In the early days of the web, web pages were found using IP addresses–horrible combinations of numbers and dots. Then URLs came along and made things a lot simpler. The Ethereum Name Service (ENS) has been trying to do the same with blockchain. It’s been swapping the complicated crypto addresses that we use today (long strings of alphanumeric digits) and replacing them with email-style names. ETHSimple wants to make things easier still.

ETHSimple is a portfolio explorer that allows people to search for Ethereum domain names—and see the profiles that come with them. Essentially, it’s a web browser for Ethereum names. It also allows you to buy and renew names as and when you need to. Prior to this, ENS was the only tool you could use–which at the time of writing, is little more than a developer toolkit with few user-friendly ways of interacting with the database.

To understand why this is a significant step forward, we need to understand how the current ENS system works. As opposed to a web browser looking up websites, which are hosted–and therefore controlled–by a number of centralized services, ENS does the whole thing without relying on an intermediary. Why? So that nobody can steal your funds. Instead it uses smart contracts to link Ethereum names with addresses. This allows a number of unique features

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You can customize your own Ethereum domain, in the same way you can when creating a website. In the weird and wonderful world of blockchain, you could create a donation page and donations can be sent directly to the site itself–all you’d need is the domain name. Ethereum domains could also become identity solutions. By connecting an identity to a domain, it could be used to publicly sign in to dapps, say on a social media dapp, and send money to other people.

Or you never know, you might soon be reading this article on Decrypt.ETH.

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