Creative industries are currently facing a significant challenge due to the rapid growth of artificial intelligence (AI). Although many creators have started incorporating generative AI in their work, they still need help with reduced earnings and infringement on their intellectual property. Moreover, the lack of creative, legal, and financial control over AI-generated art has led to over 5 billion images being used without consent from their original creators. As a result, creators are seeking fair compensation for their work.
Tackling this issue is Morningstar Ventures’ portfolio company, Ringfence – the first generative AI platform to ensure creators are paid royalties every time their work is used to create AI-generated content (AIGC).
This month's review will cover everything from the founding team to fundraising, the upcoming beta, and how the platform works. The review will end with an analysis of what we like about Ringfence and where we see potential challenges for the project.
What is Ringfence and How Does it Work
Ringfence is a platform created to ensure that creators are paid fairly every time their original work is used to develop AIGC. By uploading their photos, images, videos, documents, and music to the platform, creators such as musicians, painters, writers, and filmmakers can protect their intellectual property from unauthorized use by third parties.
Creators who wish to make money from their content can use the platform to verify ownership and grant permission for AI to use their files to generate new AI-generated content. Furthermore, Ringfence enables creators to create AI-generated content on 50+ EVM-compatible chains using LayerZero's ONFT standard. This allows for the efficient transfer of non-fungible tokens across multiple blockchains without asset wrapping, middle chains, or liquidity pools.
Ringfence operates across five essential features to fuel its platform:
- Enforceable end-user agreements
- One-of-a-kind designs
- Metadata tagging and blockchain integration
- IP safe training sets
- Security and privacy
How it works
Ringfence is designed to enhance content strategies for its users, enabling experienced and novice creators to grow their respective asset portfolios.
For example, creators can use Ringfence’s engine to create a variety of content mediums and use Ringfence to tokenize their art. The way they sign up is by:
- Connect ERC-20 wallet
- The creator can then choose to upload their existing content or jump right into generating AI-generated content.
- Ringfence’s proprietary technology screens all uploaded and AI-generated content to verify content authenticity and establish ownership.
- The creator established rules for their content, determining usage parameters and licensing permissions.
- If a creator authorizes Ringfence to use their work in training AI models, the creator is paid every time their content is used.
Team, Fundraising, and Partnerships
The Ringfence team is led by CEO Whit Gibbs, co-founder of bitcoin mining’s largest hardware and hosting marketplace, Compass Mining, and Dr.Dimitry Mihaylov. Dimitry is the Chief Science Officer of the platform. He has a strong track record in architecting complex data systems and machine learning models – including those he has worked on for many major companies and non-governmental organizations such as WorldBank and the United Nations.
The team recently closed its $1.5M seed round, led by Rarestone Capital and Morningstar Ventures, with participation from Spark Digital Capital, Curiosity Capital, Noir Ventures, and other funds and angel investors.
MSV GG partnership
Morningstar Ventures’ retail arm MSV GG has already onboarded Ringfence as one of its new partners. Soon, MSV GG will start testing the project’s upcoming beta app and provide feedback, along with supporting other strategic initiatives and content production. MSV GG and Ringfence are also planning a challenge to launch in late Q1/early Q2.
rNFTs and Recent Litepaper Release
The Ringfence team recently released their rNFT Litepaper, highlighting the NFT's main feature and how it fuels the ecosystem. rNFTs enable users to aggregate digital assets like images, videos, audio, and text under one NFT. This content is accompanied by detailed metadata for authenticity. The dynamic management feature allows creators to update and expand their rNFTs over time. Monetization options include neural network training and licensing for commercial use, providing creators with diverse revenue streams.
Key Features:
- Acquisition: Users can obtain rNFTs through an upcoming mint on Ringfence.
- Content Variety: rNFTs support a range of digital asset types, including images, videos, audio, and text.
- Metadata Documentation: Each content piece in an rNFT is accompanied by metadata for traceability and authenticity.
- Dynamic Management: Creators can update and expand the content of their rNFTs over time.
Monetization Avenues:
- Neural Network Training: Users can collaborate with Ringfence by providing digital assets for neural network training earning rewards.
- Licensing: Creators can license components or the entire rNFT for commercial use, generating revenue with automated royalties.
- Branding and Commercial Use: rNFTs can be used for branding and commercial purposes, such as licensing portfolios for advertising.
The litepaper also highlighted some Use Cases, such as;
- Food Photographer: Uploads a portfolio to an rNFT, trains AI on Ringfence for high-quality derivatives, and licenses work for advertising.
- Writer: Uploads a script to an rNFT, generates characters and scenery using AI, and easily licenses the movie for sale or distribution.
- NFT Artist: Releases a collection with rNFT-attached IP, ensuring transparency for for-profit and distributions among holders.
Read more about rNFTs: here ➡️ https://www.ringfence.ai/blog/litepaper
Our Analysis
Strengths:
- There are vast opportunities to capitalize on the lack of creative, legal, ethical, and financial control that AI-generated art and licensing companies are causing for creators and businesses. Ringfence aims to pioneer the space and become an industry leader in solving this pressing issue and finding solutions for creators who need more support and representation. Furthermore, the market potential of generative AI is predicted to grow to $1.3 trillion by 2032, and the copyright licensing market is expected to grow to $243.5 billion by 2027.
- The project has a clear token utility, as users and creators within the platform can tokenize any piece of verified digital content.
Challenges:
- AI has scraped over five billion images and works rapidly to scrape more data. It will be hard to rectify the damage already caused to the creators. Given that AI and copyright laws are still developing, it will be challenging for the team to find an immediate solution for this controversial topic and what can and cannot be defined as content misuse or plagiarism. Furthermore, since Ringfence is an early-stage project, it might be challenging for people to adopt the platform, meaning the underlying issue of regulating creators' rights might take a long time to solve.
What’s Next for Ringfence
The team is currently preparing to launch their beta. If you want to participate, you can join the waitlist here: https://ringfence.ai/.
After the beta, the team wants to use the feedback to complete their features and add more features. In the second half of this year, they also plan to launch an MVP and move away from third-party reliance by creating a proprietary Ringfence AI engine.
Learn more about Ringfence
🌐 Official website: https://ringfence.ai/
🐦 Official Twitter: https://twitter.com/RingfenceAI
🕹️ Discord channel: https://discord.com/invite/cefrTPp9N6
