Christopher Allen
@christophera.bsky.social
Blockchain & Decentralized Identity Architect — Internet Cryptography Pioneer — Co-author IETF TLS 1.0 & W3C DID 1.0 Security Standards — Collaborative Tools & Patterns
Support our work to create infrastructure that can't be taken from us. Become a GitHub Sponsor of Blockchain Commons. Help us build autonomous infrastructure for coordination, collaboration, and identity beyond Bitcoin. [19/19] github.com/sponsors/Blo...
Sponsor @BlockchainCommons on GitHub Sponsors
Blockchain Commons is a "not-for-profit" social benefit corporation committed to open source , advocating for the creation of open, interoperable, secure & compassionate digital infrastructure to e...
github.com
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Support our work to create infrastructure that can't be taken from us. Become a GitHub Sponsor of Blockchain Commons. Help us build autonomous infrastructure for coordination, collaboration, and identity beyond Bitcoin. [19/19] github.com/sponsors/Blo...
These aren't Bitcoin-specific features. They're the architecture of autonomy itself. QR codes, Bluetooth, threshold signatures, Gordian Envelope, XIDs. Technologies that enable Exodus Protocols for coordination, identity, and collaboration beyond value transfer. [18/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
These aren't Bitcoin-specific features. They're the architecture of autonomy itself. QR codes, Bluetooth, threshold signatures, Gordian Envelope, XIDs. Technologies that enable Exodus Protocols for coordination, identity, and collaboration beyond value transfer. [18/19]
A journalist stores sources in a Gordian Club. One permit for their key, SSKR shares to their editors. Even if seized, encrypted information is protected. A protest group coordinates when messaging app becomes surveillance. Immigrants have credentials with no phone-home. [17/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
A journalist stores sources in a Gordian Club. One permit for their key, SSKR shares to their editors. Even if seized, encrypted information is protected. A protest group coordinates when messaging app becomes surveillance. Immigrants have credentials with no phone-home. [17/19]
Gordian Clubs use a permit system where different people access the same content different ways: private keys, XIDs, or secret shares. Multiple permits mean resilience. Transport neutral: internet, thumb drive, QR code in a newspaper, even @Blockstream Satellite. [16/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Gordian Clubs use a permit system where different people access the same content different ways: private keys, XIDs, or secret shares. Multiple permits mean resilience. Transport neutral: internet, thumb drive, QR code in a newspaper, even @Blockstream Satellite. [16/19]
Gordian Clubs shows these principles: an “Exodus Protocol” built on Autonomous Cryptographic Objects—self-contained, cryptographically secure, resilient when infrastructure fails. Unencrypted data isn’t safe; centralized servers aren’t reliable. [15/19] www.blockchaincommons.com/musings/musi...
Musings of a Trust Architect: The Gordian Club
ABSTRACT: Unencrypted data isn’t safe. Centralized servers aren’t reliable. Gordian Club offer an alternative: the autonomous cryptographic object (ACO). Self-contained objects protected by cryptograp...
www.blockchaincommons.com
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Gordian Clubs shows these principles: an “Exodus Protocol” built on Autonomous Cryptographic Objects—self-contained, cryptographically secure, resilient when infrastructure fails. Unencrypted data isn’t safe; centralized servers aren’t reliable. [15/19] www.blockchaincommons.com/musings/musi...
Principle 5: work offline and across time. Bitcoin transactions can be signed offline and broadcast later. The protocol doesn't care about internet connectivity for core operations. True autonomy works with whatever channels remain available when coercion denies others. [14/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Principle 5: work offline and across time. Bitcoin transactions can be signed offline and broadcast later. The protocol doesn't care about internet connectivity for core operations. True autonomy works with whatever channels remain available when coercion denies others. [14/19]
Principle 4: preserve exit through portability. Bitcoin keys work in any wallet. Open protocol means freedom to switch implementations. Without the ability to walk away, consent collapses into coercion. Lock-in is the opposite of sovereignty. [13/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Principle 4: preserve exit through portability. Bitcoin keys work in any wallet. Open protocol means freedom to switch implementations. Without the ability to walk away, consent collapses into coercion. Lock-in is the opposite of sovereignty. [13/19]
Principle 3: make constraints load-bearing. Bitcoin can’t reverse transactions, so your funds can’t be seized by fiat. Rule changes require consensus, so your holdings can’t be inflated away. What can’t be changed can’t be weaponized. [12/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Principle 3: make constraints load-bearing. Bitcoin can’t reverse transactions, so your funds can’t be seized by fiat. Rule changes require consensus, so your holdings can’t be inflated away. What can’t be changed can’t be weaponized. [12/19]
Principle 2: encode rules in mathematics, not policy. Math doesn’t discriminate, take sides, or change under pressure. Cryptographic proof replaces administrative decision-making: verification is deterministic. Code can be coerced, but mathematics cannot. [11/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Principle 2: encode rules in mathematics, not policy. Math doesn’t discriminate, take sides, or change under pressure. Cryptographic proof replaces administrative decision-making: verification is deterministic. Code can be coerced, but mathematics cannot. [11/19]
Principle 1: operate without external dependencies. If it requires permission to operate, it's not autonomous. If it stops working when a company fails or a government objects, it's infrastructure built on sand. We need self-contained cryptographic objects. [10/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Principle 1: operate without external dependencies. If it requires permission to operate, it's not autonomous. If it stops working when a company fails or a government objects, it's infrastructure built on sand. We need self-contained cryptographic objects. [10/19]
In my new Musings article, I lay out five principles required to build Exodus Protocols. They define what makes infrastructure truly autonomous and resilient against centralized control or sudden disappearance. [9/19] www.blockchaincommons.com/musings/musi...
Musings of a Trust Architect: The Exodus Protocol
ABSTRACT: Digital infrastructure is built on sand due to its control by centralized entities, most of which are focused on profit over service. We need Exodus Protocol services that build infrastructu...
www.blockchaincommons.com
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
In my new Musings article, I lay out five principles required to build Exodus Protocols. They define what makes infrastructure truly autonomous and resilient against centralized control or sudden disappearance. [9/19] www.blockchaincommons.com/musings/musi...
Unfortunately Bitcoin only creates an Exodus Protocol for value transfer. We need the same architectural patterns for coordination, collaboration, and identity. We need to protect activists, empower journalists, enable disaster response, preserve long-term archives. [8/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Unfortunately Bitcoin only creates an Exodus Protocol for value transfer. We need the same architectural patterns for coordination, collaboration, and identity. We need to protect activists, empower journalists, enable disaster response, preserve long-term archives. [8/19]
Bitcoin is an Exodus Protocol: a system that frees us from external control by creating infrastructure without infrastructure. Miners can come and go. Transactions can be signed air-gapped and transferred using QR codes. It's generally hard to censor, unthinkable to kill. [7/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Bitcoin is an Exodus Protocol: a system that frees us from external control by creating infrastructure without infrastructure. Miners can come and go. Transactions can be signed air-gapped and transferred using QR codes. It's generally hard to censor, unthinkable to kill. [7/19]
Bitcoin demonstrated something profound: fundamental capabilities can exist as mathematical rights rather than centralized privileges. When your ability to transact depends on a bank's approval, it's not a right but permission. Bitcoin restored transaction as a right. [6/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Bitcoin demonstrated something profound: fundamental capabilities can exist as mathematical rights rather than centralized privileges. When your ability to transact depends on a bank's approval, it's not a right but permission. Bitcoin restored transaction as a right. [6/19]
So how do we create digital infrastructure that can't be taken from us? Bitcoin answered that question. For fifteen years it has demonstrated autonomous infrastructure that works. No servers to shut down, no administrators to pressure, no companies whose failure matters. [5/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
So how do we create digital infrastructure that can't be taken from us? Bitcoin answered that question. For fifteen years it has demonstrated autonomous infrastructure that works. No servers to shut down, no administrators to pressure, no companies whose failure matters. [5/19]
By now everyone has a story of infrastructural loss. Google Plus circles. Internet radio. MP3s. This pattern has a name: #enshittification. A service becomes essential, companies collect rent, reduce features, increase surveillance, then kill it when profits fade. [4/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
By now everyone has a story of infrastructural loss. Google Plus circles. Internet radio. MP3s. This pattern has a name: #enshittification. A service becomes essential, companies collect rent, reduce features, increase surveillance, then kill it when profits fade. [4/19]
Advocacy and activist groups blockaded by Visa, Mastercard, or PayPal without charge or trial. Platforms locking out regions citing “legal risk.” Canadian truckers with frozen accounts, professionals losing workspaces overnight. Access became permission. [3/19]
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Advocacy and activist groups blockaded by Visa, Mastercard, or PayPal without charge or trial. Platforms locking out regions citing “legal risk.” Canadian truckers with frozen accounts, professionals losing workspaces overnight. Access became permission. [3/19]
A decade ago my students lost their collaborative learning infrastructure overnight when Yahoo sold del.icio.us and Google killed Reader. No warning. No migration. Gone. A story of the systematic transformation of rights into revokable privileges. [2/19]
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del.icio.us
October 30, 2025 at 6:15 PM
A decade ago my students lost their collaborative learning infrastructure overnight when Yahoo sold del.icio.us and Google killed Reader. No warning. No migration. Gone. A story of the systematic transformation of rights into revokable privileges. [2/19]
And talk to me directly if you'd like to work with us on Gordian Clubs, Hubert, Provenance Marks, or any of the rest of our Gordian autonomy technology stack! [13/13]
October 24, 2025 at 8:46 PM
And talk to me directly if you'd like to work with us on Gordian Clubs, Hubert, Provenance Marks, or any of the rest of our Gordian autonomy technology stack! [13/13]
Support Blockchain Commons and this work by becoming a financial sponsor. [12/13] github.com/sponsors/Blo...
Sponsor @BlockchainCommons on GitHub Sponsors
Blockchain Commons is a "not-for-profit" social benefit corporation committed to open source , advocating for the creation of open, interoperable, secure & compassionate digital infrastructure to e...
github.com
October 24, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Support Blockchain Commons and this work by becoming a financial sponsor. [12/13] github.com/sponsors/Blo...
All of that and more is detailed in the newest quarterly report from @blockchaincomns. [11/13] www.blockchaincommons.com/quarterlies/...
2025 Q3 Blockchain Commons Report
It has been both an innovative and busy quarter at Blockchain Commons. Here’s some of the main things that we worked on this summer: Join the Club: Introducing the Gordian Club Th...
www.blockchaincommons.com
October 24, 2025 at 8:46 PM
All of that and more is detailed in the newest quarterly report from @blockchaincomns. [11/13] www.blockchaincommons.com/quarterlies/...
You also might want to take a look at our frost-verify tool for checking FROST signatures (specialized for ZF FROST signing). [10/13] github.com/BlockchainCo...
GitHub - BlockchainCommons/frost-verify-rust: A standalone command-line tool for verifying FROST signatures and generating test data for verification testing.
A standalone command-line tool for verifying FROST signatures and generating test data for verification testing. - BlockchainCommons/frost-verify-rust
github.com
October 24, 2025 at 8:46 PM
You also might want to take a look at our frost-verify tool for checking FROST signatures (specialized for ZF FROST signing). [10/13] github.com/BlockchainCo...
We'll have more on this in a Learning FROST from the Command Line course that we started work on this quarter and will finish up this fall. [9/13] github.com/BlockchainCo...
GitHub - BlockchainCommons/Learning-FROST-from-the-Command-Line: A tutorial on Schnorr and FROST with hands-on CLI learning.
A tutorial on Schnorr and FROST with hands-on CLI learning. - BlockchainCommons/Learning-FROST-from-the-Command-Line
github.com
October 24, 2025 at 8:46 PM
We'll have more on this in a Learning FROST from the Command Line course that we started work on this quarter and will finish up this fall. [9/13] github.com/BlockchainCo...
Finally, we made some real progress on FROST work funded by @HRF. If you want to send Bitcoins with a FROST signature, you now can! [8/13] developer.blockchaincommons.com/meetings/202...
Gordian Developer Meeting: August 2025
Docs & information on Blockchain Commons specifications.
developer.blockchaincommons.com
October 24, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Finally, we made some real progress on FROST work funded by @HRF. If you want to send Bitcoins with a FROST signature, you now can! [8/13] developer.blockchaincommons.com/meetings/202...