Hey folks, general rule of thumb: free stuff is always better than non-free stuff, and this past week, Ethereum Name Service (ENS) announced that they were partnering with Coinbase to allow Coinbase wallet users to all get free cb.id usernames:

What’s a cb.id username?

If you’re familiar with ENS names, a cb.id username is essentially the same thing, except cb.id’s are targeted specifically for Coinbase wallet addresses. When you make a transaction with your wallet, instead of having to remember (or screw-up) entering a 40-or-so-character-long crypotocurrency wallet address, instead you can do so with a relatively much simpler “.eth”or now “cb.id” address instead. The coolest things about these usernames are that they are all minted as NFTs so essentially they are all unique, meaning that no one else can have your same .eth or cb.id address. And in addition to serving like a crypto-mailing address, because it’s technically a domain name, it’s like having your own webpage — all verifyable via blockchain.

If you missed the insane goldrush towards ENS domain name claims this past Fall, some of the valuations and sales on domain names were simply just insane, for instance paradigm.eth, clearing more than 400 $WETH:

I’m not sure how great the resell value on these are, but some people are buying up 100’s of different .eth names in hopes that one day, Coca-cola will actually want to buy up coca-cola-nft.eth.

Cool, so how do I get my cb.id username?

Just to be clear, it is not necessary to have a Coinbase account, but you must have a Coinbase wallet in order to get your cb.id username. To be completely honest, I haven’t really messed around that much with the Coinbase wallet, but I haven’t heard anything negative about them either.

After setting up your wallet and your passphrase, you should immediately be taken to a screen that allows you to “Claim for free” your free username:

From there, all you need to do is to select a username that’s not taken already, and it should be minted for you immediately. If you want to double check that your name got minted properly to your wallet address, simply type your full cb.id username into your web browser where it should tell you the associated wallet address with the name. Alternatively, you should also be able to see your username show up in the top left hand corner of your wallet screen:

Conclusion:

Despite having lost a ton of money on Coinbase stock this past year, it’s probably the last centralized platform (besides maybe Kraken) that I bwlieve has not screwed around with customer deposits, and it’s still one of the places I go when I need to off-ramp my crypto.

If you’re not a Coinbase member already, please consider supporting this blog and using my referral link: https://coinbase.com/join/KOO_0U?src=referral-link. And regardless if you already have an account, they’re also currently running a pretty decent promotion for 1st-time ETH stakers were you can get up to 10% in ETH back for at least an $100 dollar (up to $300 dollar maximum) stake:

(However just note that if you decide to take part in this promotion, remember your $ETH might be locked up until the Shanghai upgrade is completed or possibly later.)

Thanks for taking the time to read this and be sure to follow me on twitter (https://twitter.com/CryptosWith) to get all my latest updates.

Disclaimer: And as a final reminder, this is not financial advice and this is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Please as always, do your own research and find what investments are best for you. Cheers everyone!