Worldcoin to pit proof-of-humanity against pig-butchers of the lonelyhearted

Worldcoin has had many lives since it revealed itself in 2021.When we all first heard about it, it was a plan to deliver a crypto basic income to everyone on earth, as fears mounted about what artificial intelligence would do to employment. Then the crypto and biometrics startup started talking more about dealing with deepfakes. Then it became more about ensuring you’re interacting with a real person.But that’s not what 90% of the mental energy that’s been invested in Worldcoin has honestly been about. It’s mostly been about the eyeball scanning. Is the biometric-based campaign good or bad? Is the company’s orb freaky or not? I have always been ambivalent about Worldcoin, but I’ve also secretly suspected I was being a little unreasonable about it, reacting more to its optics than to its fundamentals. So, this episode is my attempt to take an honest look at the project, something I’ve never really done previously. Right now, it seems like the top priority is to just get more people registered for WorldID’s (that is, to get their eyeballs scanned and get them on the network). As you’ll here in the episode, Sam Altman, one of the co-founders, likes to make bets on getting to very large scale.To that end, the company strategists have identified three verticals for growth: Gaming, social and dating. All these verticals are very popular online and all of them have a problem with either bots or people pretending to be someone that they are not.Honestly, the one of these that seems the most compelling to me is online dating. Friends, I’m gonna be honest: I have nothing to say about whether or not you die alone. That’s on you. But I do care about whether or not you get your wallet emptied while looking for someone to spend a little time with. That seems like a problem we should be able to solve as a society.Romance scams cost Americans something like $1.1 billion every year. Pig-butchering has been one of the most vile trends of the last several years. Could WorldID’s eyeball scans throw up a lot of friction for romance scam rings? Probably. It bums me out that widows and perma-singles are getting taken advantage of this way, and it’s nice to see an effort to deploy cryptography to combat it. It opened my mind somewhat to shoving one’s face into one of these orbs. Have I done it yet, though? No. But still. * Unc might need to.And yes, yes, I know that the company doesn’t go by “Worldcoin” any longer. It’s technically just “World,” (operated by the company, Tools for Humanity). That rebranding is right up there with the WeWork switch to “We.” (Do y’all really want to emulate Adam Neumann?)So, have a listen to this latest dispatch of Diamond Rhino. I go through much more than the romance use case, to be fair. What I don’t do is obsessively dwell on the orb. That facet has gotten tons of attention. What you might find encouraging, though, is the way World’s info security guy talks about using cryptography. So come for love, but stick around for discretionary disclosure.Also, if you haven’t gotten enough Brady Dale in your ears and eyes, lately, here are a couple shows I appeared on in recent days.Kate Irwin had me on her new Veda Labs podcast to talk about the year in crypto we are heading into:And the Blockspace Media guys (all CoinDesk alums, like me) had me on to talk about the state of Crypto Media, following upon the Twitter thread I put out a few weeks ago. In my opinion, the most fun part is when all three of us throw shade on the New York Times consistently embarrassing crypto coverage.In fact speaking of the Times:So that’s it for recent appearances. For the sources I consulted for this Worldcoin episode, see below:(aka, show notes)Experience Real Connections with World ID and Match GroupDigital identity - weighing the risks of misuse and missed use | Dakota Gruener | TEDxMarrakeshJuly 3, 2019Sam Altman: OpenAI CEO on GPT-4, ChatGPT, and the Future of AI | Lex Fridman Podcast #367Mar 25, 2023* Here’s what a Sam Altman-backed basic income experiment found (CBS News)At Last ft. Alex Blania and Sam AltmanWorldMay 1, 2025A New World ft. Alex Blania and Sam AltmanWorldOct 18, 2024* Introducing AMPC: Another leap in privacy and performance for World ID, Sept 4, 2025Worldcoin: Most Dystopian Crypto? CoinBureauAug 3, 2023The Real Reason World Scans Your EyeballsBeInCryptoDec 24, 2025Reclaiming the panopticon, X essayWhy Proof of Humanity Matters in an AI Future Alex BlaniaEmpire PodcastMay 16, 2023Transforming Government: Digital Identity in IndiaWorld BankJan 13, 2016Inside India’s Aadhar: The World’s Largest Biometric System ExplainedByteMonkJan 25, 2025You Can Pre-Order This $15,000 Crypto-Powered Beer Vending MachineCoinDeskSept. 13, 2021The History and Philosophy of CypherpunkHarry HalpinNov. 12, 2024World Dune DashboardI covered a World app, Divine Research, in this story:Deception, exploited workers, and cash handouts: How World recruited its first half a million test usersMIT Tech ReviewApril 6, 2022Sam Altman’s eye-scanning Worldcoin banned in SpainReutersMarch 6, 2024Sam Altman’s World pauses operations in Germany as company overhauls iris-scanning stationsDL NewsJuly 10, 2025All Hail The Orb: Worldcoin - Episode 123Crypto Critics CornerAug 2, 2023Pondering the Orb with Molly WhiteTech Won’t Save Us podAug 17, 2023Worldcoin Is Older Than Ethereum —Just Not the Eyeball-Scanning OneThe DefiantOctober 26, 2021 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.frontstageexit.com