PaperProof Protocol: The Artifact Layer for the Next Internet

This article introduces PaperProof as protocol infrastructure for durable, versioned, verifiable digital artifacts rather than as a single publishing website.

It explains why artifact identity, version lineage, controller-NFT-based control, and multi-interface usability matter for the next generation of research, software, governance, and agent-facing public knowledge systems.

Author: PaperProof Labs Category: Protocol Introduction Most internet infrastructure still treats important digital work as an afterthought. Research papers are scattered across PDFs, repositories, screenshots, social threads, mirrors, and mutable websites. Software releases are split between source control, package registries, changelogs, release notes, audit reports, and community explanations. Official Docs, public statements, datasets, forum posts, and governance materials often live in separate systems with weak links between them. AI systems now read, summarize, recommend, remix, and act on top of this fragmented surface, but the underlying internet still struggles to answer a few basic questions: What exactly is this work? Which version am I looking at? Who controls it now? Where is the actual content stored? Which comments and reactions are officially bound to it? Can another application resolve the same record without trusting this one website?...