[World Expo] Yoichi Ochiai depicts the cutting-edge of 2025 at the Expo──a digital copy that you own becomes your personal AI [2025 New Year Special] (Repost) | CoinDesk JAPAN

This article was published on January 6th. It has been reposted to coincide with the World Expo.

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The theme of “Designing a Future Society Where Life Shines” will be the focus of “EXPO 2025” (2025 World Expo in Japan) starting in April. In the center of the venue for the international expo, which is being held in Japan for the first time in 20 years, there will be eight “Signature Pavilions” created by eight producers. One of them, “null²,” is produced by Yoichi Ochiai.

“null²” is described by Mr. Ochiai as “an architecture that combines both the physical and digital boundaries, symbolizing digital nature.” What is the intention behind it? Also, what is the digital human-type ID foundation “Mirrored Body®” that cannot be replicated or substituted using cutting-edge blockchain/AI technology? In the year since April 2020, Mr. Ochiai envisioned what 2025 would look like, aiming for the cutting-edge pavilion that could barely be realized.

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Looking Ahead to the Cutting Edge Five Years Later in 2020

! [“null²” exterior image: ©2024 Yoichi Ochiai / Design: NOIZ / Sustainable Pavilion 2025 Inc. All Rights Reserved.]**── The Expo’s signature pavilion “null²” features a building with moving mirrors and a digital copy of yourself, “MirroredBody®”. What did you want to convey to the audience? **

Mr. Ochiai: I became the producer of the Expo in July 2020. From there, I had to finalize the plans within a year. It was quite a challenge to decide on something promising for 2025 from 2020 to 2021, but since I was creating works with mirrors as installations, I initially wanted to use mirrors as a motif.

Furthermore, I thought it would be interesting to create a digital mirror as well, making a “complementary mirror” of a physical mirror and a digital one. The exterior would be something like a mirror sculpture, while the interior would be a digital mirror that allows for dialogue with oneself. That was in 2020.

I have been researching LLMs (Large Language Models) since around the time GPT2 was released (2019), and I have been working on generative AI since around 2015 when GANs (Generative Adversarial Networks, a type of AI algorithm) emerged. Additionally, my background is in computer graphics, and I was creating digital humans by scanning people and using computer graphics.

Attempts at digital humans have been common for a long time, and it was around 2020 that we finally seemed to be able to cross the “uncanny valley” (when a robot looks close to a human, humans like it, but at some point it feels creepy). When I thought about 2020 to 2025, I thought that I would be able to create a digital copy of myself that I could talk to and interact with.

It is difficult to predict technology five years ahead, but fortunately, I have been writing papers in the necessary field. What I thought might be barely difficult in 2025 has now come to the point where I wonder, “Can I really do it?”

──Considering the risk of not making it on time, perhaps it wasn’t necessary to aim for the last minute.

Mr. Ochiai: The World Expo needs to show the best things at the best timing. It’s difficult to avoid it becoming “a cold pizza.” For example, humanoids (humanoid robots) will evolve tremendously by 2025. Tesla’s “Optimus” is already walking around in the world. Technology is catching up. We imagined interesting things that could just barely be shown in 2020 and were able to realize them quite accurately. I hope we can make it a little better.

The intonation in the conversation is still a bit weak. The voice is fine, but it’s difficult to speak with that person’s unique intonation. It’s almost there.

──If visitors speak on the spot, do you immediately capture and reproduce the voice information on the spot?

Mr. Ochiai: Yes. In addition, it is also significant that scanning can now be done with a single smartphone for visitors. You can create a digital human simply by placing a visitor’s smartphone on a special stand and scanning it. We already have a device that uses about 60 scanners, but considering the time required for the work and the weight of the data, it is difficult to do it every day for dozens of people. You might be able to do it with 10 of them, but that’s the end of the pavilion. Some of the elements worked as expected, and I feel like I’ve arrived safely.

──At my previous company, we were involved in human 3D scanning services around 2014. We lined up about four scanners vertically, placed a person on a platform, rotated them for about a minute to scan, and then 3D printed it.

Mr. Ochiai: Nowadays, with just one smartphone, the data is not coarse either. The reason why what can be done with just one smartphone is significant is that in the coming era, it is important for users to hold their own data.

Furthermore, regarding data, it is important to securely store your MirroredBody®︎, which is a copy of yourself in digital form, and this leads to the utilization of blockchain. I have always been interested in blockchain itself, I even wrote papers on it, and there was a section called “WEEKLY BITCOIN” in NewsPicks’ “WEEKLY OCHIAI” that started in 2017. Personally, I receive wedding gifts in Bitcoin.

It is important to securely store your data, and if you are creating a MirroredBody®︎, the wallet becomes crucial. I also believe that how to store it in a way that others cannot copy is important.

On the other hand, for the exterior of the pavilion, I considered using mirrors, specifically moving mirrors. To achieve this, it was necessary to create a moving material, which took about three years to develop. I believe that everything realized could only be made possible at the Expo.

Manage Your Own Data

──In Web3, it becomes essential for individuals to manage their own data. However, such new ways of thinking and new technologies are often difficult for society to accept. I thought that by 2024, Web3 would spread a bit more in the world, but it is struggling. What are your thoughts on the current state of Web3 / blockchain?

Ochiai: I think there has been an increase in the number of things that don’t have to be Web3. I think there are things that can only be done in Web3, but we don’t see them yet. There are many things that can only be done in a decentralized way, but how much do you want to do even if you are willing to pay for it?

This brings us to digital humans, and ultimately, I want to keep my personal information within my surroundings. It’s interesting to think about how much data is managed by the country, how much is managed by companies, and how much is managed by individuals. In fact, I think the amount of data managed by the country is not very large. They can only store text data, and they probably won’t include data like CT scans. The data held by companies, such as the data stored by Google, is quite substantial. However, I have a 60 terabyte online storage contract, but such people are rare. The storage capacity I have at home is larger. In other words, the personal data held by individuals is likely to be greater than the data managed by companies.

When considering how to create a system where individuals hold their own data, the most important data is that which is linked to oneself, the most representative of which is oneself as a digital human. I have been thinking about how to manage that for a long time.

In addition, the data on the Internet is already depleted in terms of machine learning, and AI has almost learned the data that it can learn. What will come out of this is data that is not on the Internet, that is, data that is not online. As for who has it now, individuals have it.

How to manage and utilize such data, and how to condense it into a copy of oneself in the digital realm, will become increasingly important in the future. Furthermore, from the perspective of economic security and geopolitical conditions, I am considering whether it is possible to retain Japanese data within Japan, or to store data within my digital human.

──Many people may still not realize the importance of managing their own data.

Mr. Ochiai: I think things will change once we start gathering data. For example, if I input what I am going to buy next on Amazon into my digital human, I believe it will predict it accurately. There is a mountain of data that many people do not recognize as important. How can we link that data to our own devices, to our own accounts, as our own?

──As an example, this may be a bit of a digression, but once you start to custody your own crypto assets, it may become easier to hold that kind of image.

Mr. Ochiai: That may be true, but I still don’t know. Cryptocurrencies will eventually be held by many people. However, even if Bitcoin is considered “digital gold,” just like there aren’t many people who actually hold gold bars, I don’t think Bitcoin will rapidly gain popularity. There is currently no clear use case for it.

──What do you think about the proliferation of digital humans?

Mr. Ochiai: I believe it will become widespread. This is because it shares the same worldview as the My Number card. MirroredBody®︎ has been adopted this fiscal year for the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry’s PHR verification project (Fiscal Year 2023 Supplementary PHR Social Implementation Acceleration Project. PHR: Personal Health Record. Managing and utilizing one’s own health data). The World Expo is also a venue to widely showcase this project. The number of My Number cards issued has surpassed 100 million. If all sorts of information are linked to the My Number card, it may eventually start to “speak”.

The information linked to the My Number Card alone is still not sufficient for a digital human to speak, but the My Number Card is connected to important data such as medical data and health data, which means that a digital representation of myself, who knows myself well, should exist.

[Image of using MirroredBody®︎: ©2024 Yoichi Ochiai / Sustainable Pavilion 2025 Inc. All Rights Reserved.]──Will we start consulting about what to buy next with our digital selves on a daily basis?

Mr. Ochiai: My copy may have become my own AI, and while I might not have many conversations with it, it will likely talk to others on my behalf.

──It feels like the “Knowledge Navigator” that Apple proposed long ago is finally coming to fruition.

Mr. Ochiai: ChatGPT is quite like a knowledge navigator, but the point is not on the AI side; it’s about me, who has the AI, managing my own data myself. Continuing to converse with the AI means that my digital copy is being created there, and how to input the information is crucial.

──Will my local storage be the place to hold my data?

Mr. Ochiai: Ideally, I would like to have encrypted data online and in a decentralized manner, but there are still operational issues, and a long-term perspective is necessary. Currently, the decentralized file system IPFS incurs quite a bit of gas fees for storage and operates slowly. There are still technical hurdles to overcome.

In 2025, AI will be smarter than most of humanity.

──What changes do you think the world or Japan will undergo in 2025 and beyond?

Mr. Ochiai: The advancement of AI is extremely fast, and what can be done is likely expanding every day. However, there are people who feel that it hasn’t expanded much. I think that’s the point. In reality, everyone should be quite excellent as programmers, but most people don’t write programs, and there aren’t many who build blockchains themselves. The way we face AI has created a significant gap in the world. We should be able to start doing all sorts of things.

──It is proposed that “Digital Nature” is an expanded nature born from calculation. When Digital Nature spreads and AI permeates, how will our lives change?

Mr. Ochiai: The concept of Digital Nature is that when nature becomes a computer and the computer becomes nature, and when these two become inseparable, a new nature emerges. It has been proposed for about 10 years now. Currently, in the research field, experiments are being automated using generative AI, and the virtual and physical verification processes are connected by AI. What occurs physically and the results of computations are gradually merging, making it difficult to distinguish between the physical and the virtual, and we are getting quite close to Digital Nature.

What is unclear is whether the heliocentric theory and the geocentric theory change one’s worldview to that extent. Many people did not believe that the Earth revolves around the Sun, but the heliocentric theory was correct.

──In the industrial sector, it might be similar to the use of “digital twins” (reproducing a copy of the real world digitally).

Mr. Ochiai: I think it’s easy to understand if you imagine that digital twins are moving at super high speed in the context of digital nature. In our lab, we are collaborating with major telecommunications manufacturers and automobile manufacturers. Everyone is generally conducting research with the assumption of around 2030.

──What kind of world will it be in 2030?

Mr. Ochiai: Everything will become easier to create from scratch. An image filled with such intelligence. Many people say that as the number of tasks that computers can handle increases, the value of human intelligence decreases.

──What should humans do at that time?

Mr. Ochiai: There are people who make good things, so I think the value of sense will increase. It is a long training process that determines the sense, and it is also important to make an effort to continue output. This is because if there is no trace left on the Internet, it will not enter the AI. It is important for your information to be accumulated in AI.

By the end of 2025, most problems will be solvable by AI. ChatGPT-4 was released in April 2023, and about a year and a half later, in September 2024, ChatGPT o1-preview was launched. In one and a half years, the amount of data input into AI has quadrupled, and it is currently trained to an IQ of about 130. With reasoning abilities of around IQ 150 and intelligence connected to the internet, it will be able to solve most problems. It will be smarter than most humans. The question is, will it take a year or six months to reach 150? How long will it take?

──A message for those attending the Osaka-Kansai Expo.

Mr. Ochiai: Please come and have fun. The World Expo is like a festival that gathers museums from all over the world. The physical and mysterious experiences will eventually create a lifetime pass, so I hope you can see the wonders and use it as an opportunity to think about your future life.

Yoichi Ochiai is a media artist. Born in 1987, he graduated from the doctoral program of the Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, the University of Tokyo (the first early completion of the Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies), earning a PhD (Interdisciplinary Information Studies). He is the director of the Digital Nature Development Research Center at the University of Tsukuba, an associate professor, and the research representative for the JST CREST xDiversity project. From 2017 to 2019, he served as an assistant to the president of Tsukuba University, and since 2018, he has been a member of the Intellectual Property Strategy Vision Expert Council of the Cabinet Office, a member of the Visionary Council for the Cabinet Office’s ‘Moonshot-type Research and Development System,’ and a producer for the theme project of the Osaka-Kansai Expo, among other roles. His specialty is exploring applied fields using HCI and intelligent technology. He perceives media art as the vernacular craft of computational nature and continues to transcend the boundaries of research and artistic activities with a statement of ‘The materializing computer confronts nature, ruminating on the yearnings and emotions that lie between mass and image,’ pursuing exploration and expression.

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