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Sat, 25 Mar 2023 19:22:46 GMT by Silver / ToolbloxWith AI and blockchain technologies maturing, people are left wondering how will it all change ‘office work’ — will AI take our jobs? Will we just use prompts going forward? Or should we ban it all before its too late? Kill it with fire are and nuke the site from orbit.
The truth might not be that bleak. This essay will put forward the productivity suite 2.0 containing classes of apps that will be part of the next work experience.
The stack
The app stack of the future consists of 3 classes or groups, each enabling the user to perform three distinct objectives: planning, execution and commitment.
The idea is that work is about exchanging value. You either create value for others or obtain something valueable for yourself. And you need apps to participate in the value chain.
Money makes the world go around but value makes money go around.
So if we frame office work around the transfer of value we get these three verbs:
- Plan — gather information, collect invites, analyze answers, notes, brainstorm, argue, propose. All to figure out “what might be valuable?” establishing a “value proposition”.
- Commit — agree on the terms of the exchange. Who gets what when for how much. Additionally what penalties or other terms apply to this value exchange.
- Execute — move, exchange or produce value.
Plan
This set of apps is all about collecting intelligence or tracking bits and pieces. These apps are messy! They are messy because humans are messy and processes often are messy as well. And this is OK — why try to go against our nature and fit into a neatly set workflow designed by a consultant.
While there exist business process management practices that help to formalize and instate clear workflows withing companies — freedom is neccessary in the early phases of projects. People need to bump into each other and information needs to flow around. While one can use templates and rules, the freeform apps will dominate the plan phase of app stack 2.0. Few examples of such apps would be Notion and Loop. But also chat apps like Teams and Slack.
AI can help in this phase by finding relevant information but it is very much still a manual phase — up for individuals to decide what sticks to the board, what is relevant, what makes sense for all parties and what the company should focus on. All kinds of boards, forums and freeform tools will make up this group.
Commit
This step is all about blockchain — blockchain will be the settlement layer of the next app stack. While the “plan” phase let people loose, the “commit” phase enforces accountability to agreements. Accountability to shareholders, the government, customers and between business partners. It helps to make sure the terms of the value exchange are respected.
Past few years have been about experimentation — blockchain has been used to store information that needs to be around forever and/or needs to be extremely trustworty. Data such as diamond certificates, proof of concept supply chains, health records, financial instruments etc.
Things will get much more serious though. Self-executing smart contracts provide a way to construct/emulate any business processes which will enable blockchain to facilitate all agreements between every entity! As regulation matures and onboarding (crypto wallet experience and speed) improves we will reach a tipping point where apps such as Toolblox will be part of daily office work.
Whether it is a document approval process, board vote, a sales offer, service request, warranty process, some application, a “diamond authenticity certificate” — all agreements that regulate assets lifecycle will move to on-chain. Because why use layers of error-prone and voulnerable infrastructure (cloud) when there exists an alternative that provides a much more trustworthy experience and is simpler to use?
Execute
This where AI will shine. AI will be the workhorse ready to automate, ready to create, ready to do anything we decide needs to be done. This group of apps will compose mainly of chat prompts, but also streams. Whether video streams, news streams or other data streams and the ability to either consume or to append to each.
Some examples of apps in this group include ChatGPT and clones (Bing, Bard etc), social media apps like (Twitter, LinkedIn) and video based platforms. But also automation providers like Power Automate, Zapier etc.
Summary
The classification proposed here is not absolute — it will still be a gradual change with experts continuing to work the way they do today. But for sure the powerlines will change to facilitate the three aspects needed to capture value (planning, commitment and execution) and AI and public blockchain will emerge as the key enablers.
Toolblox™ offers the flexibility traditionally found in custom development combined with the ease of no-code platforms.
Smart-contract templates, while seemingly convenient, often don't cater to all asset classes or jurisdictions, can stifle business process innovation, and become costly when adapting to specific needs due to re-audit requirements. Custom smart-contract development, on the other hand, is a lengthy and expensive process, requiring specialized skills, and the auditing phase is both costly and time-consuming.
Our smart contracts provide tailored solutions for specific assets, jurisdictions, or business nuances, all while being cost-effective to audit and easy to understand through visual workflows. This ensures you get a precise solution without the associated overheads or limitations.
Tokenization transforms traditional business protocols into self-executing smart contracts, streamlining operations and ensuring clarity.
- Efficiency in Operations: Self-executing contracts automate processes, speeding up operations like reconciliation, administration and settlement.
- Reduced Miscommunication: With every term and condition explicitly coded, there's less room for misunderstandings or disputes.
- Clarity in Business Protocols: Tokenized assets come with predefined rules and protocols, making business operations clearer and reducing ambiguities.
- Liquidity: Assets, even traditionally illiquid ones like art or real estate, become easily tradable, enhancing their accessibility.
- Fractional Ownership: Tokenization divides assets into smaller units, allowing more investors to partake in high-value asset ownership.
- Transparency: Every transaction is transparently recorded on the blockchain, ensuring verifiability by all stakeholders.
- Security: Blockchain's robustness safeguards tokenized assets, minimizing fraud risks.
- Global Market Access: Tokenized assets on Toolblox™ can be traded internationally, expanding market reach and opportunities.
- Supply Chain: Tokenize individual products for transparent tracking from manufacturing to sale.
- ESG Reporting: Ensure verifiable and trusted environmental, social, and governance data points.
- Financial Settlement: Streamline the trade and settlement of financial securities.
- Certified Credentials: Authenticate jewelry certificates, diplomas, and other achievements.
- NFT Marketplaces: Facilitate the creation, listing, and sale of unique digital art.
- DAO Governance: Automate company by-laws and decision-making within decentralized organizations.
- Asset Monetization: Tokenize real estate, land, or data sets for easy trading and verification.
- Ticketing Systems: Secure event ticket sales, verification, and anti-fraud measures.
- Insurance Operations: Simplify the insurance claim process, from filing to settlement.
- Document Timestamping: Verify the existence and integrity of documents with a secure timestamp.
- One-Time Smart Contracts: Create custom contracts for specific buy/sell/service agreements.
- Business Model Innovation: Develop new token-based business models for diverse industries.
- Smart Contract Auditing: Tokenize the auditing process, ensuring transparency and accountability in smart contract reviews.
- Proof of Physical Work Contracts: Manage contractor tasks, milestones, and handovers with tokenized contracts that verify completed work.
- Consultation Services: Tokenize consultation hours or packages, allowing clients to purchase and redeem services seamlessly.
- Subscription Services: Implement token-based subscriptions for content, software, or other services, ensuring automated renewals and access control.
Think of Toolblox™ as a hammer. We help you build your digital house (the smart-contract), but once it's built, the house stands on its own.
While we provide an auto-generated user interface and offer hosting solutions, the ownership and operation of the smart-contract and its data are entirely yours. This ensures seamless integration with any external system and guarantees robustness and adaptability for the future.
Integrating smart-contract workflows is straightforward with Toolblox™. While there are standard methods like using JavaScript web3 libraries, we offer a user-friendly DApp builder that allows you to embed smart contract actions directly into your solution.
Additionally, for those who prefer no-code platforms, we provide an open API and plugins, including compatibility with popular platforms like Bubble. This ensures a seamless integration tailored to your business needs.
Absolutely. Toolblox™ is primarily designed for no-code solution developers who understand business needs, are familiar with no-code tools, and aim to craft an MVP for a web3 solution.
However, we also cater to business owners and analysts with a feature that employs AI to generate visual workflows. This can then be handed over to technical teams for further refinement.
For those with a technical background, we offer advanced features like source code extraction and GitHub export, ensuring a comprehensive experience for teams of all sizes.
Cross-workflow calling is baked into the builder. This means that any workflow can call any other workflow.
No, we use AI to generate the workflow of an asset or service. We then compose the smart-contract out of standardised components without using any AI generation. This process (for which we have filed a patent for) offers predictability and dependability while allowing you to use AI generation to kick-off the development process. It also makes the smart-contract easier and more cost-effective to audit.
