BioMine is a prototype ai-assistant and distributed application (d’app) that helps users sell biometric and environmental data collected through their wearables.

BioMine uses intelligent agents (bots) to act as a personal data broker, coordinating data collection and storage, matchmaking with buyers, and transmitting information through a secure blockchain infrastructure.

This prototype seeks to explore how we might use intelligent agents as information-brokers over blockchain-enabled networks in order to securely transmit and pay users for biometric data they generate and environmental data they record through wearables.

Key Functions

• Marketplace of information bounties coordinated via smart contract
• Bot listens to market to find matching requests
• Bot automatically turns on applicable sensors and gathers data via Nomad architecture
• Bot packages and delivers data to client
• Payment is rendered to users wallet

Future Use Cases

I believe that the blockchain protocol will alter the paradigm for how we think about data that is generated by our everyday movements and interactions. Right now, we enjoy free insights (think FitBit) from purchased equipment and connected apps, but don’t consider how our data is being used. One design pattern that blockchains can potentially enable is the secure and anonymous sale of data the companies need and users collect every day. Imagine an air-quality study that can stream data from pins that users wear, paying them a small fee for keeping the devices turned on throughout their day. Another use case could be an exercise-monitoring bracelet that streams data about runners, cyclists, or other target groups, also paying them a small fee for anonymously providing their biometric feedback during certain exercises. One final potential use case will be for VR. Already body-tracking for realistic VR and 3D character movement is already a big industry, a simple sensor kit can be attached to users bodies tracking the precise movement of their skeleton as they complete various activities. This could allow users who engage in various occupations or activities to stream data about their movement and posture, providing a library of movements for future VR and 3D motion designers to use.

Design Research

Check out the User Interface Prototype.

See the responses from the BioMine User Survey.

 

Contributors: Dana Martens, Noa Kaplan

BioMine was created in a three-day exploratory sprint as part of the IDEO CoLab Summer 2017 Fellowship in San Francisco.