:PROPERTIES:
:ID:       b1c2d3e4-f5a6-7890-1bcd-ef0123456789
:CREATED:  [2026-05-25 Mon]
:END:
#+title: Phase 1
#+filetags: :passepartout:strategy:adoption:impact:

Phase 1 spans 10² to 10⁴ users. The protocol's existence becomes
visible to those paying attention. See the [[id:92ccd074-04a0-4e45-a44f-9da24ea20a9b][Impact]] overview for context.

**Verification:** Compliance consultancies lose first clients. SaaS
companies win RFPs by integrating proof logs. First regulator encode —
the most leveraged event in the institutional trajectory. API gateway
subscriptions decouple value from instance adoption.

**Social protocol:** Community refugees arrive — a banned subreddit or
nuked Discord server rebuilds on the protocol, discovering that their
new home cannot be taken away. Organized communities reach hundreds of
users coordinating through the protocol. Creators keep 95%+ of
subscription revenue instead of 70%, and discover that no payment
processor can cut them off. The concept of "portable identity" enters
the vocabulary — users realize that the reputation they build belongs to
them, not to a platform.

**Impact on platforms:** First structural signal that the unbundling has
begun. A community that leaves Reddit for the protocol does not return.
A creator who migrates from OnlyFans does not split revenue again. Each
departure is permanent because the protocol offers the bundle (identity
+ audience + payments + contracts) that no single incumbent can match.

**Financial services:** Still no direct impact on core financial
services. Payment processors (Stripe, PayPal) begin to notice lost
volume from protocol-native transactions, but the absolute numbers are
small — millions of dollars in a trillion-dollar industry. The
compliance consulting disruption touches financial compliance (KYC/AML
consulting firms lose first clients), but no bank or insurer has adapted
yet.

**Economics:** Verification revenue from gateway subscriptions and gate
rules ($50-200K per enterprise). Social protocol revenue from community
fees and creator subscriptions ($1-5M). Small but accelerating.
