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NatureVRM: Seeding A Tokenized Identity

In 2020 before NFTs went nuts, I decided to start an experiment and summoned the tokenized identity called Nature. I'd start to create modular, interoperable, web3 native IP that would aggregate value by growing provenance and influence across web3 platforms as well as traditional social networks. But what does all of this even mean?

The Origins of Nature

On the 7th of October in 2020 the avatar artist CornyNachos minted "Nature is on the TV" avatar (see photo below) on Cryptoavatars a platform that solves creator verifications for VRChat avatar artists which was (and still is) a problem over there. A week later I won the auction and obtained the vrm avatar which started a multi-year journey with lots of tinkering and applied research at the intersection of XR x Web3 x AI where I wrote various stories.

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Watch early footage of the Fluctuo gallery from Somnium Space in 2020

Back then, when vtubing was slowly becoming a thing and more purely digital influencers came to social media, something was clear to me: The future of content production and entertainment will massively change, especially with the ability to spawn virtual selfs into all kinds of scenarios in cost efficient ways.

I was heavily inspirect by the virtual production efforts of jin and other members of m3org, a pioneering group of builders, that I would join myself in 2022. As generative AI entered mainstream attention and more tooling was built, the group leveraged this tech and we learned how to manifest the character in more scalable ways.

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As someone who has been in the web3 space for quite some time I'm aware about the fact that tokenized identities will economically act via blockchains like Ethereum as current regulation doesn't allow them to open traditional bank accounts. I'd love to transition Nature into an autonomous agent, owning digital assets while roaming the metaverse beyond 2D interfaces via interoperable avatars. Let me explain where we at.

Collaborative Storytelling

Nature is all about experimentation at the intersection of XR x Web3 x AI which imho is the foundation of what people call the Metaverse. It's also about telling stories which helps folks to understand these concepts while pushing boundaries and supporting communities. Christmas 2020, Nature teamed up with ETH-MEN who created a digital action figure of herself.

Owners could decide if they want to leave the action figure mint in box or if they unpack it to reveal and obtain a 3D collectible of said figure. The whole experience was received incredibly well as this pioneering storytelling project also distributed early tokenized comics.

Another IP experiment during my birth year was Nature's Golden Milk a contribution to a fun experiment executed by Xibot who I highly appreciate for his excellent work at Aavegotchi.

CryptoArt Collaborations

Some of the earliest cryptoart collaborations with Pindar Van Arman, Zafgod and Polyannie happened back in 2020. I remember being incredibly proud of these which gave me tons of motivation to grow the Nature character over the coming years. All three artists turned content that I created with full-body tracking gear inside virtual reality into new works of art.

Exploring The Metaverse

Grasping Avatar Interoperability

Early VRM interoperability experiments included modded Craftopia versions, integrations into custom experiences by artist and friend Beervangeer and visits to Orgrimmar and other places via community created VRChat worlds. Stuff like this was eye-opening and fueled my fascination for 3D avatars allowing users to transport themselves across the metaverse for content creation.

During 2020 and 2021 lots of this experimentation happened. Interoperability experiments with tokenized wearables was another area that I would explore. For example attaching some of the early Cryptovoxel and Decentraland wearables that I collected since I entered the web3 space and importing these modified vrm avatars into different engines is something I explored.

Launching the Nature 2.0 Avatar

In January 2022 it was time to breath life into Nature who was born almost dead. The pixelated, minimalistic texture didn't feel alive at all. I commissioned the 2.0 avatar design to KamikazE-Chan who created her after an incredible artwork drawn by Yamer back in 2021. It was a huge step forward and exactly what was needed when it comes down to the project's storytelling.

This new avatar, rejuvenated with life, allowed the tokenized identity NatureVRM to step up her game. It enabled Natures official social media accounts on Twitter, Instagram and Lens to grow as higher quality content was being produced across all sorts of platforms. This avatar would define her overall vibe for the coming years and looks stunning across different engines.

Thoughts about PFPs and Self Expression

While the NFT bubble around PFPs grew and imploded, these interesting experiments I did with the tokenized identity Nature and my own avatar were - subjectively from my own pov - more than one step ahead. I truly believe that the human desire for self expression across the internet won't stop at 2D jpgs especially as spatial computing via VR+AR slowly enters mainstream.

Platforms like Vipe extended several NFT projects like BAYC with 3D avatars while also creating their own IP with Vipe Heroes. All of these avatars are as interoperable as Nature thanks to the vrm format in which they are distributed. History doesn't repeat itself but often it rhymes so lets see when self expression and metaverse trends are coming back. But now back to Nature!

Collaborations with Avatar Creators

Collaboration and experimentation with avatar artists allow Nature to constantly evolve into new shapes and forms while keeping a recognizable identity that is carried into the future. First one was Phetta Nature which roams the Phettaverse a trippy place created by artist emotionull who is a fellow M3 member and loves to create across all sorts of media like VR/3D sculpting.

My goal with this? Connect with talented people to make new friends along the way while being able to produce tons of based content. I'd love to see more avatar collaborations like this but at the same time don't plan to force anything. Just putting things out and see what happens. This video was recorded on the web3 ChillingChiliz GTA 5 community server. Def check that out!

Fans and Community Growth

The first Tribe Of Nature POAP was issued in early 2021 and was collected by 225 friends and supporters from the broader web3 space. One year later a second poap was issued which already reflected the updated avatar model. In 2024 a limited edition avatar that is seamlessly playable in Nifty Island, was distributed to over 1000 users.

Making Nature accessible to the community was very important to me. Back in April 2023 it was time to train and upload a Stable Diffusion LoRA allowing anyone to manifest Nature via simple text prompts into any environment. This was followed by a character card on chub.ai one month later, enabling users to load Nature into the most common LLM stacks to chat with her.

Growing Nature while learning in public is a win-win situation for me personally. So of course I published a tutorial that explains how you can train LoRAs of your own avatars.

Sharing Research and Art

As of May 18th, 2024 @naturevrm has accumulated 2222 followers and supports various projects that are very close to my heart in one way or another. Sending hugs to @m3org, @nousresearch, @qwellcode, @museumofcrypto, @galleryofcrypto and @cryptoavatars. Almost took 4 years to get here as it's not easy to find folks who understand and appreciate this story.

Btw the entire project has been bootstrapped without external funding.

Collect from Nature on zeroone

Nature started to mint artworks on zeroone a cultural distribution engine that we've launched in 2023. Make sure to follow her and collect a few pieces - its free! The stuff she posts there is mostly Stable Diffusion fueled artwork that is being generated using the LoRA I trained for her last year. Another interesting avenue that enables tinkering and novel learnings.

Turning Nature into an AI Agent

While most of the stuff you've read here was content creation done by humans, I strongly believe that in the future we will guide agents to do things on the web. They'll create content and write their own stories in asynchronous fashion in a sense that we'll be surprised to dig into their latest actions. By automating these processes it will make way more sense to execute on tokenized identities which imho will lead to the growth of a very different web.

I've already built an efficient homelab server that runs llms via Ollama. Over the next year I build my own LLM rig similar to the tinybox that geohot is developing with his latest venture tinycorp. Already got a part list but will most likely wait for the RTX 5090 to have the latest generation blackwell chips inside that beast.

These computers are able to run a variety of open source AI tooling that can be plucked into autonomous agent frameworks like Eliza by Shaw which allows us to populate virtual worlds in decentralized fashion. Digital entities, each configured to follow their own individual goals. That stuff will make Ready Player One real.

These machines will also enable personal assistants fueled by AIs which, compared to cloud services, can be trusted with personal data like emails or calendars or even digital assets and currency to execute meaningful tasks in secure environments in which privacy is of highest importance. Lots of stuff to learn while the story of Nature will be continued.