世界幣更名為“World”，強調人工智慧基礎設施層和人類身份驗證

薩姆·奧爾特曼 (Sam Altman) 的加密貨幣項目世界幣 (Worldcoin) 正在更名為“世界”(World)，該項目通過掃描人們的虹膜來換取分配的數位代幣

Sam Altman’s cryptocurrency project Worldcoin, which scans people’s irises in exchange for an allotment of digital tokens, is rebranding as “World,” the company announced Thursday.

山姆·奧爾特曼 (Sam Altman) 的加密貨幣項目 Worldcoin 週四宣布，該項目將更名為“World”，該項目通過掃描人們的虹膜來換取分配的數位代幣。

The company initially launched with the goal of providing a universal basic income, using a basketball-sized biometric reader called an orb to collect the iris data in exchange for a one-time payment of the company’s WLD cryptocurrency. But since the AI frenzy touched off by ChatGPT—made by Altman’s other company OpenAI—Worldcoin parent Tools For Humanity has leaned hard into human ID verification: In a future world in which AI is everywhere, we need a system to prove that people are humans, and not bots.

該公司最初推出的目標是提供全民基本收入，使用籃球大小的生物辨識閱讀器（稱為 orb）收集虹膜數據，以換取一次性支付該公司的 WLD 加密貨幣。但自從ChatGPT（由Altman 的另一家公司OpenAI 製造）引發人工智慧狂潮以來，Worldcoin 母公司Tools For Humanity 就開始大力投入人類身分驗證：在人工智慧無所不在的未來世界，我們需要一個系統來證明人們是人類，不是機器人。

Once people get their eyes scanned into the orb, they are issued a “World ID,” which verifies their “proof of personhood” within World’s system. The idea is that people could verify they are not bots without giving up any other identifying information.

一旦人們的眼睛被掃描到球體上，他們就會獲得一個“世界ID”，以驗證他們在世界系統中的“人格證明”。這個想法是，人們可以在不放棄任何其他識別資訊的情況下驗證自己不是機器人。

“Worldcoin as a name just doesn’t work anymore,” CEO Alex Blania said on stage during an event in San Francisco. Meanwhile, Altman touted the newly rebranded World as an infrastructure layer for AI, helping “humans and agents to send resources back and forth” and communicate with each other.

「世界幣這個名字已經不再有效了，」執行長亞歷克斯·布蘭尼亞(Alex Blania)在舊金山的一次活動中在台上說道。同時，奧特曼將新更名的世界吹捧為人工智慧的基礎設施層，幫助「人類和智慧體來回發送資源」並相互溝通。

The name change underscores the challenges the company faced as it sought to define itself and its business, as first reported by Forbes last year. “We don't seem to have quite nailed that yet. Which is fine—it's hard and it's really new,” Altman said at a May 2022 companywide summit, according to audio obtained by Forbes. “Once we've internally decided the direction we want to go—and I think there's still multiple opinions there—once that is said, and if that really resonates with people, then things can really catch fire.”

正如《富比士》去年首次報導的那樣，更名凸顯了該公司在尋求定義自身及其業務時所面臨的挑戰。 「我們似乎還沒有完全確定這一點。根據《福布斯》獲得的音頻，Altman 在 2022 年 5 月的全公司峰會上表示：“這很好，這很難，而且確實很新鮮。” 「一旦我們在內部決定了我們想要走的方向——我認為仍然有多種意見——一旦說出來，如果這真的能引起人們的共鳴，那麼事情就會真正火起來。”

A former Worldcoin employee told Forbes last year: “Definitely the new DNA of the company is the whole identity thing. They no longer say they are a crypto company.” Dropping the word “coin” from the name also comes at a time when the cryptocurrency market has lost some of its luster, after the fall of disgraced crypto exchange FTX.

一位前 Worldcoin 員工去年告訴《富比士》：「毫無疑問，公司的新 DNA 就是整個身分。他們不再說自己是一家加密貨幣公司。在名譽掃地的加密貨幣交易所 FTX 倒閉之後，加密貨幣市場失去了一些光彩，而從名稱中刪除「硬幣」一詞也是如此。

The company made several other announcements at the event, including a new version of the orb, with a white coating instead of its original metallic chrome. World also said it will allow people to use its app to have their eyes scanned on demand, with an appointment where an orb would come to them “much like a pizza you have delivered,” said Rich Heley, the company’s chief device officer. World also said it will set up orb-scanning stations at retail spaces, including coffee shops and convenience stores, around the world, starting on Thursday. The company said it has already opened “premium verification experiences” where people could get eye scans in boutique spaces with staff to answer questions, in Mexico City and Buenos Aires.

該公司在這次活動中還發布了其他幾項公告，包括新版本的球體，其採用白色塗層而不是原始的金屬鉻。 World還表示，它將允許人們使用其應用程式按需掃描眼睛，預約後就會有一個球體來到他們身邊，“就像你送來的披薩一樣”，該公司的首席設備官里奇·赫利(Rich Heley)說。 World也表示，將從週四開始在世界各地的零售場所（包括咖啡店和便利商店）設立球體掃描站。該公司表示，它已經在墨西哥城和布宜諾斯艾利斯開設了“高級驗證體驗”，人們可以在精品店進行眼部掃描，工作人員可以回答問題。

Even before its launch, World has been mired in controversy. Privacy experts worried about the potential exploitation that could come with exchanging biometric data for crypto. In 2022, BuzzFeed News reported that the company was testing its orbs in countries in the Global South, with low income users upset because they traded their iris readings for their share of a cryptocurrency that took years to launch. Orb operators, contractors that do the scanning and who typically come from low income backgrounds, had also felt they were put in harm’s way, harassed and arrested by local authorities, while facing missed payments from World and shifting performance targets.

甚至在推出之前，《世界》就已經陷入了爭議。隱私專家擔心用生物辨識資料交換加密貨幣可能會帶來潛在的利用。 2022 年，BuzzFeed News 報導稱，該公司正在南半球國家測試其球體，低收入用戶感到不安，因為他們用虹膜讀數換取了一種花了數年時間才推出的加密貨幣。 Orb 操作員是進行掃描的承包商，通常來自低收入背景，他們也感到自己受到了傷害，受到地方當局的騷擾和逮捕，同時也面臨著 World 拖欠付款和績效目標不斷變化的問題。

Since World’s founding in 2019, Altman’s star has risen astronomically. He’s become one of the most powerful people in technology, thanks to the success of OpenAI and ChatGPT. But Tools For Humanity has so far been a small player in Altman’s empire. Earlier this month, OpenAI announced it raised $6.6 billion, the largest venture capital fundraising round of all time. By comparison, Tools for Humanity raised $150 million last year (and a total of $240 million to date at a valuation of $2.47 billion, according to Pitchbook) — still impressive, but nowhere near the eye-popping figure of its sister company.

自2019年《世界》成立以來，奧特曼的明星地位如天文數字般上升。由於 OpenAI 和 ChatGPT 的成功，他已成為科技領域最有影響力的人物之一。但迄今為止，Tools For Humanity 在奧特曼的帝國中只是一個小角色。本月早些時候，OpenAI 宣布籌集了 66 億美元，這是有史以​​來最大的一輪風險投資。相比之下，Tools for Humanity 去年籌集了1.5 億美元（根據Pitchbook 的數據，迄今為止總共籌集了2.4 億美元，估值為24.7 億美元）——仍然令人印象深刻，但遠不及其姊妹公司令人瞠目結舌的數字。

At the event, Altman echoed comments he made to employees at the closed-door 2022 summit, emphasizing the importance of scaling the platform to create a large network. “One joke that I use sometimes is, when in doubt, scale it up,” he said Thursday. “We want to see what happens when we do this at mass scale.”

在活動中，Altman 呼應了他在 2022 年閉門峰會上向員工發表的言論，強調了擴展平台以創建大型網路的重要性。 「我有時用的一個笑話是，當有疑問時，擴大規模，」他週四說道。 “我們想看看當我們大規模這樣做時會發生什麼。”