Thread by @BobBodily

There are quite a few name services popping up on the Internet Computer right now: @icnsid @ic_naming and others.

These services remap an ICP address to a human readable ".icp" name.

But what exactly is an IC name service? And how should we proceed as an #IC ecosystem? 🧵👇

A name service is as simple as an object mapping ICP addresses to human readable ".icp" addresses. This means that (if supported) I could receive ICP at bob.icp instead of some crazy long ICP address. This is convenient and makes it less likely to mistype an address.

The biggest and most widely used name service on Ethereum is ENS. And Coinbase supports it. So this is how it works.

1. Go send ETH on Coinbase
2. Put in my ENS
3. Coinbase looks up the actual address from the ENS and enters it into the send field auto-magically

Pretty cool!

The only reason this works is because Coinbase supports ENS. So when I type my ENS, Coinbase calls the ENS and finds the map

This means that to succeed, a name service needs to be widely supported by the dApps in the ecosystem. Basically a standard that needs to be adopted

Anyone can do an ".icp" name service, it's just a map/api from a human readable name to an ICP address. The more important thing is WHO is doing it & what their plan is to get adoption across apps in the ecosystem. It is all about getting the standard widely adopted and accepted

So the problem (in my mind) with existing IC name service solutions is that they started with selling ".icp" domains rather than getting adoption/integration from dApps in the ecosystem. An IC name service is only as successful as the integrations it can get across the ecosystem

Which means I'm looking for the following in an IC name service:
1. Open source
2. Community owned/governed
3. Founders doxed and well known in the IC community
4. Widely integrated across IC wallets and DeFi dApps
5. Building from (and potentially integrating with) ENS is a plus

I haven't seen this yet (although existing IC name service apps might be trying to accomplish this), and so I've been hesitant to show support for existing solutions

So even if I get bob.icp on existing name services, if they don't get widely adopted it doesn't mean anything

@nic_xyz @harris0nhines I know you both were working on (or at least interested in) an IC name service. Have either of you made progress on this front? Just curious what is going on in the community as I think we're all interested in finding a good solution here.

And for existing name service solutions, I think the best path forward is to get widespread adoption from existing IC wallets and DeFi applications. Basically proposing an open internet service standard that can be community owned and governed.

That's all for today folks! Hope you liked my musings on the Internet Computer name service. I'd love to hear other viewpoints if I got anything wrong!

But I hope this has added some clarity to the existing situation with multiple name service providers right now.