By Laura Waxmann : sfchronicle – excerpt (audio)

OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman is on the cusp of expanding his artificial intelligence empire at the San Francisco waterfront.

Altman’s new startup, World — formerly known as Worldcoin — is close to leasing a chunk of office space in a newly constructed office building at Mission Rock, a brand-new mixed-use development spanning 28 acres at the waterfront that is co-owned by developer Tishman Speyer and the San Francisco Giants, according to individuals with insight into the deal…

The entire Mission Rock project calls for 1.4 million square feet of office and life science space and 1,000 apartments, but only the first phase has been completed.

If the deal closes, World, a cryptocurrency project that uses AI technology for iris scans to create a global identity network, would join a growing list of companies that have made a move to the project’s newly constructed office space: Visa took an entire 300,000-square-foot tower known as 300 Toni Stone Crossing, next to Oracle Park, after ditching its longtime downtown San Francisco headquarters. Tech firm Capgemini and the Golden State Warriors have also leased space at Mission Rock… (more)

The headlines do not tell the whole story any more than the new lease announcements do. There is no net gain in leased when the companies move out of their downtown offices into the next shiny new built 15 minute neighborhood. In this case it is Mission Bay. The neighborhood that was built for the medical professionals and students may not survive the onslaught of 24/7 business and entertainment, but, the transient techies will no doubt want to live there until they program their jobs out of existence.

You might want to tread carefully into Altman’s World, If you don’t want to be a part of his currency ID system described here… ” World, a cryptocurrency project that uses AI technology for iris scans to create a global identity network.”

Maybe just let the AI techs fight it out among themselves.