Last month Vana teamed up with MIT Media Lab and Imagination in Action to host the MIT Decentralized AI: Internet of Agents Summit in Cambridge, MA. The three-day summit brought together hundreds of leading researchers and startups exploring intelligent, network-based approaches to improve collaboration, incentives, and innovation at the frontier of AI technology.
The Summit also launched the MIT Media Lab’s NANDA (Networked AI Agents in Decentralized Architecture) project - which aims to create a stack for AI agents to collaborate across decentralized architecture.
Sessions ranged from technical deep dives and research presentations to interactive workshops, startup showcases, and strategic discussions exploring the future of decentralized data markets and agent-based AI systems.
Vana’s Creator Anna Kazlauskas took center stage at the Summit. Read on for a summary of her remarks and links to video recordings:
Data Markets and the Future of AI
Kicking off the Summit on Monday April 14, Vana Creator Anna Kazlauskas sat down with Shannon Wells of the Vana Foundation for a fireside chat on the future of decentralized data markets.
Their conversation explored critical themes including why data sovereignty matters more than ever in the AI era, how data ownership unlocks new and more efficient market structures, and the opportunities to build better AI models with user-owned data. They also discussed what's next for Vana and how builders can get involved in this emerging ecosystem.
Watch this fireside conversation about AI's future
Industry Panel: "The Beginning of the New Era - Internet of AI Agents"
On Tuesday Anna joined MIT’s Ramesh Raskar as a panelist with other AI pioneers to explore how we move from today’s siloed, centralized “bots” to a true web of autonomous, trustworthy AI agents.
- Dave Blundin, Link Ventures
- Aditya Challapally, Microsoft
- Anil Sharma, Tata Consultancy Services COIN
Anna shared that, as AI accelerates at an unprecedented pace, access to high-quality private data has emerged as the solution to today's AI data scarcity challenge and as the critical differentiator for tomorrow's AI innovations.
Listen to the full panel discussion
Showcasing Vana's Vision
On the second day, Vana Creator Anna Kazlauskas delivered a compelling overview of recent protocol upgrades during her lightning talk "Vana: An Open Protocol for Data Sovereignty." Her talk highlighted how these advancements unlock new possibilities for a more efficient, innovative, and inclusive AI economy.
Watch Anna's lightning talk:
Builder Workshop
The summit featured a hands-on Vana Builder Workshop led by Anna Kazlauskas, designed specifically for students, developers, data scientists, AI/ML engineers, and product leaders. Participants gained valuable insights into how Vana is building infrastructure to put users back in control of their data and how to harness the power of user-owned data on the Vana network to build next-generation AI tools and applications.
Join the Data Revolution
Vana's collective approach to pooling high-quality user-owned data creates limitless opportunities for more distributed value creation and rewards in a decentralized AI data economy.
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