As artificial intelligence (AI) saw a major comeback with the launch of ChatGPT and other chatbots, the technology has continued to expand rapidly, one of the most significant developments being the ability to buy, sell, and hold cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC).
Indeed, software development firm Lightning Labs has recently unveiled a set of developer tools that allow AI models like those in OpenAI’s GPT series to send and receive Bitcoin on the crypto asset’s Lightning Network, according to the company’s announcement shared on July 6.
According to the company’s tweet announcing the launch, the goal of efforts such as this one is to bring AI technology closer to the masses:
“Using L402, a standard for API authentication with LN payments, and LangChain, a simplified AI app framework, we are opening up AI for All!”
💥 BREAKING: ChatGPT now has a plug-in that can send Bitcoin Payments!
— Mister Crypto (@misterrcrypto) July 7, 2023
pic.twitter.com/CtQqzMr1Ut
What the toolkit does
As the Lightning Labs’ team explained, this toolkit aims to “enable the Lightning and AI developer communities to build global, inclusive, and out-of-the-box cost-effective LLM (Large Language Model) tooling which seamlessly incorporates Lightning and Bitcoin.”
Indeed, ChatGPT is an example of an LLM, which refers to software trainable on large data sets and able to generate human-like responses to user prompts. However, according to the company, one of the major issues with current LLMs remains the lack of a native internet-based payment mechanism they could use.
Due to this problem, they have to use less-than-ideal payment methods like credit cards, in which the end users bear the costs and which, in turn, restricts the use cases and limits general access to AI technology. Therefore, the company’s objective is to address this issue using Bitcoin’s Lightning Network.
“We’re extremely excited about the new wave of innovation brought about with the latest wave of LLM models. With the L402 protocol and LangChainBitcoin, we’re able to ensure the open models can be accessed using an open payment system connected to the world’s set of open APIs.”
Meanwhile, Bitcoin was at press time changing hands at the price of $30,225, having lost 1.26% to its value in the last 24 hours and declining 2.67% across the previous seven days but still clinging to the 12.70% gain on its monthly chart, as per the latest information retrieved on July 7.
