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If you’ve ever sent cryptocurrency to another wallet, you know the stress of looking at the mess of alphanumeric digits before you and wondering “am I about to make a very expensive mistake?”
To this day, any time I’m sending amounts over $1000, I break it up into several smaller transactions. I just can’t afford to be wrong, personally. For wallet addresses you send to regularly, you should definitely use your wallet’s built in address book. Rabby, Metamask, Rainbow, Zerion, and many others offer this feature and it's really helpful.
But the first time you send a transaction to a new address, there’s always that moment where you have to wonder whether the address has been copied correctly. And let’s be honest, most of us only double-check the first four and/or the last four digits, right?
A Solution is Born
This poor user experience is the reason we have the Ethereum Name Service (ENS). ENS, which is modelled after DNS (the service which allows for human-readable web addresses like .com or .net). ENS aims to serve as an address standard for communication between wallets, dapps, and more.
ENS’s job is to map human-readable names like ‘alice.eth’ to machine-readable identifiers such as Ethereum addresses, other cryptocurrency addresses, content hashes, and metadata. ENS also supports ‘reverse resolution’, making it possible to associate metadata such as canonical names or interface descriptions with Ethereum addresses.
ENS Docs
The tl;dr on the above quote is that ENS allows you to replace your alphanumeric wallet address with an address that ends in .eth (e.g. vitalik.eth) Many other naming services now exist, but ENS is the original, the only one which inherits its security from Ethereum, and the most renowned for its governance by a robust base of DAO token-holders.
Should I get an ENS?
The short answer is yes. An ENS can be your web3 identity, and not only that, it can simplify your experience and reduce the risk of lost funds whether sending from one wallet to another, or receiving from another user. Moreover, with the low cost of gas lately, it’s cheaper than ever to register an ENS. And now, you really have no reason not to because PoolTogether is giving away free subdomains!
Lucky Ducky is surprised (source: giphy)
What’s a subdomain, you ask?
Think of subdomains like first names, and domains like last names. So, for example, we have the domain of smith.eth and then the (subdomains) john.smith.eth and adam.smith.eth and so on and so forth. Each subdomain can be pointed to any wallet but is controlled by the parent domain; unless it’s emancipated. That’s beyond the scope of this article, but if you’re interested in learning more, you can check out this post from the ENS Mirror blog.
Subdomains offer a cool naming convention for members of the same family, company, or community. And this is precisely why PoolTogether, in partnership with NameStone is now offering pooltogether.eth subdomains.
These subdomains are being offered to community members in waves, so be sure to follow pooltogether on twitterjoin the discord to know when you’re eligible.
As well, users of Daylight’s fantastic service, which notifies you of available airdrops and other , will also be updated by email when they’re eligible. Zerion and Taho wallets have native support for Daylight built right in, so you can find the notifications there as well.
So far, the following groups have been allowed to mint:
POOL token holders who verified in the discord by May 30th
Anyone with ?$1000 deposited into the PoolTogether protocol
It’s important to note that NameStone provides permissioned subdomain management, meaning the parent, in this case PoolTogether, can still revoke names which are inappropriate at their discretion. Revoking a name is both unlikely and inconsequential. As you will still have full control over your wallet as well as any other ENS names you may have connected to it. And by using this approach, minting is able to be provided gaslessly and free of charge.
PoolTogether subdomains are not yet transferrable, but this could change in the future. They are marked as expiring in one year, but in reality they will remain valid as long as PoolTogether continues to renew their own ENS domain.
An ENS is an essential ingredient to participating in web3. It can serve as your username across apps and services, your human-readable wallet address, and much more. If you can’t afford to mint one or your preferred .eth is already taken, a subdomain can be a great option. Not only that, but it’s a cool way to show off your community pride.
If you meet the criteria listed above, you can mint your own .pooltogether.eth subdomain at https://namestone.xyz/pooltogether
After you mint yours, make sure to share this article, so others can mint their own and join the pool party!
And until next time ???
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This content is funded by the PoolTogether Growth Team Coordinape circle. All opinions are my own.
If you liked what you read and would like to support, consider minting my patronage NFT. You can also collect this post as an NFT on Optimism.
