When I think about blockchains, the major strengths they have over other networked data sources are decentralization, cryptographic verification, and (depending on the tech) anonymity and smart contracts.
There's a lot to be said for decentralization as a 'probably a better idea than letting Elsevier run the show', but it's kind of vague in my head still. The examples you point out from your own field solve a lot of that pain point without a blockchain, albeit not completely. (I feel I must note I have serious discipline envy, my field's leading journal finally said that arxiv-like prepints don't count as prior pub.)
The big thing for me are smart contracts. I keep returning to the idea that there's eventually going to be more public support of science and it's going to be directly, democratically funded through these. Not as a replacement to grants, SBIRs, etc, but as an additional cool source.
I am not sure anonymity is mandatory here. Actually, it is more the opposite: we need to know who writes what, potentially including the referee reports too. These reports should be public for sure. I am however not too sure about releasing the name of the referee. That is maybe the only place where anonymity may be necessary.
The grant issue is important as well, but this is not connected to publications. Although if I would be a funding agency, I would impose everyone to publish in open-access journals. Science should be freely accessible to anyone. Period. No discussion. :D
Oh yeah, I was a little unclear there. I think anonymity is a strength of some blockchain technologies. I don't think it's a strength relevant to a science-blockchain.
Then we agree :)
Anonymity could serve in reviewing papers without being biased knowing who and where made the research.
That is impossible in my field. We always know authors as every single paper is posted on the arxiv before being submitted to a journal :D
Bias in physics may be not that important, but with social sciences it can be pretty strong. I know that the best papers have this system of review, that the reviewers don't know in which country the experiment took place, who conducted it etc, they also don't know other reviewers. The other big problem is publishing papers that PROVED something and not publishing the ones that didn't prove anything extraordinary, which also distorts the overview of the field. So I heard the best journals 'order' the research and is going to publish it regardless of the results. I don´t know how spread are those kind of practices, but this is a way to make (social) sciences better and more accurate. Blockchain could be a mediator in that for sure.
Unfortunately, I can't speak for social sciences, for obvious reasons. Having everything public (papers + reviews) may be good, IMO, regardless the field. At least, this will remove some biases.