User-Owned AI: On-Chain Training, Inference, and Agents, with NEAR's Illia Polosukhin

Illia Polosukhin, co-author of the seminal "Attention Is All You Need" paper and founder of NEAR, unveils his ambitious vision for user-owned, privacy-preserving AI. This technical deep dive explores NEAR's foundational infrastructure, from its proof-of-stake consensus and leveraging NVIDIA's confidential computing for private inference with minimal overhead. Listeners will discover how NEAR aims to decentralize model training with cryptographically guaranteed returns and how blockchain can provide stronger guarantees for AI agent behavior, setting the stage for a future where AI truly belongs to everyone.

Sponsors:

Linear:

Linear is the system for modern product development. Nearly every AI company you've heard of is using Linear to build products. Get 6 months of Linear Business for free at: https://linear.app/tcr

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure:

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) is the next-generation cloud that delivers better performance, faster speeds, and significantly lower costs, including up to 50% less for compute, 70% for storage, and 80% for networking. Run any workload, from infrastructure to AI, in a high-availability environment and try OCI for free with zero commitment at https://oracle.com/cognitive

PRODUCED BY:

https://aipodcast.ing

CHAPTERS:

(00:00) About the Episode

(03:58) From Transformers to Blockchain (Part 1)

(17:01) Sponsor: Linear

(18:30) From Transformers to Blockchain (Part 2)

(21:23) Blockchain Security Fundamentals (Part 1)

(33:36) Sponsor: Oracle Cloud Infrastructure

(35:00) Blockchain Security Fundamentals (Part 2)

(39:01) Zero-Day Vulnerabilities Solution

(51:11) Confidential Computing Infrastructure

(58:07) User-Owned AI Models

(01:14:47) Marketplace and Governance

(01:18:57) AI-Crypto Synergy Vision

(01:27:50) Autonomous Agents Future

(01:31:22) Outro

SOCIAL LINKS:

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LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nathanlabenz/

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