WTF is Linagee Name Registrar?
An older Ethereum contract that appears to be the first NFT contract has been rediscovered. Deployed by Linagee, the contract is a domain name registrar, like the Ethereum Name Service. However, it dates back to August 8th, 2015, 2 years before ENS. The contract was rediscovered by Mason Keresty, a historical NFT archeologist who has created a minting app for it.
Finding new historical NFTs is awesome as it helps preserve important parts of Web3 history. However, there are divided opinions on what this discovery means for the historical NFT space. Let’s get into the main details of Linagee’s name registrar...
Table of Contents
#1 - What to Know About Linagee’s Registrar
#2 - Who Created the Linagee Registrar
#3 - Community Building Up Around The Registrar
#4 - Questions About It’s Worth
What to Know About Linagee’s Registrar
The Linagee’s registrar, as it’s now called, is set to be the oldest Ethereum NFT. Mason Keresty rediscovered the domain registrar while scanning the first 300,000 blocks on the Ethereum blockchain.
It turns out that the domain registrar was created back on August 8th, 2015. This predates the current oldest NFT, Etheria V1. At the time, only about 60 domain names were registered.
It is not yet confirmed if this domain registrar is an actual non-fungible token.
Who Created the Linagee Registrar
Based on recent findings, the registrar’s creation points to an anonymous Reddit user known only as Linagee. Linagee is quite an infamous character in the early days of Ethereum as LeonidasNFT, a key NFT archeologist, points out in his Twitter thread.
Linagee is credited with having deployed the very first smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain. Furthermore, Linagee is said to have been the brains behind TestCoin, the first ownable Ethereum asset.
The anonymous dev posted about the registrar on a Subreddit thread on August 15th, 2015, a few days after the deployment. Every attempt to reach Linagee has failed as they last posted on Reddit in July 2019.
Community Building Up Around The Registrar
After announcing its discovery on Twitter, the NFT archeology community welcomed the new development with open arms. LeonidasNFT has even updated his Historical NFT roadmap to include the registrar.
So far, over 6,800 new domains have been minted after Keresty set up a minting app for the smart contract A Discord server has also been opened for collectors, with several spaces scheduled for the coming weeks.
One thing to note, however, is that the domains are case-sensitive, making it possible for two users to mint the same name but with different capitalizations. Therefore, "notanothernft", "NOTANOTHERNFT", and "NotAnotherNFT" are all valid and unique domains. This differs from ENS domains that aren't case-sensitive. For ENS, "notanothernft", "NOTANOTHERNFT", and "NotAnotherNFT" are all one and the same domain name.
Questions About It’s Worth
While historical NFT collectors have been bullish about the new discovery, some community members are skeptical about the registrar’s long-term worth. A Twitter user by the name _theth noted that minting a new domain name with the old contract might not be worth much.
They likened the scenario to someone minting an ENS domain this year and comparing its value to one minted during its start. They also noted that the real value would be tracking down the first 60+ domains minted back in 2015. However, tracking those down would be futile as they’ll most probably be in inactive wallets.
Final Thoughts
Historical NFTs are important as they help us hold a part of history while understanding the space’s progress over time. As we explained in our previous article about the importance of historical NFTs, some collectors consider these assets like Bitcoin—they’re a good inflation hedge.
While the authenticity of this statement varies, depending on which project you hold, there’s no denying that historical NFTs are worth more than many recent projects. As for the Linagee’s registrar, we can only wait to see how far the project will go and if it’ll be worth anything in the coming years.
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Disclaimer
All our content is for educational purposes and should not be taken as financial advice. Any collection, project, or cryptocurrency mentioned is purely for reference purposes. Ensure to do your own research about any NFT collection, as NotAnotherNFT will not take responsibility for any loss of investment that might arise from misinterpreting our content.