Sir Timothy Berners-Lee, an english computer scientist and the inventor of the World Wide Web has created his first Bitcoin blockchain ID on June 9, through the popular blockstack-based platform Onename.
Built on the decentralized, privacy-centric, and Bitcoin blockchain-secured database Blockstack, Onename is an open source platform which enables users to register their social media accounts and IDs through the Bitcoin blockchain network.
The concept of embedding an account on the Bitcoin blockchain is fairly simple. Each Bitcoin transaction has a feature which allows users to store data apart from the core transaction information, creating space for anyone to embed small pieces of data in accordance with transaction data in a full transaction.
Through the Blockstack nodes, Onename then verifies and authenticates various social media accounts, linking it to their network and enabling users to identify others through the account.
“With the Blockstack software, a network of computers collectively maintain a global registry of identities, public keys and names. When you run a Blockstack node, you join this network, which is more secure by design than traditional identity, naming, and digital registry systems,” explains the Blockstack team.
This morning, Berners-Lee announced on Twitter that he successfully verified +timblee on the Bitcoin blockchain through Onename, establishing his first blockchain ID.
Verifying that +timblee is my blockchain ID. https://t.co/guOp0wLf4y
— Tim Berners-Lee (@timberners_lee) June 8, 2016
The Onename team and its co-founder Muneeb Ali responded to Berners-Lee’s tweet, providing the Web creator with the documentation and paper of Blockstack.
It is definitely positive for the Bitcoin community to see mainstream technology figures like Berners-Lee to utilize the Bitcoin blockchain to discover other interesting use-cases of the Bitcoin blockchain other than the decentralized digital currency.