Evidence infrastructure
The general evidence protocol of the Decentralized Infrastructure of Right: evidence properly kept is the ground on which on-chain arbiters rule fairly. With Zikaron, anyone can turn what they want kept into a record that others can check, anchored on a blockchain, so that disputes and rulings rest on it; and any record can be registered as a grant that others can check.
Deployed on Ethereum mainnet by default
EtymologyJoshua summoned the twelve men he had picked from the people of Israel, one man from each tribe, and said to them: “Pass on before the ark of the LORD your God into the midst of the Jordan, and let each of you take up a stone upon his shoulder, as many as the tribes of Israel, that it may be a sign among you. In time to come, when your children ask you, ‘What do these stones mean to you?’, you shall tell them: ‘The waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it passed through the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.’ And these stones shall be a memorial for the people of Israel for ever.”
Joshua 4:4–7
A creator records the content digest of a work in a Zikaron ledger, and each new version adds one more entry to the record of how it was made; to grant rights to someone, the creator registers the grantee, the digest and the terms. Buyers, platforms, and arbiters hearing questions of authorship can check through Zikaron who made a work and whether a grant is valid. It serves digital content of every kind, for keeping evidence and for granting rights.
Deliverables, correspondence and commitments made off chain can be recorded with Zikaron and packed into a record kit at the moment of delivery, before any dispute arises. When a dispute reaches escrow, the parties can submit record kits anchored long before, together with their time anchors, for the arbiter to verify and weigh. Evidence fabricated after the fact therefore cannot find its way into the decision.
The four panels below are samples. They share one sample ledger and run entirely inside this page.
Record with Zikaron the fingerprint of a file, a folder or a code repository as it stands at this moment. Several records can be anchored on chain in a single transaction, proving that the content existed by that moment at the latest; the gas is paid from your own address.
Grant rights in a work to someone else under a set of terms. State the period and the scope; the grant can be revoked at any time, and the grantee can sublicense it. The grantee’s credential can be given to anyone for checking, as text or as a QR code.
When evidence is called for, export the records kept in advance as a record kit. The kit holds those records, their original files and their on-chain proofs.
Anyone who receives a credential or a record kit can check it for themselves. Signature, ledger, anchoring, validity and revocation can all be checked, and the chain can be read to see the whole ledger of any address.