AI and web3: the new playground for frontend developers

Artikel uit Frontmania magazine 2023

Artificial Intelligence (AI), who hasn’t heard of it lately? Whether you’re tired of it or you consider ChatGPT your new work bestie, facts are that AI has the potential to change our future. Another promising technology is web3 and so this article is dedicated to both of them: a synergy of AI and web3. First the basics of AI and web3 are covered, followed by showcasing the potential of their synergy, reasons why this synergy is becoming the new playground for frontend developers and lastly, discuss how you can actively start in AI&web3.

I hope you realize that you’re standing at the front of a new era where creativity, innovation and limitless possibilities will come together in frontend!

💠 What is AI? An intro to the newest buzzword
👉 The three capability types of AI: ANI’s, AGI’s and ASI’s
Chances are high you have seen AI in movies. The capability of AI is categorized into three types: Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI), like R2D2 from Star Wars. An ANI excels in executing specific tasks (e.g. repairing ships). Another type is Artificial General Intelligence which mimics more human-like intelligence and can understand, learn and handle a wider range of tasks than an ANI. AGI’s seen in movies are the character Ava from Ex Machina and the cute robot ‘Wall-e’. Thirdly, there’s Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) which surpasses human intelligence in every aspect of learning, understanding and problem solving. This could be the scary Skynet of The Terminator, who sees humanity as its threat. Elon Musk thinks AI won’t develop this far…or will it? Luckily, the current development level of AI is at ANI’s like Siri or ChatGPT but one thing is certain: a rise of AI and human interactions is to be expected in the near future. These interactions will be the foundation of this new playground that the synergy of AI&web3 brings and create lots of opportunities for frontend developers to build immersive user interfaces.

👉 So..how does an Artificial Intelligence become…intelligent?

What makes an AI have artificially built intelligence are three things: It knows how to react in certain situations (generalized learning), it is able to reason why it takes certain decisions (reasoning) and it is able to provide solutions in given situations (problem solving).

AI is a complex field and has various technical domains which each can train an AI how to learn and understand things while performing tasks. There’s for example, a domain called Computer Vision that teaches an AI image recognition and there is Natural Language Processing which teaches an AI to interpret, understand and generate human language.

To grasp how the intelligence of an AI is built at its core, it’s essential to learn about a domain called Machine Learning (ML), since its principles are often intertwined with the other domains. ML focuses on creating algorithms that work as tools for the AI. These algorithms are able to learn patterns from data based on which they make predictions, decisions and classifications. The idea of ML is that the algorithms can improve on their own by having the ability to adjust their own code, based on discovered patterns. This means that the more data the algorithms are exposed to, the smarter an AI can get on its own over time! After being trained under Machine Learning principles, an AI could do various things like playing games, create music, art and generate human language.

Now you know how AI is built in a nutshell, let me show you the fundamentals of web3 and why its potential can change the world just like AI.

💠 An intro to web3: a blockchain-based internet
👉 What is web3: a little bit of history
Compared to AI, web3 is still a bit under the radar but that shouldn’t diminish its potential. Currently, in web2 users can read and write data whereas before, web1 was a read-only internet. Increased user interaction in web2 enabled big companies to collect and sell (your) data. Web3 wants to change things by allowing users to read, write and become owners of their own data by storing it on the blockchain.

👉 What is blockchain: a chain of blocks

Simply said: blockchain is just a chain of blocks. Each block contains data and in the classic example of Bitcoin, this is a list of transactions. Next to data, a block also contains a hash generated as output from a hashing algorithm known as SHA-256 which always is an alphanumeric string equal to 256 bits. Changing the input of SHA-256 only a little bit, changes the whole hash. Furthermore, each block holds the hash of the previous block in the chain which forms the chain-construction in the blockchain. I told you the blockchain was just a chain of blocks :).

👉 What makes the blockchain so safe?
Let’s say, a hacker hacks the Bitcoin blockchain and adds a transaction of 1 BTC to him in the list. What will happen? BOOM! That’s right, the blockchain breaks because once the input of a block changes, the hash changes entirely which leads to a disconnection between the blocks. This is a fundamental characteristic of blockchain that assures safety, immutability and traceability of stored data. Another technology that ensures these objectives of blockchain, are smart contracts which are programs that run on the blockchain. They can monitor all blockchain data in real time and often function as a combination of a lawyer, banker and accountant in the context of financial transactions. Consequently, web3 developers primarily focus on ensuring security and facilitating user engagement with both the blockchain and smart contracts.

💠 The potential of synergy between AI and web3
Now that you know the potential of AI and web3 each individually, let’s look at three AI&web3 businesses to demonstrate how impactful the synergy of AI and web3 is.

SingularityNET
This is a decentralized marketplace for AI services. You can use SingularityNET’s AI services (e.g. language translation) or build your own AI system with these services and offer this system against payment in tokens. Blockchain is used to ensure transparency regarding interactions and transactions.

OceanProtocol
This is a secure data marketplace for sharing and monetizing data, mostly appealing for data researchers. Users can buy or sell data and keep control of data access and usage by setting rules. AI is used to improve the quality of data and generate training models for other AI’s.

FetchAI: a digital world with AI-driven agents
This is a digital world with AI-driven agents. They can handle tasks like booking trips, monitoring health or managing schedules and get paid in tokens. All agents are interconnected via the network. For instance, one agent collects health data from your wearable, another one analyzes it with AI and a third one creates a personalized nutrition plan for you. How cool is that?

💠 The synergy of AI&web3: a new playground full of design and development opportunities
The synergy of AI and web3 creates new design and development opportunities for frontend developers, with AI having more interactions with humans and web3 introducing blockchain and smart contracts. Let’s explore these opportunities and delve into reasons why this synergy is the new place to be for frontend developers.

Innovation: Working in this playground means designing and developing Decentralised Apps (DApps) with AI. Innovation opportunities are abundant in creating user-friendly AI Integrations (like chatbots), blockchain user interfaces (wallets), data visualization, NFT market places and blockchain gaming.
User-centric design: AI can enhance interfaces with features like personalized recommendations, real-time assistance and intelligent automation. So there’s a lot of room for frontend developers to build user-centric designs within these DApps.
Decentralization: Web3 prioritizes transparency and user data ownership and so it is vital that frontend developers create interfaces that empower users to control their data to ensure privacy and trust on the blockchain.
Smart contracts: These programs are the cornerstones of web3. Frontend expertise is crucial for building user-friendly interfaces that interact with these programs that can be self-executing agreements and automate various processes within Dapps.
Blockchain Integration: It’s valuable to learn how to incorporate blockchain technology into frontend development, as it empowers secure and transparent data storage and transactions within Dapps.
Interoperability: Frontend developers can improve the overall functionality of blockchain by making DApps more interoperable with other blockchain-based services, creating a better web3 ecosystem.
Incentives and tokenization: In web3, tokens and cryptocurrencies are often used as incentives. Frontend developers can create interfaces that facilitate token and crypto transactions in decentralized finance (DeFi) applications.

💠What you should know in order to conquer this new playground 🔥🚀
Coding in web3 is similar to web2, meaning you can already contribute to web3 with your current frontend skills. To build DApps, you need to deep dive into: blockchain fundamentals, smart contract technology, Solidity, Javascript libraries like ethers.js and deployment tools like Hardhat. For the AI-part of your DApp, you could build an AI by yourself but it’s more time-efficient to use public API’s of existing AI’s. Of course, you could always ask ChatGPT for AI and web3 for learning tips and AI&web3 project ideas 😄 like a decentralized marketplace for NFT’s or an AI art generator!

💠Conclusion: get excited about this new playground!
I hope this sparks your creativity and imagination to build cool AI&web3 apps in this new playground!
The synergy of AI and web3 presents a dynamic playground for frontend developers, offering opportunities for innovation, user-centric design, blockchain integration, and skill development. As these technologies continue to evolve, frontend developers will play an important part in shaping this new playground and the future of web3.

Bio:

Jessy The loves anything design, frontend development and blockchain technology. I switched career from Tax Law to Software Development in order to make code with impact. I’ve been lucky enough to contribute in sectors of Healthcare, Sustainability and Education as a developer. Currently she is Frontend / Blockchain Developer at Team Rockstars IT.