The Proteus Project

Many have written of a disturbing trend among our tech elites of recent years.  About their untoward fascination with sci-fi dystopias and their desires to make these stories reality.  Second Life was created as a bid to mimic the world featured in "Snowcrash".  Unmentioned but just as influential was Stephenson's other novel, "Diamond Age".  It too was a warning novel, a story about a poor girl who is raised by a cloth dummy mother (like those poor Rhesus lab monkeys), in the form of a virtual reality book.  Our elite techs ignored the disembodied VR which could give no maternal comfort to an orphaned child and just focused on the VR represented in the book.  And they wanted to create it in reality.

Well they did to a certain extent.  And were also gravely disappointed that it didn't change it's users in quite the same way it changed a fictional, motherless child.  They were all so gung ho to teach us to "share and share alike", mainly by giving up our IP to the void for free.  It didn't work and it is still not working.  Whether or not Philip Linden and cohorts are still interested in this project of reeducation remains to be seen.  But now they are on a path to mimicking other dystopias.

"Finally, Rosedale mentioned the possibility of creating AI avatars that could learn from interacting with the avatars of humans in Second Life. "I find it very likely that any artificial intelligence we create will live first in a world like this," said Rosedale."

"At the time, I would have bet that by 2009, a group of us would have moved on to the brain project. After all, building Skynet always felt like an appropriate follow on to Second Life."

Work. Software for companies to work better and faster. 
Money. A digital replacement for world currencies. 
The Brain. Can 10,000 computers become a person?



Singularity University Lecture in which Philip Rosedale (Linden) compares SL mainframes to a brain.

In recent news regarding Second Life, it seems the last CEO (M Linden) has been shown the door for the return of Philip Linden to the helm.

As I've previously written, M Linden was vilified by the general SL populace for all that was wrong in SL.  I did not adhere to this storyline.  In fact I thought it more likely that M was hamstrung by the incredible backstabbing mess of a corporate culture that Philip Rosedale dumped into his lap.  He cut some fat then was cut himself.  I've seen it happen before in companies I've worked for and companies in the news.  So it was no surprise that he would be labeled the fall man.

However the rejoicing over Philip Linden's return is premature.  Most SL residents are under the assumption that old Phil will be up to his old tricks.  But that isn't the deal at all.  Philip Linden has a new direction and he has left SL far behind.

In my last post about Rosedale's Love Machine I highlighted that it was an extension of the JIRA policy that ruined Linden Lab's culture.  But Love Machine has a more ambitious plan behind it.  It is Rosedale's bid to create an independent AI.  Far from being a tabulated record of love or hate votes, it will probably be taking in data about why the voters voted the way they did.  And through that information, Rosedale hopes to fashion the basis for his AI.  But besides it being used by a high profile company such as Kevin Rose's Digg, I haven't heard of it taking off with any amount of success.  Perhaps it didn't attract the VC it had been hoping to receive.  And Digg couldn't provide it with enough voting data to fashion a prototype AI.

So now back to Second Life.  Which Rosedale has already likened to brain like activity.  A collective data point of every user's creativity and decision making.  A sizeable test bed to launch Love Machine.  Because just maintaining a virtual world was not Philip Linden's total interest.  All his interviews and comments point to this end result.  He needs SL to provide a launch pad for his AI.  He needs it to grow because the larger the data from willing test subjects, the better for the Love Machine project as a whole.  The same way the JIRA stratified residents into fighting over bugs and services, I'm sure the Love Machine will now be used in lieu of the old search mechanism in the browser.  It has been said that the search function was broken deliberately and remains unfixed.  I wonder how long it will be before all of us are asked to give Love votes for our favorite places and why.

Just how much will this Love Machine data collection system permeate the grid?  How will it affect the SL world culture?   Will it destroy it as much as JIRA destroyed Linden Lab?  Does Philip Linden care about the fallout caused by all these possible ill will votes?

He told us the world was safe in his recent address.  It is for now.  But when he receives all the information he needs for his new company, I doubt he will have much enthusiasm for keeping Second Life running.  He will most likely fob it off to another hastily chosen CEO and let it find it's own level.

I believe Linden Lab is basically gone.  It is Love Machine handling Second Life now for the time being.  We are now the side show not the attraction.

The dystopia I believe the techs are emulating now is not the Terminator Skynet from Cameron's films but the AI Proteus in the old 70's flick "Demon Seed".  A film in which this insane AI raped a helpless woman and created it's own love child.

Hence, I give you the genesis of the Love Machine.