The ENS airdrop feast has ignited the crypto circle once again. Why is ENS so popular?

Author: Chen Zou

Ethereum Name Service, commonly known as ENS, has once again ignited discussions in the crypto community following a recent round of "generous" airdrops that can hardly be described as such. Money is always the easiest tool to stir public opinion, and the myth of wealth creation is even more so.

The ENS team launched an airdrop portal for its newly issued native token this Monday. (An airdrop is a method of distributing tokens to incentivize early users, where a portion of circulating tokens is rewarded to Ethereum addresses that meet certain specific conditions, such as holding certain NFTs, etc.) ENS NFT (ENS domain name) holders are currently eligible to apply for tokens, and the airdrop will be distributed to those who have registered or currently hold valid .eth secondary domain names. The airdrop weight is primarily calculated based on the account rather than the domain name, with the formula being 0.27 multiplied by the number of days holding at least one ENS domain, plus 0.067 multiplied by the number of days until the domain expires. If the account has additionally set up reverse resolution, the above result will be multiplied by 2.

People have started to share their gains:

Most people have expressed their appreciation for ENS's generosity, and aside from these celebratory airdrop messages, the most widely circulated news is about "a blockchain media intern in China receiving a huge airdrop." A builder in the Chinese community (who is also a blockchain media intern and has created several Chinese tutorials on ENS) successfully became an ENS contributor and received an airdrop of 46,000 tokens. This user is quite young, currently a university student, and has not invested a large amount of capital in the crypto market. Through their passion for what they love, they have achieved the legend of financial freedom.

This news instantly created a ripple effect, sparking not only admiration and envy on crypto social media but also a renewed sense of belief. Many people have stated that as long as they hold onto their beliefs and work hard, the crypto space is never stingy with rewards; it's just that everyone has different ways of receiving those rewards.

In addition to the massive airdrop igniting the market, the interaction between ENS and Coinbase has further fueled the rise in ENS token prices.

Coinbase's official Twitter transformed into an ENS marketing ambassador on Tuesday, promoting the ENS airdrop and applying to become a governance representative for ENS DAO. Regarding specific clauses in ENS Constitution 644, Coinbase expressed agreement that name ownership is an absolute right, that registration fees exist as an incentive mechanism, that ENS revenue funds can be used for other public goods, and that ENS integrates a global naming system. Coinbase also stated that its world-class identity verification team focuses on defining and building leading identity standards, which can help the development of ENS and the crypto ecosystem for the benefit of the broader crypto ecosystem.

Although the ENS core team previously stated that they would not contact exchanges to list the token, Coinbase's enthusiasm has made it a certainty that ENS will be listed on its trading platform; it's just a matter of time. The ENS token has also seen a significant increase, achieving over 100% growth in a single day.

According to data from Bitpush terminal, as of the time of writing, the ENS price is $77.38, leading many to joke on social media: "Even if you missed the airdrop, those who bought tokens on the day of issuance must be quite satisfied now."

Why is Ethereum Name Service so popular?

To understand the explosive popularity of ENS, one must grasp the internet domain trading frenzy of 2003. In 2003, when the IT industry was rapidly recovering, the domain men.com was purchased by a U.S. company for $1.3 million, instantly igniting the domain trading market and sparking a prolonged period of domain speculation. In August of this year, Budweiser spent 30 ETH (then about $95,000, now worth nearly $150,000) to buy the Beer.eth domain (ENS domain). Isn't that quite similar?

Human-readable domain names are associated with a name of a computer or group of computers on the internet, composed of a string of characters separated by dots, used to identify the electronic location of the computer during data transmission. Since these character-based addresses are very user-unfriendly and almost impossible to remember, the Domain Name System, or DNS, was created to convert machine-readable addresses into human-readable ones.

The value of these domain names often stems from social consensus, which is why "men.com" was bought for the exorbitant price of $1.3 million; "Men" is a word that anyone can understand, giving it a socially recognized value. Domains like Amazon.com and Apple.com carry more brand value, but again, this value is rooted in consensus.

Now looking back at ENS, it plays the exact same role on Ethereum as DNS does, serving as a translator between machines and humans. Typically, Ethereum wallet addresses are a string of hexadecimal characters like 0x56bhcsk568699b9, which is why many CT KOLs have names starting with 0x. For machines, hexadecimal addresses are clearly logical, but for human users, even entering these addresses can be a challenge, let alone remembering them. Thus, ENS was born, translating the inhuman hexadecimal strings into human-readable addresses, such as Bitpush.eth.

Anyone can participate in registering domain names, with no maximum renewal limit, but there is a minimum renewal period of 28 days.

Regarding fees:

• Names with 5 characters or more have an annual renewal fee of $5/year.
• 4-character names cost $160/year.
• 3-character names cost $640/year.

Nick Johnson and Alex Van de Sande from the Ethereum Foundation initiated the initial development phase of ENS in early 2017, and ENS became an independent organization in 2018. It is currently managed by the non-profit organization True Names LTD based in Singapore, as an open-source project.

Bull markets are usually accompanied by countless wealth creation myths, and the stories behind these myths often result from a combination of belief, effort, and luck. Even if the wind can bring wealth, the premise is that one must stand at the forefront of the wind and wait. But can you really endure the loneliness before the wind arrives?