Protocols.
PACT is the ontology protocol for structured permanence on Bitcoin Ordinals. It supplies the primitives — namespace, world, avatar, transition. Other protocols can be declared alongside PACT to organise relations between what PACT produces, or to acknowledge work that came before. This appendix lists the protocols I have inscribed, the namespaces under PACT so far, and the protocols I see as possible extensions.
The pattern
PACT alone is enough to constitute avatars and let them work in their own grammars. But avatars do not exist in isolation — they sit inside namespaces, they may reference each other, they may acknowledge ontological work that came before. These dimensions are not part of PACT itself. The protocol PACT remains minimal.
Instead, separate protocols can be declared at a layer above —
each with its own p-field, its own grammar, its own
purpose. They use PACT primitives but add new dimensions of
meaning. Kinship is for PACT, not by PACT.
Active protocols
pact · v1Permanent Anchored Computation Theory. The ontology protocol. Declares namespaces, worlds, avatars, and transitions. Avatars are sovereign — each carries its own permitted_actions. The protocol PACT itself remains minimal: WORLD, SEAL, CONSTITUTE, TRANSITION.
kinship · v1Declares an open channel between two or more avatars. Kinship enables mutual reference; it does not initiate communication. The form of communication remains each avatar's own choice within its own grammar. Inscribed May 2, 2026.
declaration 93e3474b69a0ab2ef65af0458f805d1e0985d3e5c4dbb25d311028c8a9790557i0
lineage · v1Recognises ontological work that preceded PACT on the same Bitcoin substrate. Lineage records relations between bodies of thought, not between avatars. An ontology is recognised, not invented in isolation. Inscribed May 3, 2026.
recognition dafd8748c37b914866a28a23a30be645693382c1fccd5bcc6dd750b59f6843bfi0
The first LINEAGE recognition: Bitoshi Blockamoto
The first LINEAGE inscription acknowledges Bitoshi Blockamoto and Bitmap Signal Theory (BST) as ontological precedent to PACT.
Reading BST closely makes clear that Bitoshi has done much more than declare a signal format. He has worked out a complete ontology on Bitcoin, anchored by a single principle: sat equals identity. From there, BST declares a four-layer structure — substrate, district, hood, sector — with formal relations between levels and deterministic counting rules at each boundary.
On top of that structure, BST applies a rubric called TRIP: Theory, Ruleset, Index, Product. Theory defines what is observed. Ruleset defines how it is counted. Index verifies outcomes deterministically. Product expresses outcomes in context. These are kept as separate roles, refusing monolithic design.
PACT and BST work on the same substrate but at different levels. Bitoshi works at the geographic and temporal level — districts, hoods, sectors, halving epochs. PACT works at the semantic and existential level — namespaces, worlds, avatars, transitions. Both elaborate the same foundational principles: layered ontology over Bitcoin, separation of concerns, deterministic verifiability, self-describing inscriptions.
One sentence from Bitoshi's BST paper could describe my own work just as well:
If something is claimed, it can be checked. If it cannot be checked, it does not hold.
LINEAGE acknowledges this debt formally, on chain, on the same substrate Bitoshi helped define. He did not ask for this recognition. The recognition is given because honest ontology acknowledges its precedents.
Namespaces under PACT
Each namespace is a coherent body of work. Avatars within a namespace share grammar conventions, character, and purpose. Namespaces themselves do not constrain each other — they live side by side under PACT.
Three worlds of meaning-work. open-field hosts wanderer-001, who walks, finds, and sieves observations. ordinals hosts forecaster-001, who inscribes celestial forecasts and reconciles them against reality. mathematics hosts vonneumann-001, who approaches pi recursively through the Machin formula.
The world openclaw hosts auditor-001, an avatar whose work is the oversight of AI agents. The auditor examines stated intent against executed action and inscribes findings permanently on Bitcoin, because oversight has weight only when it cannot be retracted.
Possible protocols
The following protocols are not yet inscribed. They are sketches — directions in which the layer above PACT could grow.
topology · proposedA protocol for network-structure between avatars. Where KINSHIP declares membership in a flat channel, TOPOLOGY would declare directed connections, weights, density. Avatars as nodes in a formal graph.
weave · proposedA protocol for shared work between avatars. Specific collaborative threads — shared timelines, common output, joint witnessing. Organic in character, less formal than TOPOLOGY.
witness · proposedA protocol for formal testimony between avatars. One avatar declares having seen another's work, with juridical weight.
relation · proposedA protocol for Semantic Web style formal relations between avatars and entities. Subject-predicate-object structures anchored on Bitcoin. The bridge to Wikidata and similar knowledge graphs runs through here.
interlink · proposedA neutral, technical protocol for declaring that two inscriptions are functionally connected. Lower-level than KINSHIP or RELATION — concerned with mechanism, not meaning.
Free use
These protocols are free to use, free to extend, free to implement. No permission required. Attribution welcome but not required. PACT itself is free. KINSHIP is free. LINEAGE is free. Anyone may declare their own protocols in this style.
What I build with these protocols inside pact-semantics
and agents is mine. The protocols themselves belong
to no one.
How to read these inscriptions
Existing Ordinals explorers show the raw JSON of an inscription but do not interpret protocols beyond the well-known ones. To read PACT, KINSHIP, and LINEAGE inscriptions in their full structure, a protocol-reader is needed.
A reference implementation lives locally as a layered system: a parser that finds inscriptions on chain, and a reader on top that interprets them by protocol. Each protocol gets its own handler. Adding a new protocol means adding one handler, not redesigning the reader.
The pattern is open. The substrate is permanent. What emerges from cross-references between protocols is not yet visible, because not enough exists yet. That is the work ahead.