Please note: The following document is an initial draft proposal. All decisions are subject to change. Our present goal is to collect feedback and iterate upon this document. Please feel free to share your suggestions and concerns.
ADX is a federated network for distributing data. It leverages cryptographic signatures and hashes to distribute authenticity proofs along with the data, enabling each node to transact upon the data independently of the data's origin. ADX might therefore be described as an Internet-native database in which records are replicated across nodes.
As a consequence of relying on authenticity proofs, ADX must exchange "canonical" records. That is, ADX records must be transmitted in their original encoding and structure in order to validate the signatures and hashes which comprise the proofs. This stands in contrast to the RESTful model of the Web in which "representations" of records are exchanged and therefore may be constructed at the ti