evidence: Sam Altman wants to give every person on the planet free money—or rather free cryptocurrency. It’s a lofty goal that commands a lofty name: Worldcoin. Cofounded by Altman earlier this year, the project has raised $25 million to date from grandees such as Andreessen Horowitz and Coinbase Ventures. It’s part crypto buzz, part financial inclusion dream—and Altman believes that by piggybacking on the network effect of doling out a bit of the pie to every single human on Earth, WorldCoin could evolve into a global, fairly distributed electronic currency. Altman, who runs the AI research outfit OpenAI and used to be the CEO of Silicon Valley accelerator Y Combinator, says the concept is untested. "A lot of elementary school kids have thought that [to give free money to everyone] is a good idea," Altman says. "But as far as I know, there have been no more serious plans than that." The company has now exited stealth mode and released some extremely bold estimates on how many people it thinks will be claiming its Worldcoin: 1 billion in less than two years. Plus, Altman thinks, this might be the first step toward something more ambitious. "It could show the world a new way to think about—a prototype of UBI."