Decentralized Identity: Your Reputation Travels With You - a16z crypto

The wealth of information stored on-chain could even upend markets as big as search and discovery. A range of matching algorithms will be enabled by the openly queryable nature of decentralized identities; whereas previously, matching algorithms could only be developed by whoever had access to our data. Additionally, until now we’ve only been able ... See more

Additionally, there’s a whole class of applications based around the use of reputation to incentivize new forms of creation or contribution. Currently, it is difficult to decipher who is a subject-matter expert and to recognize and reward them. With decentralized identities that track contributions across the internet, we will be better able to gau... See more

In the realm of talent sourcing, decentralized identities promise “open CVs” based on fine-grained records of professional activities and accomplishments. This could allow for a fuller picture of someone’s past work and provide more granular insight into their skills and contributions.

By moving identities on-chain, we could upend archaic financial processes and provide equitable access to capital, re-architect how talent is matched with projects, and provide entirely new paradigms for recognizing and compensating labor online.

More broadly, it is essential to expand access to sources of on-chain reputation. At present, crypto tends to skew affluent, male, and white. If the playing field for building on-chain identity isn’t leveled, this new source of reputation will accrue primarily to the already privileged, exacerbating existing social and socioeconomic divides.

ontextualizing information explains why you’ve earned or bought an artefact. Earning an NFT for a contribution to a project, for example, should provide context about why you earned it and what skills you demonstrated.

Managing reputation information also requires publicly accessible data standards — agreed upon formats for, say, “what an attestation of a contribution looks like” or “how to formulate an on-chain record.” Structuring these inputs to reputation ensures interoperability, both (1) enabling people to meaningfully combine parts of their decentralized i... See more

And in addition to organizing the raw data, it’s important to have systems that aggregate and simplify the information contained in a person’s wallet to make that information more clearly interpretable and comparable across individuals.

For the sake of logistical simplicity (and because different facets of a person’s identity naturally overlap and interact), it makes sense to store one’s relevant activities and contributions in a single wallet. But any given person isn’t solely a creator, builder, investor, or collector; they’re many things at once. Thus, we need some way to take ... See more