Over the course of the 58th International Art Exhibition, in a bunker in an undisclosed location, a group of thinkers takes part in clandestine talks, part of the Thinking Head project by Lara Favaretto, and reflects on a number of words which the artist and her collaborators deem vital to discuss in the present moment. CRYPTO is the title of the twelfth Clandestine Talk. For this occasion, Primavera De Filippi was invited, along with the Plantoid, to identify a group of people to discuss and reflect on the use of blockchain in the artistic context, and the use of art in the blockchain context. Other speakers: Stéphan-Eloïse Gras, Dominic Perini, Beatriz Helena Ramo

Can we continue to distinguish the future from the present? Should we? The rapidly accelerating impact of technology on our society, environment, and selves has, in recent years, left us questioning the boundaries between science and science-fiction, optimism and hindsight, the authentic and the fabricated, the familiar and the unimaginable. But what about the less perceptible boundaries, those strange delineations we draw unaware? Over the past year, San Francisco Bay Area-based Stochastic Labs has convened a unique group of artists, engineers, scientists, thought leaders, and entrepreneurs to consider these questions through the production of artworks, prototypes, and social provocations. Drawing on the Bay Area’s longtime culture of innovation, deep sustainability focus, and multi-generational commitment to independent thinking, these works ask the viewer to be present and future at once –a useful strategy, perhaps, for anyone navigating temporalities mediated by technology. The exhibition includes work by past and current Stochastic Labs residents

Creative technology incubator Stochastic Labs partners with the Long Now Foundation, the San Francisco Art Institute, and other thinkers and makers for “Reclaiming The Future: A Long Conversation” at Fort Mason Center For Arts & Culture. The group of thought leaders and artists convenes to consider questions about the future of technology, science, entrepreneurship, and the arts in a radical new conversation format that includes artistic demonstrations, an exhibit, inspiring speakers, and a bar-and-bites reception.

Kate Vass Gallery organised the Automat und Mensch exhibit: a History of AI and Generative Art, co-curated by co-curators Georg Bak and Jason Bailey. The exhibition is, above all, an opportunity to put important work by generative artists spanning the last 70 years into context by showing it in a single location. By juxtaposing important works like the 1956/’57 oscillograms by Herbert W. Franke (age 91) with the 2018 AI Generated Nude Portrait #1 by contemporary artist Robbie Barrat (age 19), we can see the full history and spectrum of generative art as has never been shown before.

Burning Man's 2018 will focus on the many forms of artificial intelligence that permeate our lives; from the humble algorithm and its subroutines that sift us, sort us and surveil us, to automated forms of labor that supplant us. Are we entering a Golden Age that frees us all from mindless labor? Everything, it seems, depends on HMI, the Human-Machine Interface. In a world increasingly controlled by smart machines, who will be master and who will be the slave?.

Beware: A mysterious and controversial technology is among us. This technology is the blockchain, the technology that underpins digital currencies and makes possible dramatic new conceptions of global governance and economy, that could permanently enrich or demote the role of humans - depending on who you talk to.

Eventually, as time passes, Plantoid that successfully emerged from the Darwinian struggle for survival are those that will most likely establish themselves as the dominant species in this evolutionary process. Those are the ones that will be able to reproduce themselves the fastest—so as to slowly, but steadily, colonize our planet .

Conversely, those Plantoids that did not successfully adapt themselves to their own environment, because they failed to incorporate attractive characteristics in their body or soul, will be less appreciated. These will be unable to obtain enough funds to reproduce themselves, and will most likely exist as a single physical instance that might progressively fade away until extinction.

Indeed, the ability of a Plantoid to identify the right characteristics–with regard to their physical form (body) or operating logic (soul)–that will enable them to seduce more people will be the key factor to determine which Plantoids that are most fit for their own environment. Those are the ones that will be able to collect more bitcoins and that will therefore be able to ensure the long-term sustainability of their species.

Given the characteristics of the reproduction process, the evolution of Plantoids will follow a Darwinist approach. Different artists in different geographic locations and cultural environments will implement distinct kinds of Plantoids, whose phenotypes will attract different types of donors—either because of their aesthetic beauty (i.e. their body) or because of the underlying economic incentives and governance rules underpinning their operations (i.e. their soul). Every Plantoid will therefore evolve into multiple branches or species, each with their own characteristics. From a Darwinian perspective, the reproduction of each and every Plantoid is based on an evolutionary algorithm, with multiple Plantoids experimenting with new physical characteristics, but also diverse personalities and governance structures depending on their environment.

this is not a ponzi scheme—as is often done in the context of most crypto-currencies—but rather a legitimate pyramid scheme (akin to a multi-level marketing models) that is actually beneficial to the system. indeed, such a model contributes to incentivizing the production of plantoids with the most favorable aesthetics and genetics. the artists commissioned with the (re)production of a plantoid will not only receive the bitcoins collected by the plantoid that commissioned them (as an ex-ante lump-sum payment), but also a small proportion of the funds collected by all the plantoids they created, and all the descendants that these plantoids have generated. these artists thus has an incentive to create the most attractive and appealing plantoid, to maximize the visibility of this plantoid, and encourage the remix or the making of derivatives works, because that will maximize their return on investment (as ex-post royalty payments).

as described above, once it has collected enough bitcoins, each plantoid will be responsible for commissioning humans to aid with its reproduction process. but before doing so, the plantoid will send a small royalty (e.g. 1% of the value collected by the plantoid) to the specific ancestor that has brought the plantoid into life (i.e. the parent), as well as to the producers of the plantoid at hand.

each plantoid is forever and inextricably connected to both its ancestors and its descendants, with whom it can communicate through a shared blockchain-based network. whenever they collect new bitcoins, plantoids can store that value and transfer it through the underlying blockchain.

Most importantly, the plantoid actually shifts the authorship model around, turning copyright on its head. instead of funding an artist, with the expectation that this artist will continue to produce new works that we enjoy, it now becomes possible to fund directly the art piece itself, which will be in charge of selecting and hiring the artists that will be responsible for its reproduction.

Indeed, the underlying mechanisms for the financing and reproduction of a plantoid obviously clash with the traditional conception of copyright law, which is based on the notion of scarcity and exclusivity. instead of relying on exclusive rights in order to prevent the reproduction and distribution of creative works, with a plantoid, artists actually have an incentive to maximize the dissemination and encourage the creation of derivative works, because that is what will maximize their return on investment. this model goes, therefore, one step beyond the traditional logic of open source, in that the art piece actually acquires a life on its own, and is able to evolve independently of the will of the original author.

HISTORY OF THE PROJECT

The birth of a blockchain-based lifeform

The Plantoid is an autonomous blockchain-based life-form (and artwork) which subsists independently of any human third party. As such, the Plantoid has no official owner or creator (since it reproduces itself on its own ;). Yet, like every other life-form, the first plantoid did not emerge out of thin air. it is the result of a series of random encounters, serendipitous events, and the spontaneous collaboration of a large number of people. Accordingly, in spite of my initial desire that the Plantoid should remain an anonymous (and autonomous) project, I would now like to express my appreciation (and provide proper accreditation) to all those who contributed to the emergence of this new species.

The underlying concept of the Plantoid was inspired by discussions I had with hundreds people and the various implementations of the Plantoid (both in physical and digital forms) were facilitated through the contributions of many artists and programmers, each contributing in different ways in bringing these creatures to life. Below is a detailed overview of all the external contingencies that helped the Plantoid instantiate itself in the physical world.

In early 2015, my dear friend and artist Shu Lea Cheang (who curated the special edition of MCD magazine entitled We Grow Money, We Eat Money, We Shit Money, where I had written about my experience of living one year off Bitcoin only) invited me to exhibit an art piece at the Ars Electronica’s STWST48 exhibition, which she was curating. I had told Shu Lea about my secret (at that time) artistic practice, and my attempts at using art to challenge or communicate the underlying concepts of my research. While most of my art pieces so far were a representation of my research concerning copyright law, given my newfound interest in blockchain technologies, Shu Lea suggested I make an art piece that represented what I consider to be the most fascinating aspect of this emergent technology.

I had been researching the legal implications of blockchain technologies for over 2 years already, focusing mostly on the new opportunities provided by Ethereum and smart contracts, and I was particularly fascinated by the ability to deploy software on the blockchain that runs autonomously and can no longer be shut down, or controlled by anyone.

I started thinking about possible ways to artistically represent the particularities of a blockchain, without falling into the obvious trap of merely displaying a set of “blocks” and “chains”.. It did not take me long to realize that the best way to illustrate the blockchain is to create a physical instantiation of one of these autonomous entities that lives on the blockchain—algorithmical entities that can sustain themselves over time, by collecting funds (in the form of cryptocurrencies) in order to pay for the resources they need (e.g. bandwidth or processing power). These are the so-called Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, or DAOs, as most blockchain proponents would call them. This is how I came up with the idea of producing a real-world example of what I coined as a “blockchain-based lifeform”, i.e. a creature that lives on the blockchain and that is (1) autonomous, (2) self-sustaining, and, of course, most importantly, (3) capable of reproducing itself. The concept was there, although I wasn’t sure yet what "form" that blockchain-based life-form would take ;)

The idea of using the plant metaphor to instantiate a blockchain-based life-form in the real world came from David Bovill, who I met at the FutureFest conference in London, where I had been invited to give a keynote on “Freenet or Skynet?” describing the future of society in a world dominated by smart contracts, DAOs and other blockchain-based contraptions.

David and I had some interesting discussions about blockchain and art. I told him about Shu Lea’s invitation to produce a blockchain-based art piece at STWST48, and my intention to create a physical instantiation of a DAO through an interactive sculpture that would be able to reproduce itself as a blockchain-based life form. I showed him the work I had done until now together with the O’Khaos crew—mechanical contraptions made up of recouped metals, welded together along with a mixture of knots and bolts, in order to create “mechanical algorithms”, i.e. physical instantiations of software logic and other digital contraptions from the digital world.

Inspired by Barbara Mazzolai’s Plantoid project, David suggested I create a blockchain-based life-form that would take the form of a Plantoid, i.e. an android plant. I loved the idea of taking the concept of a "plantoid" to create a blockchain-based life-form, and I invited David to collaborate on the project. Indeed, I had already been doing several of these creatures for previous works, including the infamous flower of showers—-a human-powered mechanical plant, which eventually has been turned into the “genesis” plantoid.

At this point in time, although we had agreed to work together on a "plantoid" project, we did not have the opportunity to define exactly how we would instantiate it, though the idea was to create a DAO-based Plantoid that relies on cryptocurrency to finance and reproduce itself. As we parted ways, we decided to keep in touch and to think in more details how we could best implement the concept of an autonomous blockchain-based life-form into a Plantoid.

For many months already, I had been trying to figure out ways in which DAOs could organize and self-govern themselves. I had recently co-founded Backfeed with a ground of friends. The goal of this collaborative endeavor was to design a decentralized governance structure and value distribution system for decentralized blockchain-based organizations. Given my strong desire to illustrate my research through artistic practices, I figured that the Plantoid would be an ideal sandbox to experiment with that new governance structure.

The Backfeed team was a very special team, a group of blockchain and decentralization advocates with a variety of backgrounds. These included Matan Field, one of the greatest thinkers in the realm of decentralized organizations, who had previously founded of the first blockchain-based ride-sharing network Lazooz; and Tal Serphos, a super-hero with a background in evolutionary biology. Together, we understood decentralized organizations as living organisms, consisting of the spontaneous cooperation of a disparate group of individuals collaborating towards a common goal.

The work with Backfeed materialized into a more concrete vision concerning the way the Plantoid would operate and reproduce itself. The idea was to create a mechanical plant that would receive Bitcoin donations from people and use these funds to hire people to help it reproduce. The system also included a decision-making system enabling those who contributed the most to the Plantoid (financially or otherwise) to participate in the governance, and thus the evolution of the Plantoid.

Indeed, because the Plantoid represents a blockchain-based life-form operated through a DAO, it is intended to operate autonomously and to sustain itself over time, by reproducing itself in a self-sufficient manner. This is not to say that humans do not play an important part in the ecosystem of Plantoids. Just like traditional plants rely on the help of bees or butterflies in order to reproduce themselves, also a Plantoid could rely on the help of third parties, using a blockchain to coordinate the activities of individual, influencing them—and even hiring them (like traditional organizations do) —to reproduce itself in a proper and timely manner.

But if the Plantoid reproduce itself through the contribution of humans, it must also reward all those who contributed (financially or otherwise) to the completion of a Plantoid with the power to influence the reproduction, and therefore the evolution of the Plantoid. Originally, the idea was even to incorporate the Backfeed protocol directly into the Plantoid governance system, although we are still working on that.

Another understanding that we had with Backfeed is that, as opposed to traditional, centralized, hierarchical organizations (whose structure is rigid and formally defined at the outset), decentralized organizations are emergent organisms that evolve over time, possibly forking and multiplying themselves into new and different ‘species’, depending on the different value systems of the people interacting within them. It is the continuous tension between the need for alignment and diversification that dictates the evolution of these organizational creatures.

This, I believe, is what inspired the evolutionary algorithm inherent into way Plantoids reproduce themselves—a Darwinist approach whereby different Plantoids will evolve into a different species, and reproduce themselves more or less promiscuously, depending on how well they satisfy the preferences and expectations of their environment.

Of course, many other people have been contributing to the overall design of the Plantoid, providing suggestions or feeback on my current ideas, and by suggesting a variety of ideas that may or may not have been included into the ultimate design. These people include, first and foremost, my dear friends, colleagues, and long-time collaborators Constance Choi (co-founder of COALA) and Vlad Zamfir (blockchain architect at the Ethereum Foundation); Samer Hassan, with whom I was already elaborating a DAO-based system for art production (and reproduction) which had been selected as a Triple Canoply recipient in 2014; and Vinay Gupta, with whom I discussed the idea of transforming the Plantoid into a Burning Man project (in fact, we still have do turn that dream into reality... ;)

Finally, my long-standing research on copyright law and my role of legal expert at Creative Commons France has brought me to devise the Plantoid not only as a useful mechanism to illustrate the concept of a DAO throguh a blockchain-based life-form, but also a tool to show the limitations of copyright law and how, with blockchain technology, it is now possible to create new economic models that can encourage artistic production with a radically different approach—one that does not rely on scarcity and exclusivity, but rather encourages sharing and remix. This is the function of the so-called pyramid scheme that underpins the Plantoids reward system.

On his side, David Bovill also spent time researching possible ways to implement a blockchain-based lifeform into a Plantoid. Although similar in some respects, David’s idea was that of creating a metallic plant that can buy electricity and/or generate energy through solar power, and then possibly use the money it acquired to pay people to build another one. A collaborative account of both of our ideas can be found here.

As the concept started to materialize into a more detailed idea, I invited two friends of mine, Sara Renaud (a welder) and Vincent Roudaut (an electronic guru) to help me bring the Plantoid to life. The team was now complete, and we were all excited to work towards the production of the genesis Plantoid for STWST48. We subdivided the tasks amongst us: Sara and I would work on producing the body or the physical instantiation of the Plantoid; Vincent would use his electronic skills in order to activate the plantoid whenever a relevant event occurs on the blockchain; and David would work on the smart contract operating the Plantoid on the Ethereum blockchain. Yet, nothing of that happened..

The idea was there, and we also had a good team to implement it into reality; unfortunately time was not on our side, and we did not have the necessary resources to bring the Plantoid to life in such a short timespan. The exhibition coincided with my appointment as research fellow at Harvard law school, where I would explore the legal challenges and opportunities of blockchain technology. Ultimately, Sara, Vincent and David also got caught with other priorities, and the genesis Plantoid never came into being for the STWST48 exhibition.

I did not give up on the project, however. The genie was out the bottle. While in the U.S., I continued to work on the concept of the Plantoid, discussing it and brainstorming it with many people around the world, asking for feedback and coming up with improvements on the idea. And as I was travelling all over the world from one blockchain conference to another, I had the opportunity to meet and interact with a large number of people from the blockchain space, who all contributed in different ways to further refining the Plantoid concept. In addition to the aforementioned persons, these include (in random order): Trent McConaghy and Greg McMullen from Ascribe, who have been working on the intersection of blockchain, art and autonomous entities for a long time; Simon de la Rouviere, developer at Consensys working on a blockchain-based royalty distribution platform (Ujo); Chris Taylor & co. from the art / blockchain salons in Boston; Diana Stern, who has been working together with Imogen Heap in pionering the Ujo platform for the release of her single “Tiny human”; Greg Meredith, formal verification expert with a strong interest for art, and Peter Todd, one of the Bitcoin core dev who happen to have a background in post-modernism art.

As I returned to Europe, I decided to produce the first physical instantiation of the Plantoid, in order to make sure that it actually becomes reality. I had already built a mechanical android-looking plant in the past, and I figured it would be easy to turn it into a Plantoid. The body was there, the only thing I had to do was giving it a soul, by connecting the body of the Plantoid with a smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain, that would bring it into life whenever someone feeds it with bitcoins (or other cryptocurrencies).

At that time, my smart contract development skills were not the greatest. I had just started to investigate how to deploy software on the blockchain and I did not feel competent enough to implement the soul of the Plantoid into smart contract code. I was, however, in touch with a large number of people from the Ethereum community, who were all eager to help out with the first implementation of the smart contract operating the Plantoid. These include Andrew Miller and Simon de la Rouviere, who both helped me figure out the best way to design and implement the underlying software logic of the genesis Plantoid; Dominic Schneier and Florian Glatz, who contributed to the initial implementation of the code, and Pierre-Alexis Ciavarra, who helped me figure out how to actually implement the code on my own (thanks a lot for that!)

At the hardware level, I have been working together with the O’khaos crew to instantiate the Plantoids into the physical world. There are now six Plantoids around the world, produced by O'khaos & co. For this, I would like to thank, most notably, my dear friend and colleague Yannick LeDaniel—one of the greatest metal workers of our times, whose work has been crucial to bringing these Plantoids into being

Finally, when it comes to the electronics, I would like to thank Jason Cook, an amazing artist and electronics guru who helped me make sense of the world of Arduino and Raspberry Pi’s, the team of HackerLoop who kindly offered their space and shared their tools and knowledge with me, in order to ensure that the Plantoids can move, dance, light up and sing. I would also like to thank the Electrolab in Nanterre, whose team has been supporting me since my early days in Paris, inspiring me to experiment with electronics and to explore the possibility of digitization, whenever I had to implement my own artistic life-forms.

To conclude, I would like to stress out the fact that the Plantoids exhibited on this site are not the first of their kind (in fact, Mazzolai's Plantoid project was there way earlier than that), and I hope they will not be the last ones either. My dream is that the Plantoids acquire a life on their own, and that more and more people build upon that concept, in order to make new types of Plantoids. On that point, I would like to credit the work of two friends of mine, Isabelle Radkte and Xavier Lavayssiere, who have been forking the underlying idea of the Plantoid in order to create what they have described as the forest as a DAO. I really appreciate their work and hope it will, in turn, inspire more people to further develop the concept into many new species of blockchain-based life-forms.