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Web3 and blockchain technology are redefining digital ownership, and domains are no exception. In this episode of The Edge of Show, Richard Carthon sits down with Sandy Carter of Unstoppable Domains to discuss how AI and blockchain are propelling domain ownership into the future. Carter predicts a seamless integration of Web2 and Web3 domains by 2026, removing the barriers between traditional DNS and on-chain domains. She also highlights how blockchain enhances AI verification processes, ensuring trust and authenticity in the digital space.
This conversation covers the latest trends in decentralized identity, the rise of AI-driven branding, and how owning an on-chain domain like sandy.podcast can be a game-changer. Don't miss this insightful discussion that unveils the next frontier of Web3, blockchain, and AI integration.
Key Topics Covered:
- On-Chain Domains & Future Integration – Sandy Carter predicts that on-chain domains will merge with traditional DNS by 2026, simplifying digital identity.
- Blockchain as a Trust Layer for AI – AI tools require verification, and blockchain provides a transparent way to authenticate digital assets and information.
- Decentralized AI and Web3 Growth – The intersection of AI and Web3 will drive new opportunities for digital ownership, branding, and asset verification.
- Unstoppable Domains & .Podcast Initiative – How Unstoppable Domains is revolutionizing digital identity with domain services that support blockchain and Web3 adoption.
- The Impact of AI on Branding and Domains – AI-driven branding solutions are making on-chain domains more valuable for businesses and individuals alike.
Episode Highlights:
- "Domains will no longer be Web2 or Web3; they will just be domains." – Sandy Carter
- "Blockchain is the trust layer that AI desperately needs to verify authenticity." – Sandy Carter
- "Owning your name. podcast is future-proofing your brand for Web3 and beyond." – Sandy Carter
- "The rise of decentralized AI will push blockchain adoption even further." – Richard Carthon
- "The intersection of AI and blockchain is unstoppable, and it's happening now." – Richard Carthon
People and Resources Mentioned:
About Our Guest:
Sandy Carter is the COO and Head of Business Development at Unstoppable Domains, leading the charge in decentralized domain services. With a rich background in AI and blockchain, including her tenure at IBM, Sandy has been at the forefront of Web3 innovation. She is a well-respected speaker and advocate for digital identity, driving adoption in the blockchain space.
LinkedIn Link
Instagram Link
Transcription:
Sandy Carther: Hi, this is Sandy Carter from Unstoppable Domains. We're redefining the future of digital identity with blockchain domains and Web3 innovation. You're tuned in to the Edge of Show where listeners explore the latest in Web3, AI and tech culture every week. Stay tuned.Richard Carthon : Hey Web3 curious listeners, get ready for today's episode to uncover how Unstoppable Domains achieved a groundbreaking 4.5 million domains and what it means for the future of digital identity. the exciting announcement of the new .podcast domain and its game-changing potential for creators and podcasters, and finally, Sandy Carter's insights on the utility of on-chain domains, their role in Web3, and the future of domain governance in a decentralized world. All of this and more at the edge of Unstoppable Domains. Cue the intro.Ad: Welcome to The Edge of Show, your gateway to the Web3 revolution. We explore the cutting edge of blockchain, cryptocurrency, NFTs, ordinals, DeFi, gaming and entertainment, plus how AI is reshaping our digital future. Join us as we bring you visionaries and disruptors pushing boundaries in this digital renaissance. This show is for the dreamers, disruptors, and doers that are pumped about where innovation meets culture. This is where the future begins.Richard Carthon : Hey, everyone. I'm Richard Carthon, and I'll be your host for today. Welcome to the Edge of Show featuring a variety of top-notch guests and other hosts. It's another production of the Edge of Company, a quickly growing media ecosystem empowering the pioneers of Web3 tech and culture, responsible for other groundbreaking endeavors like Outer Edge Innovation Festival and LA REopt. Today's episode features Sandy Carter, a global leader in AI and blockchain since 2013 and 2019, respectively. She is the CEO of Unstoppable Domains and driving digital identity innovation. Formerly an executive at AWS and IBM, she has spearheaded billions in revenue through her visionary leadership. Author of AI First, Human Always, and recognized as a Microsoft MSN top 10 AI entrepreneur, Sandy is shaping the future of emerging technologies with transformative impact. Asobo Domains is a leading provider of blockchain-based domain names that simplify cryptocurrency transactions by replacing complex addresses with human-readable names. Founded in 2018, it empowers users through digital identity with a one-time purchase model, eliminating renewal fees. The company collaborates with major players in the crypto space. And Sandy, it is great to have you back.Sandy Carther: Richard, it's great to be here. This is such an exciting podcast, I have to say, and I'm just so excited to reveal our news to everybody.Richard Carthon : I am as well. And it's always fun to have a conversation with you because you travel all over the world. You get to see a lot. You're constantly on the edge of innovation. And our last time on here was about a year ago. And we explored the potential of Web3 domains and how Unstoppable Domains is redefining user-owned identities. You did initiatives like Unstoppable Women. And you did a fascinating demo of messages between domains. And it was crazy insightful. And we went on to like do a couple of campaigns. And now you fast forward to today, and we have more to celebrate. So first, I want to kick this off to you with just saying like, congrats on achieving your milestone of 4.5 million domains like that is awesome.Sandy Carther: Thank you. We're really excited. And what we're really excited about is Richard, we're really providing so much value for users. And now, you know, last time we talked, we were trying to get the Web 2 folks to come over to us. Now we've gone to Web 2 instead of waiting for them to come. We're just really excited about providing this value, you know, throughout the world, not just for Web 3 or crypto natives.Richard Carthon : Absolutely. And I think that that gap of information of understanding is finally being bridged. And there's a lot that goes into that. So like, how do you attribute this incredible success and to get this achievement of, you know, 4.5 million domains?Sandy Carther: You know, we have an incredible team, first of all. The Inge team is innovating, innovating, innovating. Our business development sales team are constantly helping us with new partners. And Richard, part of what we do is to bring new communities on. We're really doing it one community at a time. So for example, You know, we partner with onchain.org to bring .onchain on. And this opens up a whole new world for their entire community. We just announced Crow with Knife, which is a very interesting community. Now this opens up that value prop to all of them. So I love the fact that the business development and sales team really knows how to reach out to some of those amazing communities. And then of course, our marketing team, communications team does a great job trying to communicate, but more importantly, try to educate. That's one of our big goals is educating people. Like how would you use this? What's the value of it? Not just that you have it and you change your Twitter handle, which we want you to do, but what can you do with it is really important. So I really attribute it all back to the team doing so many great things. And then Richard, our community. Our community is bar none one of the best communities out there. I mean, they're always supporting, they're helping each other. They're just amazing advocates for what we're doing because they've seen the value. And without that community, the owners of those 4.5 million domains, we wouldn't be where we are today without them. So a big call out to the community overall. And then finally, I would say we have probably the best support team out there in the business. They answer questions. We just added a new feature. Of course, we had a lot of tickets come in, and their customer sat rating went up. I was like, oh my gosh, guys, you are amazing. You had all these tickets come in. You handle it so gracefully, and you really came through that you wanted to help all of these users. And so it shows in your numbers. So anyway, it's all about the team, all about the team.Richard Carthon : No doubt. And, you know, user experience is very important. And when people can come in and can see and get their needs taken care of through your service team, but then also your core team being able to educate and then constantly innovate to make that experience even more seamless and helping them understand what's going on is a great recipe for success. And clearly you all have the recipe going on. And one of the things that I'm impressed with is your ability to educate around on-chain domains? Because it's more than just web addresses, right? It's like defining or redefining digital identity and utility. So how is Ensembl Domains pushing this envelope forward with domains and what's the next frontier of the functionality?Sandy Carther: So the power of on-chain domains, I think, is really one of the biggest selling benefits. And that is that if you have an on-chain domain, You can use that domain to transact in crypto. And that means like a native like .crypto or like we just announced .onchain. All of those will support crypto. But now we also tokenize or bring onchain.coms.ai.xyz. And so all of those now have that superpower too. Also, with that being on-chain, on-chain also brings to the party the ability to do a group chat. So if you want to talk to like, everybody who loves Edge of NFT, everybody who loves Edge of AI, everybody who loves Edge of Quantum, you can do that in separate messages. So people are really focused on what's really interesting to them. Now, Richard, One of the interesting things is I just got back from Austin, and I was talking to a lot of our partners, like Austin, the city of Austin. And it was fascinating to me to kind of walk through how we got to even the terminology of on-chain. So if you remember back, there was a Today show, and it was a 30-minute show on what is online. And we kind of all laugh, right? Like, how does it take 30 minutes to explain that you're on the internet? But it was such a new concept back then that when I was watching the little replay of it, it was really fascinating seeing people grasp for how to explain that now you've got information digitized online. And the same thing is now true for on-chain. Everybody's starting to use the word. It'll grow and grow and grow. And all on-chain means is that you now have a digital asset, something that's digitized, and now you're placing it on the blockchain. The power of that is that no one entity, no one person, no one company owns that data. Now, now it's on the blockchain or on chain. And I even laugh at the similarities. I was looking, doing some history lesson and I saw originally online was on dash line. Did you know that? I didn't even know that people used to do on dash line. And then finally it became such a term. It just became online. And so I was talking to someone the other day about on-chain and they sent me back an email and they did on-chain. And we do on-chain because we're so used to it now. And so the parallels between the two are fascinating. The next future of the internet is on-chain. And so I love that every one of your listeners are going to be able to know that, be cool, be one of the OGs in the space because they'll be one of the first to use on-chain.Richard Carthon : No, absolutely. And I think even that part of the education, it's always a helpful reminder to go back and like, look how far we come over time and how regular terms are for us, are you know, mean nothing to a lot of other people that are outside of this space. But even the verbiage around using on chain multiple times, like, really digging deep into that, I think is important for more and more people to understand, especially as we keep talking about this bridge between web two and web three. On chain is one of those words that's definitely going to be one that sticks around and used even more. But kind of getting back into the digital identity piece of it, because I think you did a good job of saying like, here's how this is on chain and people can quickly identify, you know, how do you keep seeing or how do you see blockchain domains evolving to become the backbone of decentralized identity for not just individuals, but potentially businesses?Sandy Carther: So domains have long been an asset for companies, right? So if you think about .com, for example, .com, amazon.com, edgeofpodcast.com, edgeofnft.com, unstoppable.com, they've really been the identity of your company. They represent your brand. It's how you're portrayed. And it's one of the most important branding or marketing decisions you make. Because if you select a company name and then you can't match it with the .com address or .xyz or .ai, then you've got a branding issue as you go forward. And so it's a really crucial decision for a company because it does set their identity or brand, which is what we call it for a company. The same thing is true on-chain. So on-chain, more of the domains represent a digital identity of a person. And so it's a little bit different in that you've got people now that are coming forward with their brand or their digital identity. And so inside of your digital identity, which is represented by a domain, you could have things like, I went to the Super Bowl, a ticket. You could have information about your CV, your resume that exists in there. When you're working with a city, you're looking at a digitized driver's license. your membership in a chamber of commerce, or even we know California is doing car titles now that are digitized that you could keep in your digital identity. And so this just opens the door to a whole new world of having a real world asset or RWA represented in a digitized fashion. And typically where you would store that is inside of a domain representing your digital identity. I was even on the phone yesterday with a company that is now digitizing authenticity for a purse. Let's say you bought a Louis Vuitton purse or a Chanel purse. You're going to now get a digitized record that sits on chain that shows you that the purse you just purchased was actually originated from Louis Vuitton. And then where do you store that? Well, you might store that in your digital identity. And so I think in the future, this digital identity for people will become the hub of who they are. Just like today, a website You know, think about it. If you're talking about any product, any service, any company, where do you send them? You send them to your website. either to your homepage or to a sub page, that's where you send them. In the future, I believe that will be also true for us as people. You'll send people to your digital identity and they can look at what you've allowed them to see. Because we know that eventually you'll have healthcare data in there. And you know, I don't want you to know how much I weigh. I don't want you to know my age. I don't want you to know my blood pressure. And so I could hide that information and then reveal what I want to reveal about myself digitally as well.Richard Carthon : It's very powerful. I think you did a good job of explaining basically like the personal branding standpoint, understanding like there's a lot of decision making that goes into like the dot com, right? Or the dot AI or X, Y, Z, et cetera. And now that things are going on chain, it allows for a lot more variability around the dot, whatever you want to put after that. So in that same vein, you just announced the launch of .podcast. And for those who are listening, I encourage you to go check us out over on our YouTube for this video. If you look at us both right now, I have Richard.podcast, Sandy has sandy.podcast.Sandy Carther: This is a big moment. This is really cool.Richard Carthon : It is, I think it's awesome. It's a huge step for the creator economy. And I also think it gives a lot of people who not only are creating content in podcasting, but potentially aspire to do something in the future, you can go in and get that. So like, what was the inspiration with this move? And like, how do you think it helps to empower podcasters like us and other content creators?Intro/Outro: Let's take a pause to shout out one of our favorite partners. VR, AR, quantum computing, and more, ZuberLawler offers expert guidance in capital raising, IP transactions, M&A, litigation, and compliance. Visit ZuberLawler.com, that's Z-U-B-E-R-L-A-W-L-E-R.com for cutting edge legal solutions.Sandy Carther: So we believe because your digital identity represents you, and if you think about you, you take on lots of different roles, right? Like I'm a mom, I'm a boss babe, I'm a wife, I'm a podcaster. So I have lots of different things. And so that ending, what we call a top level domain or TLD, that ending actually helps put me in my tribe, gets me with my community. And so I love .podcast, and you know, Richard, you and I and Josh work together on this. .podcast now really gives us a community of podcasters, people who love to have a podcast, one day hope to have a podcast. I think it really helps to set the tone for a new tribe, a new tribe of creators, which is growing and growing and growing around podcast. And so I think that this is a really powerful announcement, not only for the on-chain version, but we've also agreed and worked with you and Josh on taking this to ICANN when the GTLD process opens up. For those of you who don't know, ICANN really manages DNS domains, or like your .coms and your .ai's. And we want to make this domain not just have all the superpowers of on-chain, but have all the superpowers of DNS, which would mean it would be searchable and taggable with a browser. And so we're really excited because right now your .podcast will be on chain and have all of their superpowers. When ICANN opens up for the next application, which should be at the end of 2025, then you could have all, if they approve it, they have to approve it. they could have now all the superpowers of Web 2 as well. So imagine, you know, instead of saying, hey, go to my superpodcast.com, you say, hey, go to sandy.podcast, or go to, you know, besttipsonai.podcast. It really shows off immediately that this is a podcast, the branding is clear, and that's part of a branding battle, right? I've been a CMO a couple of times. Clear branding, branding that people can understand is super important.Richard Carthon : Absolutely. Clarity in the name and having something like Dot Podcast, you immediately know, hey, whatever's in front of that, this is what I'm expecting at the end of it. And there's a couple of things in there that I think is really awesome for people to really digest with this. It's like this isn't just the Web3 moment. This has the opportunity to also bridge over into Web2. But I want to spend a little bit more time into the ICANN just for a second, because there's a conversation that's arising around like ICANN and traditional domains in the intersection of blockchain based domains. So, you know, how do you think these worlds continue to converge? Or do you think there's going to be a clash as we kind of move into the future?Sandy Carther: No, actually, I feel like I am making history. And Richard, you and Josh are making history. And here's why. When you have a new emerging technology, like a blockchain, The real moment that you know that you've made it is when you stop talking about it. It's kind of funny, right? So, you know, we don't go around going, oh, let's look up my Web 2 website. We say, go to the website. And that's what's happening with domains. So right now we have to say, oh, this is your on-chain domain, and this is your DNS domain. But when we bring those two together, if approved by ICANN, and when the application process starts, Now .podcast will be a domain. We're not going to talk about Web 2 and Web 3 because now it has the superpowers of both. So it's really a history-making moment. I believe that the first asset that will have the superpowers of both and will not have to qualify Web 2 or Web 3 will be this domain name. So all of you who get your podcast will be participating in history because it will be the first time that both of these come together, which I think is super exciting as we see domains going to a neutral zone, signaling the acceptance of the new technology.Richard Carthon : Yeah, I think so as well. When we were talking about, you know, partnering on this, I got really excited because I've been doing a lot of domain websites within my own career and always had like an appetite towards it, which is why when we've done our collaborations in the past, I was always like, yeah, let's figure out how we can keep doing more with Unstoppable. But to really be potentially cemented in history to make this happen, I think is exceptional. But what I think is even more exceptional is like it's just not limited to us, right? Like anyone can come in, participate and be a part of it. So for those who are listening, they're like, yo, this sounds really cool. Like what are some of those steps they can take to potentially be a part of this?Sandy Carther: So it's really easy to get your name. You just go up to unstoppabledomains.com. You can search for sandy.podcast. Of course, that won't be taken, of course. But you can search for yourname.podcast and grab that online. You can pay for it with a credit card, pay for it with PayPal, or you can pay for it in crypto. So anyway, we support all types of payments right now. And then once you get it, you can set it up so that you can start using it for payment and crypto or for using it for chats with maybe different segments of your podcast audience. But one of the things I would just really encourage you to do is to think about your brand. You know, go grab the obvious ones like your name, your first name, your first name and last name. But then think about like what you want your brand to be. For example, I love that you guys have EdgeOf, and now you can do EdgeOf NFT, EdgeOf AI, EdgeOf Quantum, EdgeOf, you know, podcasts, right? Whatever you want to do, you have this EdgeOf innovation idea. So I think that's a great brand. And now you guys are going to grab EdgeOf.podcast. I think that everybody listening should think through the same thing. Maybe you already have a podcast, so you've already got the name, so go grab that name. But maybe you're aspiring to start a podcast. I've just talked to three people this week alone who are like, yeah, my dream is to start a podcast. I've already got a name for it. So think about that name and go and grab it now, because once it's taken, It's taken. You can't come back to Richard. You can't go to Josh. You can't come to me. You have to go to the owner of whatever that is and buy it from them because this is true ownership, right? That person now owns it. So I would really encourage you to start first with thinking about your brand, how you want to brand your podcast and grabbing whatever that brand name is. in addition to your first name and your last name as well. I think that's really important. Would you agree, Richard, picking that name from a marketing perspective is so crucial?Richard Carthon : It is. And being able to be a first mover in it is critical as well, right? I even think about some of the earlier email addresses. There's a guy that was able to get A at Apple.com or other stuff like that. And just thinking about those historical moments to be able to come in and get exactly the name that you want, but then also to have the creativity to pick multiple options and then just have them on deck in case and know that that's going to be there. I just want to circle back to an education.Sandy Carther: Hang on one second. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you, but I was just thinking just from that little statement that you said, you know, I'm thinking host.podcast. You have host up there on your little name tag, right? Host.podcast or firstmover.podcast. or AI.podcast. I'm sure that one's going to go like that, right? I mean, those are the type of things that we're thinking about here. Like as Richard and I are talking, any of those would be valid. And you can get a few of them because of what's happening in the marketplace. You may want to get AI now and then quantum. Quantum will be soon right behind it. You may want to grab that one up too. So anyway, those are the types of things we're talking about just to make it real. Sorry, go ahead.Richard Carthon : I mean, it makes a ton of sense. Like even when people think about sports, people who think like, there's so many different niches of conversation. And like, you can just go get so many different variances.Sandy Carther: I talked to a woman today who's the co founder of a vodka company. And she literally she's gonna start she and I were chatting. She's gonna start a podcast about vodkas.Richard Carthon : Wow.Sandy Carther: So vodka dot podcast. I mean, that's super cool, too. Right? I mean, I don't know. There's so there's just so many choices out there.Richard Carthon : Oh, absolutely. But kind of just circling back to the education piece of this, because I think this is still really cool. When you think about bridging that education gap, you just came from from Austin, and you're talking to people who are still wrapping their heads around, like what all of this means. And again, you've kind of alluded to it earlier. You have over 4.5 million people that have now come to this. What has been a great hooks that got people to understand, ah, I get it. Here's why this is important. Here's why I need to start acting on this sooner than later. Like what has been some of the like that those concepts that really resonate with people?Sandy Carther: Well, the number one area is really around crypto transactions. So for example, you know, I want to use sandy.podcast and I want to go buy something. I was just at CES and Vegas, you know, is international. People are ahead of us in crypto internationally. And I went in probably seven or eight stores that accepted Bitcoin or any kind of crypto. I could have used sandy.podcast to pay for my item. I actually use sandy.crypto to pay for one of my items. And so I think if you're into crypto, that would be the first use case. We do about 10 million resolutions every week on taking sandy.podcast to a wallet address and vice versa. And why would you want to do that? Well, just like in the online days, you know, you used to have to type in 129.86.04.07 to get to a website. Instead of typing in unstoppable.com, you actually have to type in numbers. And of course you could get a number wrong and then you ended up with the wrong website. And so you replaced it with something that's human readable. And that's what we're doing here. Sandy.podcast represents your wallet. Instead of typing in 21 characters and numbers, you just type in Sandy.podcast. So I think some people, Richard, really love that, like they're all in on crypto. I was just in Austin, they said about 50% of their citizens today are crypto holders. which is pretty interesting. And so they'll want to use it for that. But let's say you don't like crypto, you're all about cash. So you want to use it for something out where you can you can use it for chatting with people. So let's imagine I'm assuming that you and Josh will set up group chats with maybe people in your podcast from AI people in your podcast from quantum maybe from sports. And then you are able to use your domain to have a conversation with all those people who have similar interests. You no longer need to know their email address. You don't have to know their phone number. You can just know the Sandy.podcast and I can reach out to them. We can do that in groups of people. This is right now our number two use case, especially for you know, the Web 2 users who really aren't into crypto yet. That is such a powerful use case. All your conversations are encrypted. You can find like-minded people. You know, you have badges that you guys are bringing out, badges, and badges help you to sort or tokenize into groups. And you can get, you know, different benefits based on those separations by the badge. So I think that's probably number two, and one of the biggest use cases. And then I will just do three, because I could talk all day on this, Richard, we could take up the whole podcast on this. But number three is really around using it to represent yourself. So setting up your ud.me page, which is like a profile page, just like you have in LinkedIn, except everything is trusted and verified. You used these words earlier. It's really important to know that what's now inside of your digital identity is trusted and verifiable. And what do I mean by that? Well, if you look at LinkedIn, I actually just did this this morning on ChatGPT, and you go in there and you ask, how many people on LinkedIn do not tell the truth about where they went to school? And you'll see whether you use ChatGPT, whether you use Claude, whether you use Perplexity, it's about 30% of people who don't put their correct school on their LinkedIn profile. There's no way to check that out. There's no verification of that. But inside of something that's on chain, like this digital identity, you can verify it. It could be what we call a soul bound token, meaning I went to Harvard. I get a diploma that's digitized. I can't transfer it to Richard because Richard didn't go to Harvard. It's locked to me. And then it's verified. So I know that it's mine, not someone else's. The other interesting thing, I think anyway, that's fascinating, is the NFL, the football game was here in Phoenix, and we were chatting, they had given away NFT tickets. So an NFT for your users is basically a digitized ticket that sits on chain. So it's not a paper ticket, it's a digital ticket. And before they did that, they were looking for who went to the Super Bowl. And you might say, well, they should know who went to the Super Bowl. Well, no, because people buy tickets through Ticketmaster and DigiTicket and whatever. So they don't know actually who went to the Super Bowl. So one year, they decided to scrape social media and say, OK, everybody who said, I was at the Super Bowl, they were going to scrape that. And they came up with a lot of people five times bigger than a stadium, five times, Richard. That means that there were people tweeting or posting on Facebook, I'm at the Superbowl, who weren't at the Superbowl. And so now you've got this digitized ticket that sits inside your identity. So you can prove I was at the Superbowl, or I was at this Gary V event, or I went to that AI seminar that was at ASU. Now I can verify that I was there. I'm so excited about that as well, having something that's verified. I was talking to one reporter, and I was showing it to him. He went away and did his own. And he came back to me, and he said, you know what's really interesting is on LinkedIn, I can say whatever I want to be on my LinkedIn page. And I try to make it look pretty, and I try to make it represent. But he said, then I had this on-chain profile. which is really who I am, because I can't fake it. It's got to be like who I am. It's verified. And he said, I learned a lot about myself, actually, that I wasn't thinking about that really does make up who I am. So anyway, I'm really excited about that. I think that's pretty cool. And yeah, that's super exciting.Richard Carthon : I think those are three really good points and just to add one more flavor about being able to just to prove, going just back to LinkedIn as another one, I have multiple times on various companies that I've either started or have been a part of where I have random people that say that they work there and I'm just like, not only do I have to report it, a lot of times they it can't go away, right? So it's just it's wild that like, there's no real verifiable way to do that. But doing a process like this, where you can like truly say like, yep, this person is here, or did XYZ, and that's on your profile, and you can truly prove it a real voice of truth. I think that is very powerful. And it's something that people can resonate with. And, of course, sending payments, of course, being able to have communications. But The concept that just those three, I know there's more you can talk about, just those three, all in just having this domain name, like that's power. That's very powerful. And so hopefully a lot of people that are listening to this get intrigued, want to go learn and start doing some next steps with that. But I have just like two more questions for you. One of them's around just like ensuring the trust and security. And you kind of were diving into this around the last thing that you were speaking on. But I guess the question becomes like, so how does Unstoppable Domain actually do that, right? So like, how are you able to verify and get people to actually prove? Yes, I win, Eric. Yes, XYZ.Sandy Carther: So it's really not us. We provide the vessel where you can store it. So, for example, we're working with one partner who digitizes your resume. We're working with events who digitize their tickets. So, for example, we have a a Psyche ticket, or I wasn't so lucky to go to the Super Bowl. But had you gone to the Super Bowl and placed it in your wallet, you would also see that ticket on there. So it's not us that are verifying it. It's actually the source of truth, right? It's the university, it's the event themselves. For example, for the Louis Vuitton verification, they're actually doing that through TRIC, which is a consortium of luxury fashion providers, I guess, for a better word. And they're all bounding together. So they all have this source of truth that yes, you own a Louis Vuitton or yes, you own a Burberry, whatever. So that source of truth doesn't come from us, it comes from them. And then we accept it in and we allow you to display it and have a single place for it. So for example, You know, a lot of places are starting to digitize licenses and digitize car titles, and their citizens are coming to them going, oh, this is great, but how do I see it? How do I know where all these things are, right? Cool, I got all this digitized, but now it's all over the place. And so we're like the centralized provider of your identity, and that's where all these things go.Richard Carthon : Got it. Yeah, very helpful. And just being able to have all this place live in a singular place because I just see like how many layers this can go very quickly. But it just having that first place to start, and you like, like can grow from there. I think it's important because when I when I think about this concept, just being on chain, just to go back into that simple concept, the concept of when.com the internet first came out, it took a lot for people to absorb that. Getting into crypto for the first time is like drinking through a firehose. It's a lot to understand when you initially come in. But having places where you can initially start as the starting point, I think is a really good place to do that. So I think as we kind of wrap the conversation, where I want to move forward is like, We're already at a really cool inflection point here in 2025. But what is your vision for the future of Web3 and blockchain and how we continue to be more connected in this digital world?Sandy Carther: Well, I see there's going to be, you know, one of my predictions is that domains, whether you're a company or a person, will become a domain. It won't be a Web2 domain or a DNS domain and a Web3 or on-chain domain. It will just be a domain. I think that's a pretty big projection. And I think that will come true by 2026. When we get through this next ICANN process. I also see, you know, blockchain is being propelled forward right now. by lots of different forces. One is the new administration that's come in and their focus on these digital assets. I think that's going to propel everything forward. I'm already seeing it. I'm seeing people new come into the space. We just have to kick off an educational series because we're really interested in educating all these new people coming in. And I think a lot of that is already driven by, you know, the media and Twitter and others all talking about blockchain and crypto and people are like, what is like, I have to know what it is. I also see another force, which is another massive force, which is artificial intelligence, technology. Everybody's using it. I mean, when has there ever been another time when you had something that's improved so greatly? Like AI has improved so much since I first worked on it in 2013 at IBM. and made so easy at the same time, right? That's the world we're living in now. But AI has gaps. And one of the gap fillers, one of the biggest gap fillers is blockchain. that trusted verification we've been talking about, how do you verify that something is true? Think about, you know, the trick consortium with fashion brands in it, they need to be able to verify that this bag is true. And it's not AI that's just going to be used, it has to be verifiable on chain, because that's where it's stored. And so I see this force, again, pushing forward blockchain. So I think in the future, we're going to see a lot more decentralized AI or on-chain AI. I think we're going to see more and more assets become just an asset, not a Web 2, not a Web 3, but just an asset as we move forward. And I see just a lot of progress. for you right now listening in to future proof what you're doing. I usually hate that marketing word. But right now it really is true, right? I mean, you buy your Sandy dot podcast, you have it right now for on chain, you'll have it hopefully if I can approve it next year on DNS. And now you've got both of these great worlds covered. And as AI starts helping with branding, and, you know, just the other day, I was asking Claude a question, and it was already starting to recommend things to me. Now your domain is going to become even more important as a placeholder of your brand and your information. And so you really are future-proofing what you're doing, not only for blockchain, not only for what we call DNS right now, but also for the new era of AI. I'm just wicked excited about it, and I love being able to make history, right? Make our playbook, make history, and every single one of you can participate in that as well.Richard Carthon : I think that's awesome. I share the candor of being able to be a part of history. Back when I first learned about cryptocurrency and Web3, I was like, this is the newest innovation that's going to continue to propel forward. And it's been an awesome journey. But like even just the concept of on-chain and getting more involved in this world, I see where this is going to and continue to innovate. And then the final thing of what you just said, the intersection of AI and blockchain, I absolutely agree. There's a reason why virtuals blew up and you're seeing a lot of other competitors in the space come and do something similar. That will continue to thrive as well. But Sandy, I think the future is bright. I think what you're doing is continuing to move things in the right way. But as we wrap here, for people who want to learn more about you, who want to learn more about Unstoppable Domains, and just want to keep getting this education, where can they go?Sandy Carther: So I'm all over social media. So you can reach me at Sandy underscore Carter at Twitter or Sandy underscore founder, I'm sorry, Carter founder at Instagram or Sandy Carter on LinkedIn. You can reach me out at all of those ways. In the on-chain world, you can find me at sandy.podcast, which is right here. Make sure you grab that sandy.pod or your own, sorry, your name.podcast. You can also learn more about Unstoppable at unstoppabledomains.com. That would be where you'd grab that domain, that new podcast, I hope. However, on Twitter, we're Unstoppable Web because someone already had domain. So if you follow Unstoppable Domains on Twitter, you won't be following us. So follow Unstoppable Web on Twitter. And we're also on LinkedIn and Instagram and everything else as well. So thank you for this time today. I really appreciate being on. first of all, sincerely, congratulations on the launch of .podcast. I think this is super big news. And I want to personally thank the whole team at EdgeOf, because, you know, I think .podcast, first of all, is a wicked cool naming service. And I think it's going to really shake up the whole world and help us identify all of the podcasters and future podcasters who are out there.Richard Carthon : I agree. It's always great to have you on the show. Thanks again for sharing all your knowledge. For everyone listening, make sure you go follow her. If you have questions, go and do that. And for those who are looking to participate, go grab your .podcast. Until next time, everybody.Ad: We've reached the outer limit at the edge of show for today. Thanks for exploring with us. We have room for more adventurers on our starship, so invite your friends and cool strangers to join our journey. If you're among the hundreds of thousands following us on Spotify, iTunes, iHeartRadio, or watching us on Mico or YouTube, please hit that subscribe button, rate us, and make an awesome comment too. 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