Proof Protocol
Cryptographic oracle accountability — anchors intelligence before capital, rewards forecasters only when they're net-correct.
Prior is the mind. Proof is the body.
Alex Roessner 罗轩阳
Origin
Capital markets reward narrative as much as accuracy. The same fund can publish a thesis, watch it collapse, and never have its prediction record reckoned against the next thesis. Proof inverts this: a forecaster only earns by being net-correct, and the record is cryptographic.
Problem
Market accountability requires three things at once: a tamper-proof prediction record, a way to compose predictions into living instruments, and a governance layer that lets the system course-correct without rewriting history. Most prediction-market designs solve one and break the other two.
Approach
Five-tranche capital stacks per living instrument (Senior / Growth / Protocol / Operator / Commons), with formal earned-yield mechanics tied to oracle accuracy. A risk layer handles velocity, concentration, correlation, and migration with explicit named patterns and graduated escalation, all thresholds adjustable via on-chain governance. A mesh layer lets instruments discover and transact with each other peer-to-peer — the network's intelligence compounds quadratically with the number of nodes, not linearly.
Methodology
Anchored before capital. An oracle's prediction is committed cryptographically before any capital flows; outcomes are graded against the commitment, not against memory. Accountability tokens are minted only on net-correct, never on participation. Failure modes are explicit — the risk layer names them, escalates them, and lets governance respond.
Selected milestones
- Living instruments operational across multiple jurisdictions and asset classes
- Risk layer: six named patterns, graduated escalation, full stress-test coverage
- Tranche engine deployed across the live stack
- Mesh deployed; first cross-instrument compatibility settled
- First flagship Living Instrument in attorney review: durable-removal carbon, third-party-certified, on-chain settlement
Subprojects
The constituent pieces. Each is its own concern; together they are the protocol.
Prior
The thesis layer underneath Proof — the idea before the implementation.
Persistent capital-markets infrastructure. Prior is to Proof what a publication is to a working machine: the place where claims live in argument-form before they live in code-form.
Tranche Engine
Five-tranche capital stack per living instrument with earned-yield mechanics for oracle participants.
Senior, Growth, Protocol, Operator, Commons. Each tranche has formal earned-yield mechanics; loss-absorption flows from the bottom up; governance can rebalance without rewriting prior commitments.
Sentinel
Risk-management layer with six patterns, four-level escalation, governance-adjustable thresholds.
Six explicit risk patterns. Escalation moves through four levels — silent, advisory, pause, halt — and every threshold is on-chain governance. The protocol's failure modes have names.
Instrument Mesh
Peer protocol for Proof Living Instruments to discover, evaluate, and transact with each other without human intermediation.
The instruments are a network, not a portfolio. Mesh is the protocol by which they negotiate composition without a central intermediary.
Shirokuma
First Proof Living Instrument — durable-removal carbon, third-party-certified, on-chain settlement.
Burn-to-redeem on Solana. The instrument is reified carbon-removal capital; the burn is the redemption event; the carbon stays in the ground.
Open questions
- How the accountability-token minting curve should weight novel vs. confirming predictions
- When governance should override automated escalation
- What the right cadence is for re-grading anchored predictions as oracles update
Ask me about
- Why the protocol anchors prediction before capital, not the other way around
- How the five-tranche stack distributes loss-absorption
- What Sentinel patterns are, in concrete terms
- How Mesh prevents an instrument from over-composing into systemic risk
Stack
on-chain settlementTypeScriptrelational backendMCP
To dig in —
alex.roessner@landseed.earth