As I’ve mentioned numerous times, blockchain technology is not just disrupting finance, it’s disrupting the whole world around us. We’ve been covering this series of innovations through our blog posts all the way from understanding the working of blockchain, smart contracts, oracles, IPFS, zero-knowledge proofs, and many more.
In essence, the core ideology of blockchain technology is to get rid of so-called “trusted third-party” and value-leaching intermediaries. Continuing with this effort, today, we’ll be explaining the concept of blockchain domains how they’re censor-resistant and a better substitute for traditional domains.
However, to understand the working and benefits of blockchain domains, we need to get ourselves acquainted with traditional domains first. So, let’s start with that.
What are Traditional Domains?
Traditional domains, in essence, are rented assets. Meaning these domains are centralized commodities and you don’t truly own them. The internet businesses as we know such as Google, Twitter, or HyperLinq use web domains such as .com, .net, .io, etc., which are managed by an organization called ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers).
All of these traditional domains can only be rented for a given period of time by business entities or individuals through domain registrars such as GoDaddy. Since these centralized domains are not truly owned by businesses or individuals they can be taken down by authorities and are prone to censorship by the governments.
Until now, there was no other way around these centralized domains meaning one cannot protect their right to speech. Blockchain technology finally discovered a way around these centralized domains and opened new doors to building an open, decentralized, and censorship-resistant internet. So, how do these blockchain domains are building a decentralized and censorship-resistant internet? Let’s find out.
What are Blockchain Domains?
Blockchain domains or decentralized domains are stored and governed by public blockchain networks instead of a centralized entity. Since these domains are a suite of smart contracts, they’re hosted on a blockchain network with the owner having full control over their domain using a private key.
Since the blockchain domains are stored in a distributed ledger with multiple copies across the globe, they cannot be taken down or censored by an entity or government. Thus eliminating the need for trusted third parties or central authority such as ICANN.
It’s worth noting that these domains are stored on public blockchain networks in the form of unique tokens such as NFTs, thus eliminating the need for renewals. Since NFT domains are owned, not rented, you can buy the domain with a one-time registration fee and never have to worry about expirations or renewals again.
With blockchain domains, you can also replace your crypto wallet address with a human-readable name. Thus allowing anyone to transfer crypto tokens easily with a human-readable address.
To learn more and get yourself a blockchain domain, check out Unstoppable Domains or ENS.