Into one's life a little rain must fall

We're talking about the $BALD crypto scam & AI provenance (redux)

Author

Christian Duvall
August 04, 2023

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Stick around to the end to find out who Christian most resembles, according to Google.

Here’s what we got for you:

  • The $BALD crypto scam

  • Provenance (redux)

  • Links and whatnot

The Scam of the…Moment

I’m not usually interested in talking about unsubstantiated rumors, but this one is mesmerizing.

There is evidence that Sam Bankman-Fried launched a memecoin, got it listed on Coinbase, then pulled all of the dev liquidity from the backend to floor the price. All, allegedly, from the quiet comfort of mommy’s and daddy’s basement.

This would play very nicely with the SEC’s case against Coinbase – adding a very tangible instance of a rug-pull for them to point to in the litigation. As SBF’s charges continue to drop away, it’s hard not to feel a little paranoid about the behind-the-scenes activities.

Just because you’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they’re not after you.

It’s worth it to dig through the linked Tweet..err Xhibit?…and all of its various offshoots.

Shout out to Andy for getting this one on our radar.

Provenance (redux)

You know that thing I talked about that one time? It’s happening – fast.

Meta announced this week that it is tagging its own AI content and allowing users to self-report on the content they post to its platforms.

Google’s also dropping a new “About This Image” feature, which is seeking to even extrapolate the context of an image to validate its use.

Have you ever found yourself in this position? You see an image on a website, in your feed, or in a message from a friend — and you think, "this doesn't feel quite right." Is the image being shown in the right context? Has it been manipulated or faked? Where did it come from? When you’re trying to figure out if a piece of information or an image is reliable, having the full story is key.

Cory Dunton – Product Manager, Search @ Google

As someone who has noticed Google’s reverse image search – now branded Lens – has gotten progressively worse over the years, I have zero confidence in its ability to do this well.

To exemplify this further, I grabbed a profile picture that I used all over the web back in the mid 2000s and it couldn’t even begin to figure out the original source.

Look, I had an akward metal phase ok?

Google’s power had always been centered around its ability to comprehend what is relevant and build powerful indexes around it. It would be extremely difficult for it to retroactively contextualize about 25 years worth of data with an index-based strategy, so it’s safe to assume that it’s using more and more AI even right now.

I’m actually happy to see the companies try to tackle this problem independently, because the lack of standardization and cohesion will make it even harder for them to universally block out independent voices, but they can still take a crack and some of the painful things AI brings to bear.

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