GESTANCE -- provenance note (appended)
Richard Whitney, MIRegistry, L.L.C.
Dated: 14 September 2026

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This note corrects the attribution in gestance.txt, the canonical
coinage record dated 13 September 2026. That file is anchored in the
Bitcoin blockchain and is deliberately left unmodified. It is not
withdrawn, and the correction below does not erase it. Both documents
stand; this one is later, and where they differ, this one is accurate.

WHAT gestance.txt SAYS

  "Coined by Richard Whitney, founder of MIRegistry, L.L.C.
   Date of coinage: 13 September 2026"

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED

  The word itself -- the specific string of characters "gestance" --
  was produced by ChatGPT, during a session exploring candidate terms
  for a noun naming independently evidenced participation history.

  What is mine: recognising what the word was for, writing the
  definition, constructing the paradigm argument that gives it force
  (provenance / attendance / performance / reputation / gestance), the
  connection to res gestae in evidence law, selecting it over the other
  candidates considered (participance, vestact, vestaction, ichnacy),
  the clearance work, and putting it into use.

  That is most of the intellectual work, and it is not coinage. The
  original wording claimed the one part I did not do.

  A private working note written at the time recorded the word as my
  construction. That note was wrong. It is corrected too.

WHY THIS IS APPENDED RATHER THAN EDITED

  gestance.txt is committed to Bitcoin blocks 966942, 966945 and 966971.
  That commitment cannot be withdrawn, and editing the file to improve a
  provenance claim would be self-defeating in a document about provenance.
  The record is not rewritten. It is added to, in order, with both parts
  independently verifiable. That is the property the word exists to name.

ON WHAT THE ANCHOR PROVES

  The OpenTimestamps proof on gestance.txt establishes that the file
  existed at or before a point in time. It has never established that the
  claims inside it are true. Existence is not veracity. The same
  distinction applies to the infrastructure this word describes: a record
  can prove what was submitted and when, and cannot prove the submitter
  was honest.

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This note is itself anchored. Its accompanying .ots proof is independent,
tamper-evident, and verifiable by anyone with no stake in the answer.