Interview w/ Garga.eth: “Yuba Labs, BAYC, & ENS” Identity

Welcome aboard the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC)!

In this club, you won’t just find NFT holders – you’ll find pioneers of the Web3 landscape. As one of the most recognized NFT collections in the world, BAYC is much more than just ‘bored apes’; it represents a community at the forefront of a digital revolution.

Steering Towards ENS Integration

One such pioneer is BAYC’s co-founder Garga.eth, who, during an engaging conversation hosted by Non-Fungible Films on April 19, 2023, hinted at a future where ENS (Ethereum Name Service) becomes integral to BAYC’s ecosystem.

“Why can’t I just say, go to any blockchain explorer, type in my Ape ID, and my profile will show you everything?” was the candid question posed by GaryPalmerJr.eth during the discussion.

In response, Garga.eth affirmed that this was indeed something the Bored Ape Yacht Club was actively considering!

As Garga.eth noted, ENS is part of BAYC’s radar. However, the club’s ambitions don’t stop there. They aspire to create a future-proofed, durable system that’s resilient, effective, and inclusive.

Leveraging ENS could ultimately make BAYC more accessible, bridging the gap between blockchain’s complexity and mainstream user-friendliness.

Digital Identity – The Heart of Web3

ENS, or Ethereum Name Service, allows blockchain addresses to be human-readable, replacing the cryptic hexadecimal addresses with simple names ending in .eth. A much-needed development in the space, ENS offers ease of use, accessibility, and the potential for personalized digital identities.

Your PFP NFT + Your ENS Name = Your Web3 Identity!

GaryPalmerJr.eth’s question during the Twitter Spaces conversation unveiled the desire to possess a unique digital identity within the BAYC ecosystem. “When am I going to be able to be Gary.bayc.eth?” he asked, emphasizing the role of personalized identities in enhancing the user experience on Web3.

Indeed, the possibilities are intriguing. Imagine typing in your name followed by ‘.bayc.eth’ into a blockchain explorer and being greeted by your unique Ape. The Bored Ape Yacht Club represents not just a collection of NFTs but an interconnected community of digital identities – a clear, ambitious vision of the future of Web3.

The ENS & Web3 Revolution

The BAYC’s prospective integration with ENS isn’t just a powerful endorsement of the protocol, but also a reflection of a broader trend in the blockchain and NFT space. As GaryPalmerJr.eth said, every project in the world will need a naming mechanism, similar to how the internet evolved with IP addresses and human-readable URLs.

The ENS DAO and teams like Spruce ID are already working on game-changing developments like the Name Wrapper and Sign-In with Ethereum, aimed at creating a seamless, intuitive Web3 experience.

We can only speculate on when we’ll see the integration of ENS within BAYC. Still, the conversation sparked by Garga.eth and GaryPalmerJr.eth confirms ENS on on the burner, and the days of human-readable blockchain identities, with personalized digital experiences, and user-friendly Web3 interfaces are in sight!

As we set sail into this exciting new digital era with captains like Garga.eth at the helm, it’s evident that the Web3 seas ahead are filled with endless opportunities, and BAYC is ready to navigate them all.

Remember, folks, stay curious, and keep exploring!

The Twitter Spaces Transcript:

GaryPalmerJr.eth:

The sun is shining, the seas are blue! And no banana daiquiris for me, I’m going to stick with the strawberry, even though I’m an Ape. Lots of ice, extra ice! But I know that whatever we’re going to expect, it’s going to be better than that.

Garga.eth:

Hell yeah!

GaryPalmerJr.eth:

Right?! And so super excited about… I don’t know where ApeFest is going to be. I don’t know when it’s going to be. I’m guessing we’re going to get enough time. Yeah. It’s just the anticipation, everything, just the way it works together, it’s beautiful, it’s flawless.

And you know what’s really great that I love most? It’s really Web3. And one of the things about the Bored Apes that I’m speculating, I know nobody should do that, but I like the area of identity. And I want to know, when am I going to be able to be Gary.bayc.eth? Because I want my identity in the club. I bet we all do.

I don’t know if I’m going to end up being 3636, because that’s my Ape ID, .bayc.eth, or if I’m going to get to be Gary.bayc.eth, but with a Name Wrapper, with all these other projects that are adding the human-readable identity. When I tell people, “Hey, check out my Ape,” how do they do it? They got to go to OpenSea, they got to type in the Bored Apes, then they got to put in my token number 3636.

I just want to say, listen, go to any blockchain explorer, type in 3636.bayc.eth, and my PFP will show you everything. And then Gary.bayc.eth, that’s my name. That’s my name in the club. Anything that we could say about that?

Garga.eth:

Yeah! I’m a huge fan of ENS and I know they have a pretty ambitious roadmap. And I think I’d be curious, this is something we’ve looked into, I don’t know, six, seven months ago or something like that, and I think fell on the back-burner a bit. But I’d be curious on what other projects are integrating certain things like this. And I’d have to look back into what the latest ENS roadmap and things that they’re doing are.

With anything that we do, we just want to make sure that it’s future-proofed and not going to fall apart and that it’s durable and exactly. If we’re going to open it up to 10,000 Apes and 20,000 Mutant Apes, we want it to be strong and not going to change the way it works, and hopefully exactly. There’s a lot of other probably just partnerships type work.

And in talking to Etherscan or MetaMask or other people, I’m just trying to make sure that you’re following all the right rules to make sure that it’s consistent across different block explorers and all that kind of stuff. But I don’t know. I guess I can just say it’s definitely something that’s on our radar. It’s not something that we’re actively building towards right now, but as the stuff starts to come more and more online.

I would love that. That’s what we wanted the BAYC to be in a lot of ways was your Ape is your digital identity, and also by virtue of being on Ethereum and having an address associated with it is this can also be your mailbox.

Hopefully, there are even ways to chat directly to wallet addresses, which I know a lot of people are working on, too. All this stuff can get integrated in a much better way so that we don’t have to go to Discord or Twitter or other things. Just having a more native accessible layer to communicate with people and directly, that’s awesome and I think a big deal for all Web3.

Twitter Spaces Conversation:
Non-Fungible Films ™️, “M3DIA w/ Garga”

Additional Links:

• Bored Ape Yacht Club Website: boredapeyachtclub.com
• BAYC on Twitter: @BoredApeYC
• BAYC OpenSea NFTs: pro.opensea.io/collection/boredapeyachtclub

Yuga’s ENS Manager Links:

• All Yuga/BAYC ENS Names: https://app.ens.domains/0xaBA7161A7fb69c88e16ED9f455CE62B791EE4D03
• BAYC.eth ENS Name: https://app.ens.domains/bayc.eth
• BAKC.eth ENS Name: https://app.ens.domains/bakc.eth