Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin wrote a paper about ‘soulbound tokens’ or SBTs. This is a kind of non-transferable NFTs to fight scams.
It’s widely known that Vitalik Buterin hates NFT.
More precisely, he hates the way the non-fungible token concept is developing, just making ‘rich people more wealthy’.
Buterin thinks that NFT technology should serve people more with different social projects, not just funny apes trading.
So recently he came up with his own plan to make the crypto community benefit from NFT.
The new concept Vitalik Buterin is pushing is called ‘soulbound tokens’ or SBTs. Though for now, it isn’t clear how these tokens would work.
What are SBTs?
A few weeks ago Buterin co-wrote a 37-page paper about Ethereum’s future and its role in the ‘Decentralized Society’ ecosystem.
In particular, the Vitalik Buterin mentioned the soulbound tokens that should be available later this year. The name comes from the World of Warcraft videogame, which Buterin has previously praised.
So basically SBTs are NFTs that some people can own based on their previous jobs and education history. SBTs are non-transferable and these tokens would represent a person’s reputation or accomplishments.
Buterin calls it a kind of ‘extended resume’ that would maintain people’s identities due to ‘unique, non-exchangeable badges’.
The whole point of this is to help fight scams and identity theft in the world of decentralized finances.
How the SBTs would work?
Vitalik Buterin supposes that universities would be issuing degrees as soulbound tokens, employers would give SBTs to their workers, etc.
The new token idea should make it impossible for scammers to steal someone’s identity. And it would also help employers to verify the job history or education of their potential workers during the hiring process.
A person’s SBTs would then be validated by other ‘souls’. That stands for people who can ensure your credentials and accomplishments. It’s kind of similar to LinkedIn connections where other people can verify your skills.
The new SBTs would be stored on a blockchain wallet, making it public, secure, and transparent.
Vitalik Buterin hopes that soulbound tokens would push Web3 forward by decreasing reliance on centralized companies. And people would have more power over their digital data.
Surely, there is also a chance for NFT artists to get rid of platforms like Twitter or OpenSea to sell their work, as they would have the opportunity to do it by themselves.
The main problem with this concept lies in the way of receive SBTs by people. Or simply how you should confirm your status and achievements.
Despite that, Vitalik Buterin thinks soulbound tokens can be ‘one path toward an alternative, where NFTs can represent much more of who you are and not just what you can afford.’
Although, that’s interesting how digital slavery can one day become digital liberations because of things like blockchain and Web3.
