Decentralized naming systems like @HNS and @namecoin seem focused on competing with DNS. They're also hopelessly complicated. Is there equivalent for user names instead of DNS?

I think the challenge is you need to drop the idea of creating a global namespace. Otherwise you end up with DNS or blockchain solutions, both of which are centralized. You need something that doesn't rely on the entire system being aware of all other names.

I know this is maybe something we'll never agree on, but I don't see the problem with a global namespace? Isn't it a feature? It makes the web work! It makes the phone system work! It makes email work!

The reality is that the only real question of a global namespace is a regulatory one - who gets ultimate control of it? And in that, DNS is actually not a bad approach and has spent ~30 years ironing out regulatory bugs and has found a pretty stable spot.

Agreed! And all the blockchain versions of a global namespace have nowhere near this level of experience in maintaining the system in the long term, and are very likely much more fragile than DNS

Yup. I've said similar things in the past, but now more than ever, I wonder if the way to think about this stuff is to take a different tack, and instead ask: "Given all the potential negatives of email-style identities, what would email address portability look like?"

i.e., is that something that *must* happen with consent from email providers/domain controllers? Or is it something that could be baked into ssb/deltachat/similar? What would ownership verification look like in that case?