a16z Maps 11 Paths Where Crypto Meets AI

The agency argued crypto can counter AI centralization by giving customers management over id, knowledge possession, and funds.

Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto group over the week outlined 11 areas the place blockchain networks might intersect with synthetic intelligence, laying out how crypto instruments may form id, funds, and possession as AI techniques unfold throughout the web.

The agency framed crypto much less as a speculative asset class and extra as infrastructure that would counter rising centralization in AI by giving customers management over knowledge, id, and financial participation.

a16z Lays Out Use Circumstances as AI Energy Concentrates

In a January 20 put up on X, a16z crypto argued that the online is shifting towards interfaces dominated by AI prompts, elevating questions on who controls knowledge, distribution, and income as conventional web sites lose visitors.

The agency mentioned blockchains can present a impartial base layer for AI techniques by supporting persistent consumer context, transportable identities for AI brokers, and on-chain funds that work with out platform gatekeepers.

A number of of the concepts targeted on id and belief, with one instance being decentralized proof of personhood, which goals to assist platforms distinguish people from bots with out counting on centralized ID suppliers.

The put up pointed to present initiatives comparable to World’s Proof of Human and newer techniques just like the Solana Attestation Service, which lets customers hyperlink off-chain credentials to wallets whereas protecting knowledge personal.

Funds have been one other recurring theme. a16z described how blockchains might assist micropayments between AI brokers, content material creators, and finish customers. That features income sharing when AI instruments depend on third-party content material, in addition to techniques the place net crawlers pay websites immediately for entry to knowledge.

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The agency famous that just about half of web visitors now comes from automated sources, whereas extra web site operators are blocking AI scrapers, a stress that has pushed corporations like Cloudflare to promote blocking instruments.

The put up additionally highlighted decentralized bodily infrastructure networks, or DePIN, as a strategy to pool unused compute and power assets for AI coaching and inference. By aggregating {hardware} from gaming PCs and knowledge facilities, these networks intention to scale back reliance on massive cloud suppliers.

Why Identification, Funds, and Possession Preserve Resurfacing

Most of the concepts echoed considerations raised elsewhere within the crypto trade. For instance, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin just lately mentioned that he plans to leave centralized social media behind in favor of decentralized platforms, arguing that shared knowledge layers enable competitors with out locking customers right into a single interface. His feedback mirrored a broader push to separate id and content material from platform management.

The Ethereum Basis has additionally moved on this route. Final 12 months, it launched a brand new AI group targeted on agentic funds and coordination, with the said purpose of constructing Ethereum a settlement layer for AI brokers and machine-to-machine transactions. Basis developer Davide Crapis mentioned on the time that AI techniques want impartial infrastructure for worth switch and fame, slightly than counting on a number of massive know-how companies.

a16z’s map doesn’t declare these techniques are near mass adoption. A number of use circumstances, together with AI companions owned by customers or absolutely open agent-to-agent markets, are described as longer-term concepts. Nonetheless, the agency’s define exhibits the place buyers and builders suppose crypto might match as AI techniques transfer from remoted instruments into always-on intermediaries between individuals, knowledge, and cash.