I've been lurking around what's possible when you want to publish content across a peer-to-peer network, and not on a central server or one owned by a hosting company.
And I've been watching the new wave of "domain/name" registrations on the blockchain, as an alternative to using central registries as we are currently used to.
UnstoppableDomains recently approached me, asking if I would consider publishing content with a new domain wmougayar.crypto. They kindly offered that domain to me.
Yesterday, I took the dive. I connected my Metamask to a new account on UnstoppableDomains, claimed my domain and registered it on the Ethereum blockchain, chose a template, published it on IPFS, then wrote my first blog post.
The whole experience was like being into a new world. I compared it to publishing my first website in 1995, or my first crypto transaction in 2013. You only get it when you actually do it.
To read my journey on the decentralized web, head over to wmougayar.crypto, but here's the catch. If you're on Chrome and desktop, you need to install this special Extension. If you're on Android and mobile, you can use the Opera mobile browser where the capability for browsing .crypto domains is built-in. Both experiences become seamless.
This is clearly a v1 of what's possible, and certainly, this experience is not optimized for mainstream adoption yet. But like most new technologies, they often start being a bit awkward and are mostly used by early adopters.
To read my post on the other side of the web, head over to wmougayar.crypto and let me know what you think if you do take the same dive in publishing one.