What is the $ENS governance token?

Ethereum Name Service (ENS) is a simplified Ethereum standard address, for example such as “nonfungible.eth”. The main purpose is to make use of the addresses on various Ethereum applications easier: MetaMask, MyEtherWallet (MEW) etc.

After the migration of the ENS.eth registry in May 2019, each domain became a non-fungible token (NFT), compliant with the ERC-721 standard, which means that any .eth records can be transferred in the same way as an NFT. 

What is Ethereum Name Service?

ENS works by domains as well as the domain names of current websites, these domains are linked to an Ethereum smart-contract and the owner of the domain is also managing sub-domains. 

We can find several important pieces of information in this register:

• The owner of the domain. It can be an Ethereum user, but also another smart-contracts that redistribute sub-domains.
• The registration of the past and present states of the domain.

To conclude, Ethereum Name Service aims to become the DNS (Domain Name Service) of Web 3.0.

The launch of the ENS Governance Token

Ethereum Name Service (ENS) has always been an open-source service that belongs to the community. The operation of ENS is already largely decentralised and self-managed, however some decisions are still taken by the team, which is why the project aims to take things a step further:

We believe that both ENS and the DAO space have matured enough that now is the time to pass ENS Governance over to the community via the creation of a DAO and the $ENS Governance Token.

More specifically, the team wishes to hand over control of the existing and future cash flow, from the registrar contract that is in charge of the registration mechanism for .eth domain.

What will governance look like? ENS wants to implement a delegate system, although everyone is invited to vote independently, the team encourages token holders to delegate to one of the community leaders.

We expect ENS Governance will evolve over time. Learning from Gitcoin’s governance experience, we believe a delegate model is a good place to start. This helps the DAO represent the interests of members who can’t personally consider and vote on each proposal.

So, if you are an active member of the ENS ecosystem and want to participate in the future of ENS, you can apply to become a delegate.

The Airdrop in numbers 

After a snapshot was taken on Monday November 1st, the new ENS token started to be distributed on Monday, November 8th. 

Those who have created an ENS domain in the past can claim ENS tokens on the site until May 4, 2022. Unclaimed tokens will be paid to the community treasury.

The total supply of ENS will be 100 million and 25% of the tokens will be distributed to early users. Each wallet received a variable amount of ENS depending on the duration of its domain, the expiration date, etc.

137,689 wallets are eligible for airdrop and 41,621 have already claimed their tokens, which is about 30%.

As a result, more than 8 million ENS have been claimed, representing a haul worth around $320 million at the time this article is written. The fully diluted market cap is currently over $4 billion.

Some voices criticized the distribution model for not rewarding enough early users or meaningful domain names. However, it still seems to be beneficial for those who have registered their domain for a long time.

It should be noted that an airdrop for domain names is difficult, is jpeg.eth more valuable than random.eth?