Pokémon Go has been quietly harvesting participant information to coach AI

Key Takeaways

Niantic is growing a “Giant Geospatial Mannequin” (LGM) from information collected by gamers in its video games like Pokémon Go.
The mannequin learns from scans utilizing a Visible Place System (VPS), which may use a single picture to find out its place on a 3D map.
It is unclear how lengthy Niantic has been gathering this location information for.

Do you keep in mind taking part in Pokémon Go again within the day and all the encompassing hype? All of the enjoyable adventures of catching Pokémon round your neighborhood with family and friends? Niantic definitely does.

Niantic is the developer behind Pokémon Go, and it has recently announced that it is constructing a brand new “Giant Geospatial Mannequin” (LGM) utilizing thousands and thousands of scans taken by Pokémon Go gamers on their smartphones (through IGN). How does the LGM be taught from these scans? Nicely, that is because of Niantic’s new Visible Positioning System (VPS).

“Over the previous 5 years, Niantic has centered on constructing our Visible Positioning System (VPS), which makes use of a single picture from a telephone to find out its place and orientation utilizing a 3D map constructed from folks scanning fascinating areas in our video games and Scaniverse,” Niantic stated in a press release.

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How does Niantic’s LMG work precisely?

Numerous information and many coaching

You have probably heard of a giant language mannequin (LLM) mannequin earlier than, like ChatGPT for instance. Its AI mannequin is educated on huge quantities of current textual content so it might probably produce fairly regular sounding and coherent textual content when the person prompts it to. An LGM operates equally. It is educated on what actual world locations appear to be, comparable to a church or park, and might use that information to supply data on locations it hasn’t seen but. Niantic says the LGM will assist computer systems understand and work together with bodily areas in new methods, and can be utilized in AR glasses, robotics, content material creation, and autonomous programs.

So how does Niantic get all this location information? Nicely, its video games, after all. Pokémon Go remains to be a well-liked cellular sport, and it has customers touring and pointing their telephone at locations making an attempt to catch Pokémon. These location scans get despatched again to Niantic, although its unclear how lengthy it has been gathering them for. The benefit of Niantic’s Pokémon Go is that it will get location information different companies like Google Maps cannot.

To map out and create areas with AI, you want extra than simply the attitude of a automotive on the highway. You want the attitude of a pedestrian at road degree taking a look at locations and seeing various things, and that is precisely what Pokémon Go gamers unwittingly ship. I have never performed Pokémon Go in years, nevertheless it’s wild to assume I’ll have contributed my very own information to creating an AI product like this. I suppose the phrases of service I did not learn had loads in it.