What Is FLock.io and How to Earn Points on FLock.io

How to Earn Points on FLock.io For Potential FML Airdrop

You can stake FLock's FML by delegating your FML to validators, and also interact with AI applications by chatting with explorers or contributing knowledge to the AI models. 

Key Takeaways

• FLock.io is a decentralized platform focusing on federated learning for Artificial Intelligence (AI) model training. 

• It was founded by Jiahao Sun, an Oxford alumni with a Master of Science in Computer Science, and has successfully raised $8 million in funding. 

• Ahead of its mainnet launch, interested users can participate in activities on the FLock testnet such as staking and interacting with AI applications. 

The AI Boom

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has taken the Internet by storm with many praising its usefulness in boosting productivity. The development of AI started taking off in the late 2010s but was still slow to reach everyday consumers. That is until the introduction of OpenAI’s GPT-3, and more importantly, ChatGPT. Many credit the tool for accelerating the AI boom as other companies raced to release their own language models like Gemini, PaLM, and LLaMA.

Despite AI’s increasing popularity with everyday users, the industry still has a lot of potential for growth. Current challenges include data acquisition, centralized control, data privacy, and meaningful contributions. 

Introducing FLock.io

FLock.io is a decentralized platform that aims to solve some of these challenges by creating an AI ecosystem promoting transparency, inclusivity, and trust. It is designed with federated learning at the forefront – a method of training AI models without anyone seeing or touching your data. 

FLock’s approach enhances data security and privacy by taking advantage of blockchain technology to distribute the training process across several nodes. As a result, there is no single entity that is in control or is able to manipulate the process.

The AI training platform aims to support a wide range of applications by developing models for various sectors like finance, healthcare, and gaming. The specialized AI models can also be applied to blockchain applications including performing due diligence, investment analysis, operational support, and more. 

FLock also contributes to decentralized AI by getting involved in academic research and is the only AI project to receive an academic grant from the Ethereum Foundation in 2024. On top of that, the FLock team is the first and only Web3 project that was invited to present about decentralized AI at the Royal Society. This institution is the oldest scientific academy in continuous existence and has seen the works of Sir Issac Newton, Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, and more. 

Leading the team at FLock is founder and CEO, Jiahao Sun, who received a Master of Science in Computer Science from the University of Oxford. Some of his previous roles include Director of AI for the Royal Bank of Canada and an AI Research Fellow at Imperial College London. 

On March 28, 2024, FLock announced that they had successfully raised $6 million in seed funding. The round was led by Lightspeed Faction and Tagus Capital with participation from DCG, OKX Ventures, and Volt Capital. Jiahao Sun informed The Block that the seed round brings FLock’s total funding to $8 million and will be used to grow the team and further develop the platform.

What FLock Is Building

Within FLock there are three key products – AI Arena, FL Alliance, and AI Marketplace. AI Arena is meant to provide a collaborative environment for users to propose and participate in AI model training tasks. Meanwhile, the FL Alliance fosters partnerships within the AI ecosystem by empowering various stakeholders such as AI engineers, compute providers, and data owners to collaborate. 

The AI Marketplace will be a platform for developers to showcase their AI models and services while data providers can find models that suit their needs. All three products will work together to facilitate the entire lifecycle of AI model development and foster a community-driven collaborative ecosystem.

FLock’s Token System

FLock will employ a token system that rewards participants and encourages active involvement in model training and development. The system is centered around its native token, FML, which will be used for staking, as contribution rewards, and more. 

In anticipation of FLock’s mainnet launch, interested users can now interact with FLock’s testnet and participate in various activities to earn points. Do take note that the FLock team has not made any official announcements on when the token airdrop will take place or the specific requirements to qualify. Therefore, following the steps below and participating in FLock’s testnet does not guarantee a future token airdrop allocation. 

Step 1: Connect Wallet and Get FML

Go to https://train.flock.io/stake-to-earn and Connect Wallet in the top right corner. 

There are a few wallet options available from but in this guide we will proceed with the OKX wallet. Agree to the terms of use and choose your preferred wallet.

Documents by FLock state that your wallet needs to hold at least 0.002 ETH either on ETH mainnet or Base mainnet for a few days to proceed. However, we found that we were unable to proceed until there was at least 0.02 ETH in our wallet. 

Therefore we do suggest that you have at least 0.02 ETH either on ETH mainnet or Base mainnet for a few days. 

After connecting your wallet, Please verify your identity first to get your FML token.

You can choose to verify your account through Github or Twitter. Having a Github account will allow you to participate as either a Training Node or Validator. However, this guide will assume that you are not a developer with a Github and proceed with the Twitter Account Verification.

If you do have an active Github account, we recommend checking out the Training Node and Validator guide to see how else you can participate.

Training Node Guide: https://docs.flock.io/flock-products/ai-arena/quickstart/training-node-guide

Validator Guide: https://docs.flock.io/flock-products/ai-arena/quickstart/validator-guide 

Once your Twitter Account is connected, Follow @flock_io and make sure to Verify when done to receive 1 FML.  

Step 2: Get ETH on Base Sepolia

To pay for transaction fees on FLock, you will need ETH on Base Sepolia. 

Head over to https://faucet.quicknode.com/base/sepolia and paste your wallet address.

There are three options to claim your ETH. You can sign up or log in to your QuickNode account for a 4x bonus, share a tweet to get a 2x bonus, or just claim 0.05 ETH. 

Either option will provide you with enough ETH to carry out the following step. 

Step 3: Delegate FML

Back on https://train.flock.io/stake-to-earn you can choose any wallet from the list to delegate your stake to.

Then input the amount of FML to stake, Approve FML, and Confirm the transaction in your wallet.

Step 4: Earn More Points

Go https://beta.flock.io/ to interact with the FLock model ecosystem and earn points.  

Connect Wallet in the top right corner. Be sure to use the same wallet as the one you staked with. 

Connecting your wallet will automatically earn you 60 points. In the top menu, go to Earn Points to see the other ways that you can earn points. 

In the Task Center, you can proceed to complete each task listed down. For example, Connecting your Discord account will earn you 60 points. 

The social tasks are fairly straightforward and FLock will direct you to the correct link to proceed with each one. 

At the bottom of the list, you will also find your referral code to invite others. 

Below that are the tasks that earn you 200 Points by having you interact with the AI models.

At the time of writing, one of the tasks was to chat with the Bitcoin GPT. Here, you can ask questions to test out the chat function.

Other than that, you can Contribute to Bitcoin GPT by uploading files, inputting data, or pasting links to relevant information sources on Bitcoin. 

In this example, we submitted the CoinGecko article on the Top Bitcoin Mining Companies.

Conclusion

In the face of challenges that many AI models are facing, FLock is working towards a decentralized solution. The platform focuses on federated learning and utilizes blockchain technology to expand AI model training. With the platform’s mainnet launch soon to happen, users can now participate in activities on the FLock testnet to earn points.

Do note that airdrop farming is highly speculative, and following the above steps is no guarantee of an airdrop allocation. As always, do your own research before connecting your wallet to any protocol, and ideally use a separate wallet when airdrop farming to reduce risks.