FAQ

A TLD, short for Top-Level Domain, is the last segment of a domain name – the part that comes after the final dot. The most common examples are .com, .org and .net.
Traditionally TLD’s were centralised by ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), a private organization and were not available to the public to register.
However since the development of the decentralized web (AKA DWeb or Web 3.0) there’s a whole wide world of different TLDs is now available to all.
Now you can own a piece of the Internet.
Nowadays TLD’s can be purchased with a one-time payment via auction at namebase.io.

A Second Level Domain (SLD) is the section of a domain name that is to the left of the dot. For example, the domain name apple.com, with ‘apple’ being the SLD and ‘.com’ being the TLD. This part of the domain is known as ‘second-level’ due to the hierarchy of the Domain Name System (DNS).
You can’t truly own a SLD as they are leased in yearly increments via agents of ICANN such as GoDaddy.

Yes, search intent is very important although keywords are not the be-and-end-all of SEO for domain names.
Instead, you should focus on creating a domain name that is well-branded and best for your business offering. Building a consistent and well-branded online presence will intertwine with your SEO efforts.
Brand recognition is critical to the success of your business. When your audience is aware of your brand and the story behind it, you will see more conversions and increased revenue.

It takes time to build the brand authority, but once you reach the point where your prospective clients know your brand well, you will have their trust leading to increased sales and recurring visits to your e-commerce store or business website. 

Handshake domain names are top-level domain names (TLDs like .com, . net or . org) but are available to own outright, not just to rent for an annual fee. You own your Handshake domain names forever, and no one can take them from you, or prevent others from accessing.

The decentralized web is simply a social-ecological system for publishing and sharing information, without being subjected to censorship from third parties.

Blockchain technology creates an environment where you can trade resources in a more trustful manner as it allows participants to establish trust despite the lack of available shortcuts or pre-existing frameworks. This means there are no middlemen like banks who stand between two traders.

The reason blockchain is such an important part of developing the decentralised web is because blockchain enables decentralisation by introducing different kinds of computers as nodes in a network, often called distributed ledgers. These blockchains form components for data storage that are permissionless and immutable which ends up making them a secure place for publishing information without worrying about any third party censorship.

Yes. Blockchain generically refers to any decentralized and distributed ledger or network whose records are maintained as “blocks” of information, which is linked cryptographically one after the other. You can host a website directly on blockchain, without any centralized web hosting service provider like Namecheap, Amazon Web Services or Siteground etc.

Embedding HNS links in the HTML content allows browsers with HNS compatible integrations to load its respective webpage from scratch without going through TLD servers.

The handshake between browser and webserver asymmetrically encrypts data/keys over HTTPS
Data blocks are assembled together into bundles for denser storage.

Blockchain is the next step in the evolution of the Internet.

HND was founded to host websites on blockchains, and because Handshake is a public blockchain they’re able to offer free hosting options for everyone who publishes their website through their partner network via HandshakePublish.

A website on a public blockchain will be 100% decentralized, 100% censorship resistant, and there’s no one stopping you from publishing freely whatever you want.

The downside here is that it might not always be as easy to find your website or have it rank very high in search engines because they (Google) don’t crawl or read content stored on blockchains like they do traditional web pages… yet!

Handshake ensures DNS records can be modified only by the name’s owner, which prevents Handshake domains from being censored or maliciously redirected.
The network maintains stability and security with a distributed system that doesn’t rely on any centralized server for data storage. All of this means you won’t have to worry about censorship-resistance when it comes to resolving names on the Handshake blockchain!