troquerre

There should be a disclaimer that the author works for Deno https://gist.github.com/littledivy

Can't believe I didn't know about this before. Just shared this with our entire dev team and they like it!

Are you concerned about AWS starting a competitor to keydb cloud/have you considered modifying your license to prevent that from happening? I'd imagine that'd be important in ensuring the long term sustainability of keydb development

You don't need to KYC as it's just a mobile wallet — same with all the other crypto wallets out there. I'd be surprised if Signal integrated features in the future that require KYC.

MobileCoin is already liquid on multiple exchanges so the coins would just be purchased at whatever the market price is. It also doesn't make sense for late adopters to get the same price because there's a lot more risk associated with being an early adopter than a late adopter. This works both ways — if something bad happens to MobileCoin that tanks the price late adopters would be able to buy at a cheaper price because the new information gets priced in.

ICANN corruption is wel-known at this point after the .org fiasco. A lot of DNS industry folks are now giving decentralized DNS alternatives more attention. I wonder if we’re reaching a tipping point — it’s not unimaginable to me that in 10 years ICANN’s influence over DNS is significantly reduced as decentralized alternatives take over

Yes $1k for the gas fees on ethereum. What problems do you mean?

This is an awesome development for Handshake and the decentralized web. This is how DNS should have functioned from day one, but of course the technology wasn't available when it was created.

Matt you were incredibly helpful back when we went through the YC Fellowship — excited to see you starting this fellowship for Scientists, I'm sure it'll be a great program!

This is a great initiative to help scientists take the jump to start their own companies. How many startups will be in the first batch?

That's right! Though the infrastructure for HTTPS without CAs on Handshake is still nascent (the community welcomes contributors if you're interested!). This article covers how to set up HTTPS on Handshake using DANE https://medium.com/@ca98am79/how-to-view-dane-tlsa-websites-...

Namebase is a service built on top of Handshake similar to how Coinbase builds on top of Bitcoin. It's an incorporated company that has to follow normal AML/KYC laws like other onramps. You don't have to go through Namebase to get HNS. Also, you can buy HNS with BTC without KYCing on Namebase. You can't sell or transfer the HNS without KYCing but you can still register names and transfer the names to other wallets without providing any passport info.

They're top-level domains on an alternative root but that doesn't make them not top-level domains.

Per the announcement tweet [1], HNS.to is just a gateway with limited uptime guarantees. It's much better to connect directly via NextDNS.

[1] https://twitter.com/NamebaseHQ/status/1348707701744922625?s=...

Did you use the HNS.to gateway or connect directly via NextDNS? Per the announcement tweet [1] the gateway has limited uptime guarantees — it's much better to connect directly and only takes a few minutes to set up.

[1] https://twitter.com/NamebaseHQ/status/1348707701744922625?s=...

ICANN is expected to re-open TLD registrations in 2-3 years but you can't actually buy a new TLD in the traditional system at the moment. Once the registrations open up, there's a $180k application fee (that's not a registration fee, you pay that whether you win the TLD or not) on top of the registration fee which can cost millions. Furthermore, ownership of the TLD is delegate by ICANN, which is a central authority as opposed to ownership of names on Handshake which are controlled by private keys that you control.

There are two sides of censorship-resistance that are important when it comes to DNS. Censorship-resistance/seizure-resistance for owners and censorship-resistance for consumers.

For owners, it's important that their domain names can't be taken down or seized from them. Sci-Hub has dealt with this issue numerous times and has had to register a pool of domain names to try too counteract this issue before getting their Handshake name. Domain registrars can seize domain names and there isn't much recourse for the owners — it doesn't even need to be for a good reason[1]. On Handshake, ownership is controlled by your wallet's private key (similar to owning Bitcoin). As long as you control your private key no one can take your name from you.

For consumers, it's important that you can 1) access the domain name and 2) trust that the DNS records you're seeing are authentic. Handshake is a distributed network so as long as you can connect to a single node you can access it. This mechanic is what gives other distributed networks like Bitcoin and BitTorrent their strength. Furthermore, you can verify the authenticity of the records since each DNS update is reflected on the blockchain similar to how you can verify transactions on Bitcoin.

[1] https://www.izoologic.com/2018/12/20/zoho-domain-taken-mista...

Namebase CEO here. The article misquoted me (and some of the data I shared) in a number of places. See this tweet where the writer incorrectly stated that Namebase created Handshake when we only build on top of it (similar to how Coinbase builds on Bitcoin) https://twitter.com/CoinDesk/status/1348801310498443264?s=20.

I'm happy to talk through how Handshake works if you have any questions about it. I also wrote an article on how Handshake can improve the root of trust for DNS which was previously discussed on HN [1]

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20995969

You're right that Handshake can suffer from a 51% attack like other proof-of-work chains. Importantly, the security of DNS records on Handshake is strong even with the possibility of a 51% attack.

51% attacks on blockchains used as a store of value are bad because an attacker can spend their coins (ie BTC) on an exchange, withdraw their profits, then perform a 51% attack on the previous block to take back their spent coins.

On Handshake, that same attack exists for HNS, but DNS updates on chain take 36 blocks (about 6 hours worth of transactions) to propagate, which is significantly more expensive and unlikely than pulling off a normal 51% attack on a single block (it gets exponentially more unlikely). Furthermore this wouldn't even be an attack per se. An attacker may be able to undo a DNS update, but they wouldn't be able to falsify DNS records because only the owner of the name who controls the private key would be able to submit valid UPDATE transactioins.

Great question. All Handshake names are registered with HNS through the auction process. Say you bid 1000 HNS on a name and I bid 900 HNS. You'd win that name and pay 900 HNS (the second highest bid price. Importantly, that fee doesn't go to Namebase or any other entity — the coins are burned on-chain so they go to no one.

Handshake has taken a lot of lessons from previous attempts at alternative blockchain DNS roots like NameCoin. Here are some ways its different:

- Handshake names are not *.bit domains like NameCoin they're actually top-level domains. This is because Handshake's purpose is not to decentralize domain names per se but too decentralize the root zone and create a more secure root of trust than Certificate Authorities [1]

- Handshake name auctions were spread out over the course of the first year after launch to prevent early adopters from hoarding all the good names. For instance, .crypto was available in the first few weeks after launch but .information isn't available until next week. This is important because early adopters hoarding names prevents latecomers from supporting the protocol.

- Handshake names are sold via vickrey auction instead of a flat fee. Different names are more valuable than others. Flat fee pricing allows a hoarder to arbitrage that fact by being first whereas auction pricing ensures that names are better distributed. .X sold for 311k HNS[2] (about $40k) whereas other names sell for a few cents.

- Handshake has a light client[3] that can trustlessly verify DNS records on-chain. This is critical because very few people run full-nodes, so without a light client the majority of users would rely on third parties which provides worse security than users resolving names in a decentralized manner

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20995969 [2] https://namebase.io/domains/x [3] https://github.com/handshake-org/hnsd

Handshake has a number of mechanics built into it that I think give it a stronger chance of succeeding than previous attempts. It's similar to how there were numerous failed digital currency attempts before Bitcoin figured out all the mechanics necessary for success. Some of these mechanics are:

- There is no centralized party that owns Handshake. This allows for any party to step in and contribute to the protocol. We've already seen this play out in building Namebase (I'm the CEO) as numerous unrelated parties have come together to further Handshake adoption

- It's not just about opening up the TLD namespace. Handshake's main technical goal is to improve the security and censorship-resistance of DNS by shifting the root of trust from CAs to a distributed ledger. My article on the technical improvements Handshake can provide was previously discussed on HN [1]

- TLDs aren't sold for a set price. There's a vickrey auction which awards the TLD to the highest bidder. This creates a better distribution of names than selling at a set price or to the first buyer

- The Handshake coin (HNS) provides an incentive for miners to provide security to the network and for holders to support ongoing adoption of the protocol, similar to how Bitcoin holders have put in massive efforts to evangelize it (I recognize that on HN people may find the Bitcoin evangelists annoying but I believe Bitcoin wouldn't be where it is today without them)

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20995969

The article has a few technical mistakes in it (I've found most publications do that when it comes to a technical subject I'm familiar with...), but in short Handshake is an alternative decentralized DNS root hosted on a blockchain. It aims to replace Certificate Authorities as the root of trust by pinning TLSA keys directly on the blockchain instead of relying on trusted parties for verfication.

CEO of Namebase here. We posted the original tweet announcing the news[1]. If any of y'all have questions about how sci-hub.hns works or how Handshake works in general I'll be online today to chat!

[1] https://twitter.com/NamebaseHQ/status/1348707701744922625?s=...

We’ve been using Skynet for all our decentralized web projects at Namebase.io ever since they added Handshake naming support[1] — it’s been fantastic. It now takes us days to build things that previously took our intern a month to do. With censorship entering the zeitgeist nowadays I wouldn’t be surprised if the next big decentralized social network is build on Skynet.

[1] https://siasky.net/docs/#handshake

ICANN has proven itself incapable of governing the root DNS namespace. As much as crypto gets a bad rap here I think it’d be better if authority over TLDs was decentralized such that anyone could own one. Handshake.org is one project trying to do this and interestingly there are additional benefits to decentralizing the root DNS such as getting rid of CAs as the root of trust for security.

Have you checked out Handshake? It’s a decentralized DNS experiment that launched this year and already has adoption from domain registrars like 101domain.com and Encirca

What country blocks Reddit?

I wouldn’t use it for big commercial projects because the ecosystem isn’t very big (ie I wouldn’t build a b2b saas app with it) but for small projects and side projects it’s great.

How did Roblox solve the chicken and egg problem of getting developers to build games on their platform and getting kids to play them — did they launch with their own games first?