Get on the Train

 

Hello Zentaurios!!!

 It's been too long. I have neglected my writings. I am soon to be publishing my book of journals of the first year behind the scenes of Onboard60 and Me. I have focused on the Metaverse and more. Please forgive me and read on, it's time to get on the train.

I think the last time I wrote this was the middle of September. Rosh Hashana, Yom Kipper, and my birthday have all passed. I am now officially old, I am 63. It’s time to focus. 

The news around the world is disturbing. Our government is using arbitrary and capricious excuses to reject Bitcoin ETF applications. They keep pushing the deadline further to the next month, every time the deadline arrives.

I wonder what’s really going on. So much misinformation. The articles and news stories seem to continue to be against cryptocurrency. However, large financial institutions are buying it up and making portfolios for their clients. Grayscale has had a Bitcoin Trust for a while but was denied the conversion into an ETF. It doesn’t make sense unless the government wants their percentage, their control of the pie.

What does make sense is the fear of not being in power, control, fear of where is our salary going to come from. Taxation pays for their salaries. If we are paying people directly and there are no taxes, no third party to take fees, no money funneling into the government, what then?

I don’t believe we are going to get rid of the dollar anytime soon. There have been rumblings of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC) that governments control. CBDC can be monitored, and tracked. Something people may not realize but so can cryptocurrency.

Using a KYC from a centralized exchange? That’s how the government found stolen cryptocurrency. There have been many people on X formerly known as Twitter and other platforms encouraging others to get their cryptocurrency off centralized exchanges.

The point is centralization will always be controlled by someone else, not you. You won’t have control over your finances. You will be subjected to paying third-party fees, needing approval to make big purchases, and your money being used for banks to make theirs.

The reason the saying “cash is king” is so popular is that for those who want to use only cash, there are no records, no paper trail, no taxes, and no fees. Total control over their money by keeping it under the mattress. No government in their business is what they say.

I have a customer who comes into the restaurant where I work like clockwork. He makes a large $300 to-go order, and leaves whoever serves him $100. He pays cash. We are a cashless restaurant. We don’t accept cash, but his cash is king. The manager will allow people to pay with cash but rarely. He is one of the exceptions.

Covid accelerated digital types of transactions. At our restaurant, we have a QR code people can use to pay with. The misnomer that handling cash was a risk to your health made this possible. Yes, cash is dirty, being passed around who knows where, but from what I understand there is more cocaine residue on bills than covid germs. At least that was going around for years.

Digital communications and digital finance practices have been around for many years. They were magnified over the past three. The people in power have taken this opportunity to rewrite regulations and create new ones.

Transparency is not a skill the government practices. Decentralization is transparent and not controlled by one organization or a few powerful people. Decentralization takes the delegation of power from a central authority like the government and disperses it out to many entities. Decentralization empowers multiple participants to manage a network, a business, even a government.

It's more of a bottom-up approach to running an organization where authority is delegated. They are empowered to manage and contribute to the organization.

The point I’m making is to stay informed, it’s your money,  your livelihood, and your future.

Let’s talk about Artificial Intelligence tools. I say tools because that’s what they are. There are a plethora of “GPTs” to choose from for anything you need. There are software programs that can remember you, be familiar with your style of work, your conversation style, familiar with past tasks. “GPTs” are about efficiency. The time you save from using them is astronomical.

One example is for professional emails in your business. Our Banquet Manager at work who does many emails a day says ChatGPT4 allows him to be more productive, lets him spend more time with potential private event makers.

  Another is writing quality newsletters. I know people who put their ideas and subjects into a “GPT” software program and ask for it to write a certain number of words in a certain style. I have done my ServerSamm60 tips and tricks with it for quite some time. I have been doing free weekly tips for food servers for over a year; I was having a hard time coming up with tips to give them. I used it as an example once for my newsletter on Substack and posted a conversation I had with Bing.

I know people who have used these “GPTs” to write a business document for them, a How-To eBook, marketing advertisements and so much more.

My go-to is Claude2 because of the familiarity that builds in time and can seem like having a conversation with an old friend. The style of the output is like mine and even how I am in conversation seems to come through now. I’ve used Perplexity mostly for tips and tricks and some generated ideas for articles and video content.

Artificial tools used in art are spectacular. It is all in the prompting. Artists input their ideas, their vision until they receive the image they desire. I use different art apps that use artificial tools to restyle a picture, and reconfigure a drawing. There’s Dalle-2, MidJourney and the Adobe ones (PhotoLeap, MotionLeap) and a few more. I use Storyz, MidJourney, ReStyle, and the Adobes.

Artificial tools in healthcare. In healthcare, you have virtual assistants, different prognoses software (as in preemptive, can generate what could happen if you continue down the health habits or bad health habits), and smart technology. Smart technology is the Ring I have on my finger. It has a NFC chip (near field communication) that computes my heart rate, oxygen level, stress level, activity level, and sleep patterns. Imagine you are in a hospital where they are taking your vitals all hours of the day and night multiple times in a 24 hour period and you have an NFC chip wristband connected to an app on their phone that once tapped sends accurate information back to their records.

I only talked about a few examples that Artificial Intelligence tools are being used and will be used in the near future. I think it useful to understand, and be informed of what’s happening and will be happening. 

Let’s talk Metaverse, the all-encompassing buzzword that’s thrown around for Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Extended Reality. I have written about Roblox before and how generations are brought up in these “worlds” they create.

There is now digital twinning, an exact replica in 3D that you can immerse yourself in as your office from work, college class, a business workshop, or a meeting.

Imagine becoming a doctor and while in school using virtual reality to learn how to perform a procedure. The firefighter learning virtually. Experiencing the sensation of running into a fire without running into a fire. Experiencing heightened emotions, and anxiety too.

Travel using Virtual Reality, feel like you are swimming with dolphins, walking up the Eiffel Tower, and more.

Picture yourself in an empty room. There is a television on the wall with a console underneath. You put on a headset and are immersed in a completely different environment, but you still have the television and console in your view. That is Augmented Reality. Also, there are three types of Augmented Reality. Augmented Reality on markers; for images, location-based (with GPS), and surface based called world tracking.

Extended Reality is, you guessed it, a combination of artificial and real environments. It is intended to combine or mirror the physical world with a “digital twin world” able to interact with it.

 

I wanted to update you on not only what’s happening with technology, cryptocurrency, and the world but also what Onboard60 is embarking on. I have entered the world of Spatial and Oncyber.

On Spatial, I created the Onboard60 Auditorium, a virtual space, where I have live chats, expert speakers, and travel portals (spaces of different environments).  Travel portals enable experiential learning. If you are new to this technology, using the controls to walk and move about can be somewhat difficult. I spent 4 hours in a chair because I didn’t know how to optimize the controls. A friend graciously took me on an experience of a lifetime through travel portals, allowing me to experience Spatial and get me to where I am today.

I’ve also created the Onboard60 Gallery on Spatial. It’s the place where we have social meetups, Onboard60 members display their art and NFTs. A networking space to make long-lasting connections.

On Oncyber, I created a space of my photos, AI art and NFTs with videos introducing people to the Metaverse and more. I have pertinent questions displayed for the purposes of research and self-education. I also answer What is an NFT.

 

 

I touched upon monetary systems, GPTs, AI tools and the Metaverse. I do see this as what reality may look like soon. People are already acclimating and adapting, just like we did when the internet came into our homes. It’s just a matter of time and we all know time doesn’t stand still, it moves forward, as we should.

It is useful to take a moment or two, maybe five minutes a day to learn one or some of these tools for your future. I started with five minutes a day and I am here. You can be here too, you are worth five minutes a day.

 

Thank you for reading and

Be Fabulous,

Sandra Abrams

Onboard60

Get the Web3 1101 eBook in my Stan Store

 https://stan.store/onboard60