One of the core problems in today’s blockchains is the identity problem. Consensus is permissionless, which makes it impossible for the protocol to know who controls how many nodes (machines). This allows single entities to mine in parallel using multiple virtual or physical machines, or to dominate using faster hardware, pushing the network towards centralisation. Many ASIC-resistant or staking-based systems attempt to address this, but they fail and reward scale, parallelism, and capital. If an average individual cannot compete on equal footing within the network, that isn’t decentralisation, it is industrialisation and that is exactly what this work aims to address.
r/GrahamBell is a blockchain that operates using a familiar philosophy of signup, login and live miner analytics and activity monitor, enforced decentrally at the protocol level (no KYC, no central authority). You can think of it like a real-time Google Analytics for blockchain, where the network observes when and how mining is done, not just the final result.
1) Mining activity (online status, rate of computation, and rule compliance) is observed and enforced decentrally by the network
2) Miners must sign up (create an account) before they are allowed to propose blocks.
3) Signing up is computationally difficult, so creating many identities (accounts) is expensive. After sign up, miners must log in before they can propose blocks. When logged in, the entire network knows which ID is online. So, 1 account = 1 active miner allowed at a time.
4) To propose a block, miners must submit it together with their mining analytic/activity report, showing how computation was performed to reach the final result.
5) The network only accepts the miner’s analytics/activity report if it was observed, signed and validated externally through decentralised public servers (permissionless and run by multiple random nodes). These servers only sign when the report consists of sufficient evidence proving the miner followed protocol rules. Without valid server signatures or analytics report, the miner’s block, even if valid, is not accepted.
The result of this approach enabled us to make a Proof of Work system resistant to multiple sybil identities, easily controlled by a single entity. The protocol enforces 1 ID = 1 registered user = 1 active miner allowed at a time, where anyone is allowed to compute multiple identities but it is computationally difficult due to the work required to compute an ID. This also enabled us to make miners only mine at a fixed hash rate of 1 hash/attempt per second per node, anything above that is immediately rejected, meaning Phone = PC = ASIC by design.
You can try the MVP demo (local client) here: https://grahambell.io/mvp/ or watch a short video here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znby1BQeHoo&t=61s both currently show that mining above 1 H/s per node is rejected (assuming the miner is already registered). The demo also exposes miner analytics via Proof of Witness and Witness Chains (servers).
I’m looking for community members, builders, researchers, and protocol designers who build when things don’t exist. If that resonates: https://grahambell.io/mvp/#waitlist
If you want direct discussion, you can find me here: https://grahambell.io/mvp/#team
