Human Protocol is to bring AI to a new frontier says tech director

Human Protocol has recently announced the full launch of the HUMAN App – a web-based application that demonstrates how work published to the Protocol can be accessed and completed by distributed workforces.

According to the company’s report, the new app will serve as a gateway to work processed on the Protocol.

Users access it to complete data-labeling tasks and earn HMT for each task successfully completed.

Coin Rivet spoke to Harjyot Singh, technology director at Human Protocol who explained the app showcases what is possible through HUMAN Protocol. Singh said: “Hundreds of thousands of users all completing work on the same network via a simple interface that serves as an access point to the permissionless job markets the Protocol enables.”

Human Protocol emerged from hCaptcha – one of the most popular CAPTCHA services on the internet.

However, Human became its own distinct entity, and hCaptcha now exists as partner.

Singh noted CAPTCHA is “a type of question to be answered – a question that requires a human response, reflecting the specific understanding of the respondee”.

He added that in the first instance, CAPTCHA on-chain is important because it allows decentralised applications to verify the humanity of users.

“It’s important because it allows us to aggregate the response of millions of participants and account for bias in the dataset in a democratic way,” he elaborated.

“In the example that a CAPTCHA asks a question of what images contain a car, the response may be different according to the background of the respondee.

“Cultural context matters, and historically this hasn’t been reflected in the data used by AI and ML technologies.”

Singh also said that by “using the Protocol, projects can also better value individual contributions, and reward contributors for their efforts”.

“The HUMAN App is provided to showcase how all of this may be achieved; contributions requested in the form of a CAPTCHA-style question from millions of participants, with each contribution rewarded.”

hCaptcha offers improved privacy

Singh also mentioned the Human’s native token HMT and confirmed that in 2022, the company anticipates the use of HMT to increase with each new integrated application, and job market (and job type) supported.

Talking about the main differences between reCAPTCHA and hCaptcha, Singh explained reCAPTCHA does not pay for the valuable data people label when they complete CAPTCHAs.

“They harvest it for free,” he said.

“hCaptcha pays websites and users who do that work.

“Also, hCaptcha offers improved privacy, while proving to be a more effective bot blocker than reCAPTCHA. hCatpcha is used by about 15% of the internet.”

Asked about the main pros and cons of AI vs. human performance Singh answered that there is actually a little to compare.

“AI is only good at specific intelligence tasks, like GPS, or automated assistants such as Alexa or Siri,” he noted.

“Humans are still far ahead in terms of generalised intelligence, which relates to their ability to respond to changing environments, and use reasoning, common sense, and understand the context to execute a range of tasks.

“Human Protocol is here to bridge the gap; to use Human intelligence to bring AI to a new frontier.”

Singh revealed the company’s plans include helping projects integrate with Human Protocol, and realise its unique benefits.
“All our technology is available open-source,” he said.

“What we achieve with HUMAN App, we present as a proof of concept to other projects, enabling them to create their own solutions for requesting and rewarding contributions from their user bases or workforces.

“This is in addition to Proof of HUMANity – the first dApp bot blocking tool – and IMOO: an on-chain oracle for decentralised prediction markets.”

Singh added the company is also working to support more blockchains and said Human Protocol is chain agnostic.

“To achieve the vision of tokenising all work, we have to remove the obstacles to development, optimising both the experience of integrating with the Protocol and using the solutions that are created on top of it.”