{"title": "Augmntd", "logoImg": "bafkreihvt6622s55h2m7nwokgyxjfqym7pwpvqzugjui2zn62wizl64kfi", "website": "https://augmntd.xyz", "bannerImg": "bafkreichx6aozp2bvzda4cwxvtd4qmmgtdejryrwfhhpompzcsitbdtvva", "createdAt": 1675121129281, "credentials": {}, "description": "Augmntd is working towards a metaverse. We're currently building social, meaningful, and accessible products for the Metaverse. \n\nOur mission is to bring true interoperability and decentralization to the Metaverse.\n\nTo offer a platform that empowers you, the user, and doesn’t turn you into the product by monetizing your attention. Our goal is not to replace real interactions, but to make digital interactions more social and real. To bring society closer together.\n\nWe care about bringing you something that feels humane and intuitive, something that combines art and technology in a seamless way. Products that are not overly complex and frustrating, but that bring you joy and excitement. We want to help steer our shared future in a positive direction. \n\nThe Augmntd ecosystem.\n\nThe Augmntd ecosystem is the result of all current and future products and how they build on each other to create a seamless user experience. To understand its implications better, we first must differentiate between centralized and decentralized products and services. Underlying protocols, mechanisms, and infrastructure must be used by all contributors for an interoperable metaverse to be possible. It is Augmntd’s mission to develop mentioned technologies to make such a seamless experience possible. As all contributors use and are affected by them, gradual decentralization has to be applied to them to result in a user-governed platform. Users get a democratic say over changes and improvements and make suggestions and propose new features that will be implemented if passed. As part of gradual decentralization, Augmntd initially retains a veto to ensure that governance mechanisms are incorruptible and extensively tested, upon which all control is to be handed over to the users. This approach primarily applies to the first and second layers, as the technologies these are comprised of need to be used by all contributors. The third layer works differently, as it allows for contributors to potentially retain control indefinitely and put their own governance structures in place - as long as they follow the broad consensus of layers one and two. The creators of any virtual environment can choose whether to implement centralized control or build an environment based on user ownership and governance; more intricate and case-specific approaches can be applied too. This allows all users to create environments based on their preferred approach and structure or contribute to any existing one they agree with. This allows for the most dynamic metaverse to emerge, shaped by users’ interests and demands, built by users for users.\n\nWe’re now going to look at current and future products developed by Augmntd and their role in the ecosystem. Explanations for certain future products and services have yet to be unlocked - release dates for new information, trailers, and demos will be continuously announced. Names of future products are often placeholders, with the final name being unveiled upon release.\n\n\nAugmntd Founder.\n\nFounder is a collection of 1250 art collectibles based on ERC-721 tokens (NFTs). This is your first opportunity to become part of the movement and show your support for our mission. It combines art and technology, showing the collectors’ ability to question and challenge the status quo with the sole purpose of moving society forward and improving our collective future. It’s the first step in assembling a supportive and enthusiastic community on our quest to reach the augmented age. It’s multipurpose by design; additionally to being an art piece visually representing our values, it also makes you part of our core founding community and grants access to upcoming products and experiences. Collecting and becoming a Founder makes you an essential part of the future of Augmntd. Founder is also intended as a dynamic art piece, evolving like Augmntd and the metaverse. The upcoming Wear platform and collections will allow you to alter the appearance of your Founder, therefore letting you create your own visual identity within our ecosystem. A small number of early collectors were already able to mint. Future mints will be made available in smaller batches, with spots being allotted through a recurring raffle. You can learn more here.\n\nAugmntd Hub (3rd layer).\n\nAugmntd Hub is our primary product within the third layer. Its purpose is to act as a central knot, connecting many different worlds and environments. It’s also a place for people to connect and have meaningful interactions. You can own a small part of Hub and use it to easily create your own space within the metaverse, resulting in a variety of potential use cases.\n\nAugmntd Hub is designed to be a fully modular environment, just like many other of our products are going to be. It is comprised of Tiles, hexagonally-shaped pieces of land, which can be assembled in various ways, resulting in bigger constellations called Clusters. The hexagonal shape is directly borrowed from the greatest designer ever to exist; nature. It allows for efficient use of space and continuous expansion of Hub. By assembling individual Tiles into bigger hexagonal shapes, the resulting Clusters also represent our focus on decentralization by creating structures without a single center and no visual depiction of hierarchy.\n\nAs mentioned before, you can either use your space to create experiences that exist solely within Hub or use them to connect to any external environment. As an example of such a link, your space could act as an introduction to what expects people in the external environment, as a lobby to assemble groups for games or as a meeting spot for a class of students about to explore an ancient city. Staying within Hub, your space could act as a showroom, demo of a product, store, public space for discussions and presentations, or a virtual environment for international teams to meet and collaborate. These are only very few potential use cases, many of which we might not even be able to think of at this point.\n\nIn the previous chapter talking about the metaverse’s impact on our cities, I briefly mentioned the concept of polycentric cities, which I think is just as vital to be implemented within Hub. In practice, this means allowing Tile owners to collaborate with others and build Clusters following a specific cause, theme, or sub-governance structure. Such a sub-governance structure might elect a group of planners to propose how their Cluster could be assembled and laid out. This allows users sharing the same interests and goals to collaborate easily and create a result more significant than its individual parts. Ideas or values based on which a Cluster gets assembled could be the style of architecture it employs or the specific use of Tiles, which might lead to a Cluster focusing on the proliferation of a particular philosophy or idea. Many other assemblies, like an education-themed Cluster or one connecting users to different games, are possible too. Again, the use cases listed are only supposed to give you a more applied understanding of what Clusters could potentially be used for; seeing many more being explored by users in the future makes Hub so exciting.\n\nThe ultimate goal is to offer a playground for experimentation. Whether it be in design, use cases, governance, or creating meaningful interactions, the potential is only limited by one’s imagination.\n\nDevelopment of Hub is currently in a very early stage, primarily focusing on layout and design. We will then continuously implement more features and complexity while letting more users explore the environment, using their feedback to further improve and iterate.\n\nFounder collectors will be the first ones to get early access, with members of the Circle following a bit later. You can learn more about becoming a collector or Circle member here.\n\nThe first look at Hub is coming on January 31st.\n\nAugmntd Utilities (2nd layer).\n\nAugmntd Utilities comprise our efforts toward the creation of layer two. Augmntd will develop and maintain protocols and services that are part of Utilities. Protocols that will be enforced to enable a seamless and interoperable experience will be governed and controlled by the users. Other products, like different tools allowing the creation of virtual environments and experiences, are potentially subject to a more centralized approach, still, only in cases where users can use or even create alternatives, therefore never forcing anyone to use solutions they don’t enjoy.\n\nEnforced protocols might include standardized formats used for assets, a unified approach toward creating a virtual economy, and general networking protocols. Unenforced ones might consist of 3D creation tools that users can replace with ones they personally prefer.\n\nUsing standardized protocols allows for interoperability and seamless connections between environments and brings countless benefits like the earlier mentioned self-sovereign identity and data portability. Those can then be used to create a trustless user ID, on which Augmntd Avatar will be based. Avatar is a system allowing for the easy creation of user avatars, allowing people to transfer their identity into the virtual realm. The Wear platform, briefly mentioned in the Founder's explanation, allows the creation of virtual fashion and accessories fully compatible with Avatar.\n\nUtilities will also contain various SDKs enabling independent developers to create their own implementation of Augmntd products, better suited for their individual needs.\n\nCreating and coordinating a comprehensive asset library optimized for environments hosted on layer one might also eventually become part of Utilities. This approach could subsequently expand into various other areas, such as user-created and owned databases based on which genuinely open ML (machine learning) models could be created.\n\nAugmntd Cloud (1st layer).\n\nAugmntd Cloud is our approach to creating the decentralized infrastructure required for a complex and vastmetaverse, ideally fully user-owned and governed - resulting in layer one.\n\nThis system will also be subject to gradual decentralization, with control being handed over to users and contributors as the system expands.\n\nIt will be fully modular, enabling fast deployment and implementation into existing infrastructure based on local demand. Additionally, it will be integrated with other components of existing infrastructure or compatible with other purpose-built modules. That way, the system could be leveraged to address problems far beyond the metaverse.\n\nAugmntd Cloud is still only a concept; further details and plans will be shared in the future.\n", "logoImgData": {}, "bannerImgData": {}, "projectTwitter": "@augmntd"}