Governance

The governance of the Verified Presence Protocol™ (VPP™) exists to preserve long-term neutrality, semantic integrity, and institutional trust.

Its primary purpose is to ensure that the protocol remains a stable, authoritative reference for execution authority and verified human presence — independent of vendors, platforms, market incentives, or technological cycles.

Governance is explicitly designed to prevent:

  • unilateral control
  • vendor or platform capture
  • regulatory or jurisdictional fragmentation
  • erosion or dilution of protocol meaning

While ensuring:

  • authoritative stewardship
  • institutional confidence and defensibility
  • enforceable legitimacy
  • long-term protocol stability

Governance does not exist to control implementations.
It exists to protect meaning, integrity, and accountability semantics at the protocol level.

Stewardship Structure

The Verified Presence Protocol™ is stewarded by a designated governing entity (the Steward), responsible for:

  • maintaining the official protocol definition
  • preserving semantic integrity and authoritative meaning
  • controlling versioning and formal change management
  • administering conformity, certification, and licensing frameworks
  • governing Trust Mark usage
  • representing the protocol in institutional and governance contexts

The Steward does not implement technology, operate platforms, deliver services, or control deployments.

This separation ensures that protocol authority remains independent of commercial or operational interests.

Separation of Concerns

To preserve neutrality and prevent capture, VPP™ governance enforces a strict separation between:

Protocol semantics — governed exclusively by the Steward

Implementation methods — determined by licensees and implementers

Technology choices — selected by vendors and solution providers

Operational outcomes — owned by adopting institutions

No implementer, vendor, licensee, or adopter may control, redefine, or unilaterally influence the meaning, scope, or evolution of the protocol.

Versioning and Change Control

All modifications to the Verified Presence Protocol™ follow a controlled governance process designed to ensure institutional continuity and semantic stability.

This process includes:

  • formal proposal submission
  • impact and compatibility analysis
  • advisory or expert input (when applicable)
  • Steward review and approval
  • controlled publication and version release

Backward compatibility, institutional reliability, and preservation of meaning are mandatory principles of all protocol evolution.

Certification & Oversight

Conformity assessment and certification activities are governed separately under the VPP™ Conformity & Certification Framework.

Public reference to VPP™ documentation, materials, or concepts does not constitute certification.

Certification authority is exercised exclusively through formal governance procedures and designated certification mechanisms.

Funding & Independence

To preserve institutional trust and neutrality, VPP™ governance explicitly rejects advertising-based revenue models, behavioral tracking, and data monetization.

Permissible funding mechanisms may include:

  • conformity and certification-related fees
  • stewardship and governance licensing arrangements
  • public-interest, academic, or institutional grants

No funding mechanism may compromise protocol neutrality, governance independence, or semantic authority.

Transparency

Governance activities are documented and made available for institutional and public review to support accountability and long-term trust.

This may include:

  • published governance reports
  • descriptive governance records (non-operational and non-sensitive)

Governance Statement

The governance of the Verified Presence Protocol™ exists to ensure that the protocol remains stable, neutral, and institutionally reliable across decades — independent of vendors, market dynamics, regulatory shifts, or technological evolution.