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Exploring the Metaverse and Data Ownership
Recorded: Sept. 18, 2025 Duration: 1:18:09Space Recording
Short Summary
In a recent discussion, industry leaders explored the transformative potential of the metaverse and data ownership, highlighting strategic partnerships and growth opportunities in the digital economy. With insights from Brian Wehner and Sarah Ashley, the conversation underscored the importance of empowering consumers and leveraging technology to enhance engagement and monetization in the evolving landscape.
Full Transcription
Thank you. you
Hey guys glad you glad you could make it let's give it a few more minutes for the rest of the people to join Thank you. you Hi, Emmy a Kieran hope you guys are doing well
Let's wait a few minutes more for the rest of the people to join especially the guest speakers of course Hey, Christina.
Hey, Robbie.
Hi, Christina.
How are you?
I am great.
How are you doing today?
Great.
I'm always great.
I'm always great.
So that's a good thing, basically. I'm always great. I'm always great. So that's a good thing, basically.
I'm seeing Sarah Ashley as well. Sarah Ashley, I sent you... Oh, okay. That's perfect. That's
done. Then there's Stephanie.
Let's bring up Synth Studios. That should be Brian.
Yep. Let's do so. Okay, Brian, I sent you a request to be a speaker as well
all right perfect I think everyone's uh set settled now um so great uh thank you thank
you for everyone for joining today as well um and welcome everyone um so I'm excited to
co-host this space with uhina from continuum um and i'm pretty
sure like the people in here let me have a look the people in here are aware of christina so uh
very excited um our topic for today is one that really shapes the future of digital life
exploring the metaverse and data ownership and today we are joined by two fantastic guest
speakers. So today we'll be having Brian Wehner, founder of the Illusion Factory and CEO and
founder of CISL, with decades of experience in media, advertising and future-driven storytelling.
Today we also have Sarah Ashley, founder of the Sarah Ashley Agency,
who has been pioneering work in brand building, digital identity, and the creator economy.
So we'll spend the next hour discussing how the metaverse is evolving, what data ownership really
means in these new digital spaces, and what opportunities and risks come with
it. All right, so let's dive in, shall we? So let's, Brian, let's start, let's kick it off with
you. Brian, could you start by introducing yourself and sharing how your background led you into thinking about the metaverse?
Absolutely.
Hi, my name is Brian Weiner.
I'm the CEO of three companies, the Illusion Factory, which has been around for 47 years,
and Sizzle, which is a technology platform born out of all of the technologies created at the Illusion Factory,
technology platform born out of all of the technologies created at the illusion factory
and synth studios which is the third company specializing in synth humans and
anamorphic 3d animation we've been a mainstay in hollywood advertising and marketing for all
the major studios for four and a half decades working for every single one of the large ones
for quite some time in that, all of the technology that has
impacted the entertainment industry socially has come along and that starts with computers to the
internet, to the smart devices, to the apps, to the metaverse, to web3 and everything else in between.
And so it was always our job to anticipate how and where the consumer pathway
was going to travel and anticipate what we were going to do to ensure that our clients were on
the front edge of of that path and carving and sculpting that that opportunity so when second
life came along i think it was 2004 we were the second developer inside Second Life.
We built the world's first virtual world learning center.
And that's since been copied by universities and institutions of higher knowledge all over the world.
And subsequent, we've probably built about 50 metaverse experiences,
including a theme park for Warner Brothers and Space Station for NASA, the Bellagio Casino and projects for American Psychiatry Association and similar. the opportunities in the real world by making new experiences in the metaverse as we developed more
and more of those those models the ability to make media uh transmedia so it's not just television
it's not just movies it's not just animation but existing in the metaverse existing on a second
screen app existing on a tablet existing in a game and a tablet, existing in a game, and so on,
it's always been our opportunity to grow those variables.
And so that's how we got involved in the metaverse.
Awesome.
That's a very rich experience in career entertainment.
45 years, I think it was, you mentioned?
47. 47 even sorry um so like
looking back on this because you mentioned for example warner brothers um what are some of the
projects in film television or live entertainment that you're most proud of, that you played a part in, let's say?
Wow, there's been so many of them.
I can assume, yeah.
And I don't mean that arrogantly.
I mean, I've been very fortunate to get to participate
in a lot of different experiences.
On one side, the metaverse experiences
that we were talking about.
On another side, working on the NSYNC Bigger Than Live IMAX film
and making that all come to life when NSYNC was at the peak of their career,
doing a music video for Alan Jackson
and winning the Country Music Award for Best Music Video.
And he won Best Album and Best Song in that period of time.
And then literally being the key agency instrumental in launching the the two dominant comedy and and drama during
the 90s friends in er we were running both of those on top of lots of other uh programs that
we were marketing including the sopranos west wing nuck, Two and a Half Men, Big Bang Theory, and then working on marketing the theatrical projects overseas on Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter and Dark Knight and Matrix and projects like that.
We're working on Terminator.
We were building a whole new form of 3D escape room entertainment,
which would absolutely translate into metaverse experiences and otherwise.
And so it's not so much that there's any one particular project.
It's just the brilliant team of people I've been fortunate enough to collaborate with,
whose genius has helped facilitate my ability to navigate the illusion factory
into all of these disparately interesting categories.
That's amazing, really.
Like you mentioned, Friends, Big Bang, Two and a Half Men.
Like these are great shows, of course.
And I think a lot of people in the audience would agree with me on that.
Absolutely.
So you've worked across so many creative mediums as well, Dan.
Was there a turning point when you realized
technology was going to reshape entertainment?
Which time?
There have been so many. Look, when I started the Illusion Factory,
there were no computers, there was no internet. So how many different times has technology come
along and reshaped entertainment? I mean, for starters, on the technology side, when we were
editing all of our promos for all of the shows in the early years,
that was all being done in linear editing systems, which was arduous and long. And every time you'd
have to make edits, you'd have to go back and forth. So when nonlinear editing came along,
that was massive. It may not be massive to the general consumer, but to those of us who were
producing content, everything changed when we could suddenly have a computer to be editing on instead of editing systems with old linear decks.
As the Internet got stronger, it became incumbent upon us to find the systems to find a way to start streaming media and putting media into the Internet.
So as you remember, when the Internet was nascent, making a video play on the
internet was really non-existent. And so working with compression technologies and the things that
facilitated, that was also equally important as the metaverse came along and giving people a
mutual opportunity to be face-to-face. That was super keen. And then right after that,
as we were building the metaverse concepts
for Warner Brothers,
we had a theme park, as I said,
for Warner Brothers that we were working on.
But as you know,
if any one of us were to say,
we're in front of our computers
and let's meet on YouTube
and we say, let's press the button on the same video, three, two, one, play,
within five seconds, we wouldn't be in sync with one another. So we had to create synced,
shared video on demand, which we patented. That way, if I'm Daffy Duck and you're Porky Pig,
and we walk into the cartoon theater, we're laughing at the same moments together because
the video stays in sync.
That was an integral component to how shared media was going to operate because there really wasn't shared media at that point in time. So then we did a big project for Paramount Digital
Entertainment and we put their entire theatrical library cannibalized into two-minute segments,
a platform called Vuzoo TV. And it was something that we-minute segments a platform called Vuzu TV and it was
something that we installed into this new platform called Facebook in 2007-2008
unfortunately the Vuzu TV didn't get to launch because the housing market fell
apart and everybody at Paramount Digital Entertainment for whom I was working
was laid off and so the project unceremoniously closed,
but that's another key moment as to how and why shared media
was going to become so important.
And then everything that I was working on with IMAX,
helping usher them over the years from 2D into 3D
and helping create the IMAX experience and so on.
There's been a lot of chapters,
but if there's one thing that's been consistent in all of the changes, it all boils down to, can I make something more convenient for a consumer
to access? Can I make it more cost-effective and intelligent for the client to produce?
And ultimately, can I create things for the consumer that expands the entertainment experience, whether it's a game for ER where you're presented with a patient that's presenting specific symptoms and you have to diagnose within 10 seconds what you think the malady is or the patient goes into cardiac arrest or you're running for president on the West Wing, and I'm asking you controversial questions. And then I give you an approval rating of whether or not you'd be electable in the United States as a presidential candidate based on Gallup poll.
Whatever we were doing, it's always been a deeper extension of fan experience, which is why when I built the Sizzle platform,
coming at the end of all that and taking 150 unique technologies and putting them into a cloud-based
SaaS platform that expands everybody's opportunities, it was really important to make sure that
all of those functionalities further accentuate our core mission, which was expanding fan
attraction, engagement, and then building long-term relationships.
So those are the, those are a lot of the big key pieces. There's lots of been, there's been lots of
really outstanding technologies that have come along in between, but those were the,
those were the beats where everything really started to change. And now the,
the single biggest beat of all of them, which is artificial intelligence being used in filmmaking, that's exponentially bigger than all of the other ones that I mentioned combined.
how that's going to be viable in the entertainment space
and then partnering with entertainment brands
with the expectation of helping them do
ever further fan engagement opportunities.
There you go.
Right. Thank you so much, Brian,
for this amazing introduction as well.
And I agree with AI technology,
I think we're just scratching the surface in in some way right um
but i think there's gonna be a lot to show for as well still um great thank you so much brian
sarah ashley welcome to the geek space hello thank you very much how is everyone
i'm i'm good on my end uh hope you as well. Thank you. Happy to be here. Thanks for having me.
Awesome. Awesome to have you, Sarah Ashley. So could you tell us about your journey and
how your work intersects with questions of identity and ownership in digital spaces,
for example, and to get a quick introduction
about yourself, of course. Sure. So my name is Sarah Ashley. I have an agency, Sarah Ashley
Agency. I'm based in Miami. I am a direct source boutique, meaning my phone is very resourceful in calling whomever direct.
So I have leveraged that ability of my network and being able to directly reach A-list celebrities, actors, entertainers, sports athletes, and different business sectors.
And I've leveraged that into helping bring people together through different partnerships
and collaborations.
That's amazing.
That's actually piquing my interest a bit when you said athletes, actors.
I think a lot of the audience feels the same way.
So thank you for the introduction, Sarah Ashley, as well.
So let's dive into the metaverse foundations, let's say.
Christina, go ahead as well, because I don't want to hijack the space, of course, either.
No, this is perfect.
So we can't say everything, obviously, but there's a few broad strokes that we can talk about what it means for celebrities or athletes or IP holders to be able to take their IP into the fabric of the metaverse and create their own lanes of commerce
around that. So Sarah Ashley, I believe he's asking about why the metaverse and why would
that even matter? Why all this digital stuff, which is really why you and I are working together.
So feel free to share. I believe, you know, we are at a point right now where we're really on the frontier, the wild frontier, and anything is possible.
If I can think it, it can be built pretty much.
So that is why Christina and I have partnered together.
I come up with the ideas and then run them by her and and she magically makes the tech happen so i see um you
know we're moving into a space with the ai that it almost doubles a entertainers or athlete or you
know the the individuals um reach because they can be in the metaverse and then in real life so
there's that aspect. And
then also being able to reach the legends that are no longer with us and being able to bring them
back to life per se, and then engaging them with, you know, Brian's technology with existing
legends that maybe never got to perform together. So there's so many different things that we could do.
And I'm happy to be able to think outside of the box
and bring all of these magical things together in idea form
and hand them off to Christina.
And she goes and gets the tech and the tech people to do it.
And so that's pretty much where we're at right now.
Great.
So when people hear metaverse,
they often think gaming or VR, right?
So how do you define the metaverse in a way that captures its broader potential i think like
you mentioned like uh entertainers in the metaphors and outside of the metaphors
um but how would you capture it in broader potential
is that addressed to me uh to Sarah, actually. Sorry, Brian. Go ahead, Sarah.
Brian, I'll kick that off to you.
I'll let you answer that one.
Brian or Christina?
Sure.
Go ahead.
You're asking the greater applications of the metaverse
and how that's going to correlate in real world?
Was that the core question?
Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's go with that.
Right. So the metaverse offers the opportunity for global community to be proximal to one another.
As we were starting to build all of those systems out 20, 25 years ago, almost now,
those experiences were good, but they were shallow.
And the metaverse needs deeper experiences going into concerts, going into gamification, going into, you know, real world events that are taking place in part in the metaverse so that people who are not proximal can have part of that experience.
and have part of that experience.
And then concurrent to that,
the business models about making all media interactive
and transactional and gamified and so on
was my takeaway from the metaverse.
And then the reason behind building the Sizzle platform
so that everything needs to be seamlessly hyper-connected,
painless for the consumer and frictionless for the brand
so that across the board, all parties are benefiting. So we've stayed myopic to making
all of that happen. When you come to a celebrity, whether it's an athlete or a musician or
an entertainment property, the opportunity to leverage things both in the metaverse and into
the real world is exponential, in part because if you anticipate how you're going to drive traffic
back and forth between real world metaverse, let's say I buy something in the real world,
or I attend an event in the real world or similar. And in the course of attending or purchasing, you know, I've picked up a digital asset.
And that digital asset is usable or productive or viable or collectible in the metaverse space
or could open up privileges or discounts or otherwise inside the metaverse.
Conversely, I might be doing something
or attending something or purchasing something inside the metaverse and the opportunity to
take that benefit and manifest it into something that's actionable in the real world is equally
important so that you've got the bi-directional flow of of transactions and
experiences and consumer engagements that makes good sense to the consumer and gives them cause
and reason to to want to be participating with the entertainment property wherever they are
and I think that the more that you embrace that thought process the more valuable all of it
becomes otherwise the metaverse is just a three-dimensional space for avatars to to embrace that thought process, the more valuable all of it becomes.
Otherwise, the metaverse is just a three-dimensional space
for avatars to congregate and chat with one another.
But as with the world's first learning center
that I built in the metaverse,
we created a human heart
that was 15 times the size of an avatar.
And we brought cardiac surgeons
who specialized in open heart transplant surgery
and made them 1 15th the size of the heart
so that we could walk around
inside the different chambers of the heart
and then give them laser pointers
and they could point to the different parts of the heart
and discuss how and why they cauterize here
or they do this procedure there.
And they all walked out saying that it was immensely beneficial to them because
it gave them a perspective being inside the organ they're so adept at working
with and seeing it through different perspectives.
So if you extend that disparity of size, proportion, experience, knowledge, engagement to entertainment experiences
predicated upon the genre, whether it's music or movie or television or otherwise, then you've got
a fan who's so excited about the experience that they're going to participate at a deeper
engagement, which is more profitable for the brand more profitable
for the licensing party and better for the consumer as well because the consumer is getting
getting extra value assets that they wouldn't necessarily have if this entire ecosystem
weren't in place so that's how i see it
great thank you brian for this so um we talked about like the metaphors obviously
digital world um then there's also data ownership right so there's consumers involved
and so obviously a lot of data so um sarah ashley, so your agency works with creators and brands navigating the digital
economy as well. Like from your perspective, what does data ownership actually mean in practice?
I mean, it gives the control back to the consumer. It's something that most people haven't ever even thought of.
It is a new concept for most people.
And flipping it and giving it back to ownership to, you know, the individual is a concept that people haven't, when they haven't even thought about it the
other way, flipping it around is, you know, we're like 10 steps ahead.
So I think that it's definitely on the edge, cutting edge. I'm super excited to be a part of the platform.
And it's so important to give the control back to the individual.
Can I ask a follow-up question, Ms. Sarah Ashley?
Yes.
You and I talk a lot around what it would mean for the artist
to have control of their data, to have control of their monetization streams and treating Continuum City and these celebrity metaverses as really the fabric where we can bring their dreams to life, bring in their collaboration partners.
talk openly about it, but you and I have had many conversations around how fundamentally this is
going to change artist ownership and IP ownership and having traceability of that and being able to
kind of stack those things together that, yes, do ultimately end up benefiting the consumer,
but they also benefit the celebrities an awful lot to have access to this tech.
tech. Can you tell us a little bit around why they care? Why the celebrities care about IP
Can you tell us a little bit around why they care?
ownership and monetization? Well, because it protects them in the future for somebody else,
you know, taking their information and doing something with it and so I mean that's right
now I think is the the most important thing is just getting a handle on it and protecting it
which is why we built continuum
so you know it's a concept that most people aren't even thinking about and and even the
artists themselves and so this really while a lot of the
people you know this may be you know day-to-day um you know for tech people this is this is not
a new concept but for most people um that you know this isn't a very new concept so um it's exciting
to to see people kind of come alive and almost, you know, like they've been
duped all along. Like it's a whole totally new concept to them to be able to flip it in their
brain where they have control of their IP. So it's exciting.
great
Brian I got a question for you as well
concerning personal
data and stuff
so you've worked with
digital media
for many many years
how do you see the balance between
immersive user experience
and user control over personal data?
I think all users want control over their data if they're cognizant of how much money is being made
or how many unseen moments in their life are being guided by the fact that their data is so readily accessible. I don't know if any of you have experienced,
you know, I took a walk in Beverly Hills a couple weeks ago
and I was walking by the Annenberg Theater.
And literally that night,
I had never seen an ad for Annenberg Theater
coming up on my Facebook, but there it was.
So I'm being tracked and I know I'm being tracked.
The opportunity to leverage platforms that are very cognizant of allowing the user to control their own data and to choose to either stay anonymous or to monetize the data in a way that makes good sense to them is, I think, imperative.
is I think imperative.
And as long as we remain the product,
meaning we are the product that social media is selling,
we keep putting our posting up,
which is why people keep coming there
so that they can keep monetizing us,
the more we need to be aware of the fact
that we're literally just being,
you know, they're marketing on our backs.
And is that really the way
the new world order ultimately should be or should
we change that around and to Sarah Ashley's point the ability for the the talent whose
metaverse experiences or live concert experiences or the living legend experiences that that
we're collaborating on together for them to have complete control over how much of that data is being aggregated
and what participation they have in that because it was being aggregated as a result of their celebrity,
I think is equally important and needs to be properly aligned so that the parties who are bringing the value to the equation
have the single greatest control and participation in it.
I love that you shared that. Can I ask one more question of Brian to just kind of set up the
landscape here? So Robby, I know that you were talking about data ownership and to Sarah Ashley's point, it is a very foreign
thing in the entertainment world of like, wait, I get to own all of that? So like it is a learning
curve, but also the fabric of the metaverse allows us to kind of go from physical and digital,
which some people call physical, I hate that word, but it's data transfer and data
continuity. And this is one of the brilliant things around the geek blockchain of data as a,
excuse me, blockchain as a database in order to create this continuity between if a real human
is going to experience these things and have that unlock new things in the metaverse.
Or if a marketing agency is able to get directly
to a customer that's interested in certain things
without thinking, oh, that might be a bot.
All of these things are like actual data components
that Geek was built for.
And this use case of using metaverse
as kind of the fabric that brings it all together
is continuum's really creating the continuity of your persona when you're out in the world when
you're at the metaverse when you're at a particular piece of our ecosystem we're able to create that
continuity we believe that by showing that example to the world consumers will start to demand that
kind of transparency around data ownership they won't know that it's data ownership. You know, this is my favorite
topic here. But the experience that they're going to have and what Brian has built with the Sizzle
platform that will tie into some of the experiences he's building with the Synth platform that ties
back to the metaverse platform of Continuum,
that ties back to the other celebrity metaverse's ecosystems.
It's all about continuity of data,
and that's what data ownership really means.
So Brian, do you mind expanding a little bit
around some of the products that you've built,
particularly in your AR, VR, what the phones can do,
and why that matters back to the metaverse
sure there's there's myriad technologies in that regard if you're starting with
with ar ar has gone through through multiple iterations we made the world's first
augmented reality music video with mel b in I think 2011, 2012, somewhere in that window of time.
And the world was on a much slower phone system at that point.
So trying to download a 100 megabyte app was problematic on its best day unless you were
connected to Wi-Fi and you had to put the video inside the app in order to make it work.
So an app became a one trick pony.
So clients were excited about the technology, but reticent to do anything because you couldn't
put a hundred extra megabytes into an app, you know, if you're a big studio or something
at that point in time.
So it became incumbent upon us to find a way to literally be able to stream billions of augmented reality videos from a common platform which we built that's part of the origin of Sizzle.
as realistic as a human being and conversant as a human being, facilitate our ability now to not
have an augmented reality video of that person, which is what we had done with Mel B, but instead
have an augmented reality, right? Yeah, an augmented reality, artificial intelligent avatar
of that person. So, you know, if Christina were the celebrity and she was there on stage
we would have the opportunity for a person to have a video and or a a still picture of themselves
you know shot with christina but the difference is that our artificial intelligence can see
on the consumer side of the screen so if i was the one taking the video of christina
consumer side of the screen. So if I was the one taking the video of Christina with somebody who
wanted to take a picture with, you know, with her as the synth human, Christina as the synth human
would be seeing through the camera that I'm holding, pointing at her character. So she would
have complete geospatial relationship to me as a, or to the person with whom she is posing.
And that changes the entire world of augmented reality.
That's going to be huge as we move forward.
I see that's going to be a product with jam alongs with various musicians.
If you want to sing a song with a musician of your choice or similar.
And I think that the opportunity to take these kinds of technologies and to
marry them backwards into ways to tie that into our metaverse is equally important.
The synth human characters that we've created are smarter than all the PhDs put together because
they're tied to seven large language
models concurrently. And the conversation with them takes place instantaneously, like
having a FaceTime. So you have complete control and opportunity to engage, interact, and learn
from those people. And that could also be a celebrity synth human in certain circumstances.
And then our respective technology for bringing them to life inside the theater that we're building in Epic, we've surpassed those kinds of technologies
and we're using artificial intelligence
and pairing that with the respective synth humans
in order to create something that's literally
indistinguishable from watching a live show on stage.
So when the lights go down, it doesn't matter
whether it's, you know, pick your favorite celebrity
that we want to have on stage,
it's gonna feel like you're really there in the in the
stadium or the the theater in this situation because it'll
be a smaller theater of about 3 500 seats and you'll be able to see a concert
that that feels very much like you're right there during the heyday of
of these respective bands so there's so many forms of technologies that facilitate this.
We've built completely interactive
and transactional media.
You could be watching a fashion show
and buying the garments right off of the models
as they're walking the ramp.
And there's 150 of them, so there's a lot.
Did I miss one you wanted me to talk about it, Christina?
No, those were great.
I was trying to set up for the synth uh
arvr of like basically my favorite example is you could be at a baseball game and like have a dragon
fly through like on your phone because your phone is this window to all these other layers of data
and it includes ownership tracking as well like if if you have the NFT from the thing,
then you have the key to unlock what you need to unlock.
And the idea of gamifying things within the metaverse is cool,
but then gamifying things in real life, at a concert, at a festival,
all throughout Vegas,
some of the things that we've been talking about offline.
It's really fun to think about all of this as like one giant Pokemon Go
ecosystem and these new interactions of commerce,
all because it can be programmed with data.
And because you have the sizzle mobile ecosystem that we can do all these
things and the synth digital replication of basically bringing the metaverse
into real life. It's just the
coolest application of data. I just wanted them to know as much as they can
about Synth and Sizzle. Sure. Making the dragons fly through the
stadiums, we've done that quite a bit. For Esports World Cup, you know, we
facilitated dragons coming on there. We also had a large group of live K-pop dancers on one side of the stage and the other side of the stage were augmented reality, equal number group of K-pop dancers.
And when you're looking at it on your phone, they were all dancing in sync and it looked completely integrated.
There's really nothing that we can't do at this point in time.
The technology has come so far and AI being the final barrier to limitations being released,
it makes it so exponentially bigger.
We're really excited for the partnership and what we're going to be bringing to life here,
especially as we get into 2026.
It's going to be incredible.
Yep.
All right, Robbie, I'll turn it back over to you, Lo.
Great. Thank you, Christina.
So with technologies and then talking about metaverse,
data ownership, a question for you again, Brian.
It's a two-sided question, actually.
So about opportunities and challenges then.
So what do you see as the biggest opportunities
of combining the metaverse with verifiable data ownership?
And then on the flip side,
what are the greatest risks
if we get data ownership wrong in the metaverse?
Tying the metaverse with ver get data ownership wrong in the metaverse?
Tying the metaverse with verifiable data ownership
has a huge strength because if you empower a consumer
to be in control of their data, you also
can equally empower them to monetize and benefit
from their own data.
So rather than us being the product that facilitates putting
more money into one of the large social media platform coffers, why not instead empower that
consumer? Furthermore, by empowering them to be the agent and advocate of their own respective data,
you're facilitating the consumer's ability to build a more honest relationship with the brand.
If I'm a brand and I know that I'm getting my data through that resource, through an opt-in consumer that is pleased with sharing their data with me,
then I know that I've got a much stronger bond than somebody that was captured surreptitiously under questionable circumstances.
that was captured surreptitiously under questionable circumstances.
The data may be no more accurate or less accurate,
but the fact that it's coming through the channel of consent,
I think adds a huge variable to the equation that can't be overlooked.
I think that's really, really important.
Getting data wrong, the converse side of what you're talking about,
plays exactly to the opposite
of what I just shared, which is if you're doing the data wrong, if the consumer is feeling violated
or spied upon or any other one of the negative adjective scenarios, I think you're dealing with
a consumer that is no longer building a brand relationship, that brand relationship is becoming ever more questionable
as a result of the consumer feeling like
I don't like the way I'm being treated.
I haven't walked back on the Annenberg site in Beverly Hills
and all my walks through the city every day
just because it felt weird that I was being spied upon on their property.
So if somebody like me who's very aware that it's going on and everything is raising red flags in my brain,
not that there was anything wrong with them showing me what was going on at the theater
that night, if anything was actually potentially beneficial, but that doesn't mean that every brand
who's getting access to my information is acting in the same degree of benefit to me.
And so if you look at the way that systems with data go to the extreme,
if you start to watch how data is captured in China, for example,
and that your social standing can be altered by certain things that you do, which starts to alter
your privileges within the country and your ability to have access to various things within
the country. That to me, I think there's a dangerous curve there that needs to be looked at closely.
And so I think that this opportunity to allow the consumer to be their own agent of their information, I think is really, really important.
And I think you would also, in the Sizzle platform, we don't ask the consumer for their data until there's something that they genuinely want to do.
So you want to come in and explore and check this out and check that out, no problem.
out and check that out, no problem. But if you're ready to unlock an offer or launch an augmented
reality experience or talk to one of our synth humans or similar, then at that point, all we're
asking you for is your email. And as a consumer, you have a choice. We didn't illegally harvest it.
We didn't sneak away of making you give it to us upfront before you even knew that you wanted to.
And I think if you treat the consumer the way you yourself wish to be treated,
you're well on your way to having the ultimate combination
of business variables that will succeed.
So that's the flip side.
Right. Okay. Thank you so much, Brian.
And then how might regulations,
like there is GDPR here in Europe, future U.S. rules shape how this evolves?
Are you asking how the regulations are going to shape that? Is that the question?
Yes, yes, yes, yes, correct.
Oh, yeah. You've got governments all over the world that are looking at this now and they're much stronger about those choices in Europe than we are currently in the United States and everything is massively disparate over in Asia.
So on a territory by territory basis, you know, each nation state is sorting through this on
their own basis. What ends up transpiring is where the data is going to ultimately be leveraged regardless of acceptance.
So one of the big arguments that I've heard made against TikTok is that all of these videos are
shot and that all you have to do is assign AI to look at all the videos and all the things that
the Chinese government can learn about our country in what
seems like innocuously small, inconsequential bites, but collectively as one big giant snapshot
of the country can't be overlooked. So I'm not trying to demonize China to the contrary. I like
China quite a bit and they're on their way to becoming number one in the world as the leading technology platform and leading economic country in the world.
And we can't overlook that.
And in the United States, we're falling victim to choices that are being made out of the divide and conquer methodology that the people in power in this country are trying to use
to keep us divided.
And in the meantime, China is just going full speed forward, going into everything that
they want to do without funding foreign wars and without creating a dissent between their
two different factions in their society.
factions in their society. So they've got a big edge. Now they've got all the data on all their
So they've got a big edge.
users and that data is not owned by the users whatsoever. Does that make that infinitely more
negative and dangerous? Maybe, maybe not. There's upsides to it because you get all sorts of
benefits from it. There's downsides because depending upon how they
value or devalue the things that you're doing in your world, you can start to discover your
societal privileges being being curbed as a result of that. So there's a massive censorship component
to all of that. And I think that's why the the models that facilitate the consumer being their own agent of choice for their data couldn't be more important.
Does that make sense?
Makes a lot of sense to me, at least.
So I have one more question for you, Brian, and then I'm having a question for Sarah Ashley as well.
for you, Brian, and then I'm having a question
for Sarah Ashley as well.
So, Brian,
fast forward five years,
so let's say 2030,
what role do you see the metaphors
playing in everyday life?
Depends on whether humanity is still
alive. Wouldn't you start there?
Yeah.
If you
just Google
AI 2027 and start doing some reading about about what could potentially be in our future coming up.
And then it's not such a smiley face anymore. Then it's a wow, we really need to get our government and the Chinese government in league.
You know, otherwise we human beings are going to become pets for the AI and we won't have a role anymore.
That's part of why I'm spending such a big portion of my life studying AI every day and mastering everything that's new that changed, you know, the night before.
If you want to try and envision where things will be five years from now, I don't think that there's anybody on this phone
call that's genuinely capable of that. There was a time at Warner Brothers, it was in 1999,
and CNN was working on a documentary called 2020, a history of the future. And they gave me a 30
page brief so that we could start working on the promotion
of that project.
And I got four pages into that document and I had to put it down and I was so depressed.
I was, I just couldn't fathom that the world would be like that in 2020.
Flash forward, was the world like that in 2020?
Well, some of it was, some of it wasn't, you know, predictions are what they are but but the exponential nature of
the curve of ai hitting humanity can't be underestimated it's it's beyond the impact
of what the industrial revolution had on society and we could we could project and we could
prognosticate but i'd be willing to bet that even what i think the world
is going to be like in june of next year it's not going to be like that because it's just happening
so fast which is why i'm staying myopically entranced with with monitoring and watching
all of it for fear i become obsolete overnight so i agree with everything you say. And also the depressing side of all of that is
very real, especially if you know a lot about data and what this our current phase one version
of AI looks like right now is very surveillance based. And it's very much monetizing the consumer as you discussed.
I actually had held off on watching AI 2027 because of that. I was like, I don't need more depression in my life. I'm good.
But I watched it recently this weekend for the first time.
And I remember watching it and hearing at the end of the scenario,
everything they were talking about was correct for centralized AI and I remember thinking to myself
but by then we'll have geek and geek will show an entirely separate kind of model around own your
data structure and having AI have to check in and validate and have authentications and have those
permission structures be there which is entirely different than how the entire ai community
is thinking about data they're racing towards you know the monopolization of it and stephanie just
wrote a great article i don't think it's out yet so i don't think i can talk about it but everything
that's in it is accurate of what is happening at this humanity convergence of blockchain and AI. All of this is data.
All of this is really just exponentially evolved over the last 30 years.
Blockchain's been around for 20 years, you guys.
Like even before the Bitcoin white paper,
the government was using blockchain for cross-border transactions.
Where we are now at AI and the people who are in power for AI,
they're there because they understand data.
They understand what the consumer profile looks like.
And that's essentially the same structure that we use at Continuum,
but we go beyond GDPR, extreme data ownership,
all the way down to using the Geek Blockchain.
Robbie. Great. Robbie great yeah I had issues with the mic the button was
lagging again I was like oh I broke him
it's Elon
no thank you so much as well for pitching in
gig as well because like we're very excited to be a part of everything, really.
And the whole team is, and especially Stephanie as well,
so I'm really looking forward to that, actually.
Also, quick note, Brian has to run soon.
Should we let him go?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, Brian, thank you so much, Brian, for being here,
for being part of sharing your experience, sharing your insights.
I hope we're still all alive and kicking though in 2030 or 2027.
I hope we're still all alive and kicking, though, in 2030 or 2027.
Like,
I really want to thank you for joining us on the geek space.
Like for,
for the audience,
please give,
give Brian a follow,
look at his website,
look at what he's doing,
what he's up to.
I'm pretty sure your mind will be blown.
And looking forward for a next talk as well with you, Brian.
And then I hope you'll have a great day.
Thank you so much for having me.
I really appreciate the opportunity to share the thoughts.
And I'm an optimist by trade,
so I'm not trying to be Debbie Downer
by telling you about the variables about
AI, but I haven't worked on all of the Terminator franchise. I'm also very aware of, you know,
James Cameron is, is working on the next Terminator right now, and he's having trouble writing it
because the world is moving so fast. Finding his position as to how it relates to AI is in and of itself causing him consternation.
So more important than anything else,
people need to, they need to wake up
and be aware of the fact that this isn't just a toy.
This is one of the single biggest moments
in human evolution ever.
And if you're not aware that it's happening, it will,
or pretending like you could just let it slide by
is like hoping that the tsunami that's coming out to you could just dive underneath it like any wave at the beach and you'll come out on the other side.
You won't.
And that, yeah, that's that.
That's the other thing I wanted to bring up that we had touched on the other night was policy around all of this as well.
all of this as well. There's definitely, I believe, a need for that. And, you know, it's
There's there's definitely, I believe, a need for that.
no easy task, but I see that being the future, even, you know, PACs being started for this and
everything. I think that's where we're headed. I agree. And it is a tsunami. Thank you so much
for being here with us, Brian. We're going to keep going. We're going to stay, but I know you have to run off for a very important meeting and I'm very
excited. We'll catch up soon. All right. Thank you all. Nice to chat with you. Thank you, Brian.
Thanks for being here. Thanks, Brian.
So yeah, there's a lot of threads to pull on here and you know, I try and keep it light while
we're here at the, you know,
at the podcast microphone, but it is important that folks do understand there's dire consequences
for ignoring this. And I feel honored every day to be working with Sarah Ashley and bringing it to
the celebrities and the luxury brands and allowing them to understand what blockchain and AI is.
And I'm in this wonderful position
to give them the tools that we've curated at the continuum network to show
this is how you'd use it these are the ones that are safe these are the ones
that are enterprise ready safety will happen when the products go out in the
wild right hackers are a very big concern but the integrity of the
blockchain with geek the integrity of the data systems and the personas, that continuity that we talked about, we feel very confident that even if we were pulled in front of Congress, we'd be able to easily defend the business model, even though it's going to upset the big boys because we are taking the orange and flipping it inside out.
It is something the world has never seen before, and it will shake things up. Well, I think it's not only that too, Christina,
giving the power to the artists themselves as well hasn't been done. And that's been by design
through the music industry. So it's upsetting absolutely everything. But at the
same time, I believe it's also fixing things back into order as they should be. I kind
of feel like we're in Star Wars light versus dark and good and evil. And, you know, through
AI and everything that we have, we can direct it and make it where it, you know, protects
people, protects the artists, artists protects you know um legacy
and and that's what that's what we want to do is use it for good you know we we all know um about
you know all the the the dark side of the world like you know we were just talking about and in
the entertainment uh industry specifically so this believe, is a chance to really, you know, take the high road
and be able to protect those that have been taken advantage of.
And that's what I'm passionate about is, you know,
really having a safe space for the artists where they're going to make the most money.
And with all of this stuff automated, you know, it's going to put more money in their pockets as well.
So it'll be interesting to see that.
But definitely upsetting the industry in terms of cutting out a lot of, you know,
the teams and entourages for these artists as well.
But necessary, I believe.
Hey, I just build tech.
That's all I do.
No, I love it.
And we have so many shared philosophies on that subject that it really is all about data ownership.
Robbie, I'd love to break protocol here and invite Stephanie onto the stage.
She's been with us for a few kind of meet and greets as she's met Sarah Ashley and I know she has a few questions but also can help weave together the geek story through all of this.
Stephanie, we can't talk about certain things. I know you know, but just in terms of what it's going to mean to the artists and really helping Sarah Ashley be able to kind of tell her story.
Sarah Ashley is not a tech wizard,
but that's why she has me and bringing it all together is really a story about
geeks functionality and the own your data standards that Stephanie set.
I'd love to bring her up if we can.
Yeah.
I made her a speaker just a few seconds ago.
Stephanie?
Hi, Stephanie.
I've been so impressed.
I actually wasn't planning to speak, Christina and Robbie.
And thank you so much, Sarah Ashley, for being here.
for being here. I was just blown away. I think what I'd love to say is I'm not the only one
I was just blown away.
talking about person-first tech. These are people who are really well-known and important. You know,
I'm just me, but there is a, there's really a need and a pent-up demand.
And I keep saying this,
we are really reaching beyond
what anybody has thought about for blockchain.
And I'm so proud.
I'm so grateful that Sarah Ashley and Brian and Christina,
you brought some other people on in this past week who are passionate about flipping the economics.
And ultimately, you know, we're building cryptographic systems, but it's all about aligning the incentives so that the economics turn out all right,
so that we do protect people who are vulnerable.
And whether anybody likes it or not, that's just the way it's going to be. Every single person. And so I don't want to get up on my, I'll walk off my soapbox, but so happy to be in this conversation with you all. So feeling so lucky to work with you.
Oh, we love you so much. We wouldn't have all the own your data ecosystem if we didn't have
geek to be the blockchain as a database backbone of all of this. So AI is very centralized data.
LLMs is a big old bucket. SLMs are a big old bucket. Having the agentic interface and being
able to not move data, like literally just access it.
I don't think people understand what a big concept that is to be able to have kind of a giant shared database that people can't see everything in the database.
You can only see what you're authorized to see. And when you own your data, it's yours to own.
It's yours to do something with. When these celebrities get themselves scanned
and they get themselves AI twinned, right,
to be in the metaverse, that's their asset.
They can do other things with it, right?
The ownership of things, I think,
is gonna be a huge new conversation.
And Stephanie, I had a feeling
that you had some questions for Sarah Ashley because you know some things.
Sarah Ashley is not always comfortable talking about the tech, but the feeling of what it's doing for the celebrities.
I was hoping you might help me find some words in that so that she can kind of showcase the impact.
Sarah Ashley, I have had the privilege of being in calls with you for
several weeks now and I think that you're a genius to be bringing this to
not just one person but you're sort of starting a movement of awareness and actual between the two of you, Christina and you, of action.
And I would love to hear more about whether there is a feeling of empowerment.
Oh, absolutely.
You know, but I err on the side of Kanye West delususional in my life and i always have been that way so if
i think it it's put there for a reason it's because i'm supposed to do something with it now
i don't know how that is plays out usually but if i if it's in my head, it's there for a reason. And I honestly believe that.
Thought is real energy.
It has a starting point.
And that starting point, you know, to me is very important.
And so the intention and where it comes from and it winding up in my brain to then become a thing, that's where we're at.
to then become a thing that's where we're at so I I just go with my gut and what I think and what I
everything that I put together from the my experiences right so I see an artist and I know
that um they are totally getting ripped off they're totally getting taken advantage of they're
you know exhausted they're blah blah blah blah blah, blah, blah, and all this. So I
think of how, how can I fix that? And this fixes it on such a level that it is going to
revolutionize the, the whole industry, because where a lot of these artists have been, you know, treated this certain way.
Now they're going to have the power, right?
They're going to be able to be self-sufficient a lot, very self-sufficient.
Whereas before it took teams and, you know, labels and all of these things.
And now that's not really all that necessary, you know, to a degree, of course.
But so it's going to streamline a whole lot of things and simplify.
I believe once you, you know, you know, it's that fine line of taking the human element out of things and automating things,
out of things and automating things, you know, and that's where, you know, that's that sweet spot
that you have to protect and make sure that those governances are there and those, you know, the
laws, if you will, are there to protect on the other side of when this change happens. And,
you know, that's kind of where we're at as well so yeah it's it's
very forward thinking i think but it but it's it's here uh whether you know and so i'm excited um
about the project um it's it is it is uh it's it's bigger than i think we even can imagine
than I think we even can imagine.
One of the things that I really like about all of this
is that it's only automating the part that should be automated it's only saying you know when
you move data you should be able to know which one came from your favorite
musician and which one didn't I just I just think that's such a basic function
that we're missing right now you know know? And vice versa. If a star is having interactions,
I don't imagine they want to be interacting with bots.
You know, they want to know who is my verified fan
and we can do that now.
And I just don't think that has been possible before.
You're very right. Absolutely. And it's now everything can be tracked and monetized for
them in multiple ways. I think there's also a layer here. Stephanie, this question is for you.
And Sarah Ashley, I imagine you'll have a follow-up answer.
Stephanie, in your article that I got a sneak peek at,
you talked about data ownership as a sense of security,
that it was critical to mental health,
that we are actually so much more vulnerable than we think
we are. And this lack of security is detrimental to mental health. Can you expand a little bit
around that, especially, I think it touches on some of the things Sarah Ashley just said,
but in your own words, if you could share that with the audience, I think it's really on point
for what we're talking about today. Well, Christina, that's so close to my heart. So I think that uncertainty is crushing. And as
someone with an economics background, and there's been an internal debate about whether or not you should provide benefits in dollars or
whatever currency or
some kinds of services and a lot of people are against
Make transfers of dollars because I don't know they think they think
You're gonna go buy a bottle of wine instead of taking care of your basic needs. I don't happen to agree with that.
But the stress of just getting through the day and dealing with a lot of noise
is something that I know some people very close to me have a really difficult time.
So if that can be taken away, if you can just verify what the signals
are that you should pay attention to and strip away all the uncertainty, like, you know,
is that my bank who's emailing me about a potential fraud alert? Is that someone who's
supposed to be calling me? Am I supposed to, you know, give my social
security number at the doctor? And the answer is no. Just simplifying things so that everybody
is only doing the minimal intrusiveness because you have protected yourself, because you are able to protect yourself and I think being able to feel that efficacy of I can look out for myself because the system is working
with my incentives is so important it's it it just fights helplessness and I
could go on and on about this but none of us need that none of us need that at
a personal level.
So we should just flip the incentives.
Thank you so much.
Ms. Sarah Ashley, anything to add on mental health and data ownership?
to add on mental health and data ownership? Wow. You know, we didn't even talk about the
wellness space that I am in. I need to add that. So fashion, art, music, sports, entertainment,
and wellness. So I have a partnership with Dr. Mark Hyman's son, Misha Hyman. Dr. Mark Hyman's son, Misha Hyman.
Dr. Mark Hyman is the leading expert in wellness
and longevity and biohacking.
He is part of RFK's entourage.
You can check him out.
But his son, Misha, is who I'm partnered with,
and he's amazing and learned from the best.
And they are bringing me in as a wellness.
They're treating me.
I'm no spring chicken, so the longevity thing is appealing to me.
So I'm going through the paces and learning and doing the technology
right now. And so firsthand, I will be a test patient and we're going to be filming it. And
there's some exciting things I can't talk about, but it's very, very, very exciting. So
you guys will be seeing it soon. But yeah, so the wellness and mental health and everything, I've been sober since 2013.
And so I have been a sober coach and helped in that space independently for many years.
So I'm excited about this new venture as well. But the AI, you know, is everywhere.
I mean, that's where the current health system is completely broken. So don't get me started on that.
I mean, this is a whole thing. but I welcome AI in the space of healthcare, healthcare and wellness and mental health.
Absolutely. And I know we can't talk about things, but she's way more than a patient in this ecosystem.
We'll leave it at that. Robby, I'll turn it back over to you. I think you had a few more questions.
Yeah, I've got a question as well for Sarah Ashley.
FYI, I think it's very important, mental health,
all such things. And I think AI can play a big part in it as well.
So Sarah Ashley,
sorry. What advice would you give to creators, artists, entertainers who want to be early movers in building responsibility within the metaverse, for example?
Well, they could start by joining Continuum and getting this great network that is on the phone right now.
That makes a lot of sense.
I mean, honestly, that's why we're building what we're building.
That's it.
You know, this very authentically happened.
And it's because the intentions and ethos of Christina and I are very much the same.
And that is very simple to protect our people.
I was a philanthropist in my previous life for 26 years.
and when I started my agency three years ago, you know, I was able to leverage my networks
of people and it stemmed more from a personal relationship.
And so, you know, people do things for me that they won't do for other people and that's
how I have the favors and the things that I can do and the things that I can pull off. It's because
of the relationships that I have. So protecting those relationships is the most important thing
to me because that is what I have built absolutely everything my entire life on is just that. So however that needs to happen, you know, and how it's evolving and it's, you know,
joining up with the tech with Christina, it was just a perfect marriage and it makes total sense.
And, you know, I'm excited to be able to be in the forefront of really these initial conversations of talking about policy,
about all of this, because you think about all of the doctors right now that are using AI.
It's being used on a day-to-day basis. So we really need to make sure that what gets put out is right and that people are using
it correctly and that we harness it and keep those agencies safe for people because that's why we're
building this to begin with. So we've got to start really thinking about these things
and putting them into place now, however that looks like.
Right. I love what you said when you mentioned
it's very important to protect your people, your connections.
And to be honest, I wasn't really aware of the issue
that's going on right now in this topic for artists, entertainers.
And I'm sure you've been helping them a lot already over the years
because you know when people are getting ripped off and such.
And so with Continuum now as well,
which Geek is very happy to be a part of,
like, it's, like, might sound a bit altruistic,
but, like, we're going to do a lot of good things,
you know, for a lot of people.
So, yeah, very excited about it.
Absolutely.
At the end of the day, I mean, that is my goal. So let's do it.
Awesome. Awesome. Let's go. Yay.
Thank you, everybody that got on. I appreciate it very much. I'm not a tech person, so I was very anxious about this call.
So I appreciate you guys struggling through the last hour and 16 minutes of me talking tech.
Thank you so much, Sarah, actually, as well for being here.
I think a lot of people have learned more about what you do as well, who you are, your background a little bit as well for being here i think a lot of people have learned uh more about what what you
do as well who you are uh your background a little bit as well which is great um and i think we're
all very much in sync uh when it comes to data ownership uh when it comes to doing the right
thing uh you know so again like, I'm very excited.
Everyone's very excited.
And I want to thank everyone for joining in today, again,
for the space with co-hosting with Christina from Continuum.
There's a lot more stuff coming, guys.
So, make sure to follow everyone.
Engage.
Look what's going on because there's a lot of stuff coming.
And at the end of the day, the metaverse is still being built.
And today's conversation shows how critical data ownership will be
in defining whether it becomes a place of empowerment or exploitation.
But we know how this is going to go with Continuum and everyone in here anyway.
Yeah, no room for failure. We can do it. We can do it. how this is going to go with Continuum and everyone in here anyway. No room
for failure. We can do it.
We can do it.
Yes, we can.
Yes, we can.
Okay, thanks so much for having us.
Thank you so much, everyone.
Thank you, Christina.
Thank you, everyone.
Thank you, Stephanie, for coming in.
Bye-bye.
Have a great day.
See you. Bye-bye. Have a great day. See you. Bye-bye.
