Value (MEV)? What Blockchain Miners Need To Know

One of the points of greatest interest for crypto miners and validators in recent months has been MEV, or “maximal extractable value” (the term can also stand for “miner extractable value”). Sometimes MEV is referred to as the “invisible tax” miners collect from participants in a crypto economy by reordering and manipulating transactions in the validation process. But what exactly is MEV, how does it work, and what are some of its potential impacts on crypto ecosystems? Profit in Transaction Man...

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Stories by Nathan Reiff