Web3 Credentials: The Future of Digital Identity and Education

Forget those easily forged PDFs and embellished resumes – the future of proving your skills is happening on the blockchain. In this eye-opening episode, we dive deep into how on-chain credentials are revolutionizing education, employment, and community building by creating permanent, verifiable proof of your achievements.

We explore why blockchain-based credentials matter: they can never be lost, altered, or questioned. Unlike traditional certificates that require lengthy verification processes, on-chain credentials provide instant proof through immutable blockchain records. These digital certifications serve as more than just proof – they function as keys, unlocking access to exclusive communities, events, and opportunities previously unavailable to most people.

The timing couldn't be better. With the Web3 job market exploding and companies desperate for qualified talent, having verifiable blockchain credentials positions you perfectly to capitalize on these opportunities. We announce our "Fundamentals of Web3 and Digital Identity" course launching February 1st at LearnWeb3.xyz – designed to give you comprehensive understanding of blockchain technology while earning your first on-chain credential that proves your knowledge to employers worldwide.

Think beyond resumes. What if your achievements were instantly verifiable by anyone, anywhere? What if your digital wallet contained credentials that automatically qualified you for promotions, bonuses, or exclusive opportunities? This isn't some distant future – it's happening now. Visit LearnWeb3.xyz to join our waiting list and be part of the community that's redefining how we prove our worth in the digital age. Your career in Web3 starts with a credential that can never be questioned.

Chapters

• 0:00 Tech Talk Introduction & Updates
• 4:05 Freename's $6.5M Series A Funding
• 6:25 On-Chain Credentials Introduction
• 8:51 Benefits of On-Chain Education
• 13:16 Practical Applications for Employers
• 17:29 Learn Web3.xyz Course Launch
• 22:16 Career Advantages & Closing Thoughts

Transcript

Speaker 2: 1:19

Thank you, gm. Gm, I check 1212. Hopefully you can hear me loud and clear. But, yeah, welcome to our tech talk. Yeah, we do this. I just started here in just a moment I am actually pinning some things to the top of the space that I will be referencing. But, yeah, glad to be here and hop into it. And yeah, again, we'll be live in just a moment. Alrighty, alrighty, that moment did not take long.

Speaker 2: 2:06

This is actually an extremely busy weekend, as typical if you've ever been in any space with me. If anybody wants to hop up on stage, please feel free to request a speaker role. Always enjoy another perspective or someone to add to the conversation. But yeah, in the meantime, I'm going to go ahead and get started and, once again, thank you and welcome to our Tech Talk podcast. We do this now bi-weekly. We used to do this weekly, now it's bi-weekly, but this is a discussion where we'll record and highlight news, innovation, education, alpha and business development in the Web3 domain namespace.

Speaker 2: 2:40

I am your host, marcus aka 1Airdrop, founder of iHeartDomains, and we are your number one resource for unbiased Web3 and blockchain domain educational content, with over 125 recorded Tech Talk episodes and YouTube videos produced and archived over the past two and a half years. You can search our entire podcast archive for prior recordings and an easy-to-read blog overview of each episode at iHeartDomainscom. Also any resources. If you're looking for how to mint a domain, if you're looking for again basically any resources connected to the space, whether it be our content, anything we put out or anything that we're pushing, iheartdomains is the place to go. Our AI bot is also built in natively into the site. It's like a little chat bubble on the right-hand side. So if you want to do any domain name appraisals or anything like that, feel free to hit the bot. But again, prior recordings are also available in podcast form on every major podcast player, including Apple Podcasts, spotify and iHeartRadio, and you can easily reach those at techcom.

Speaker 2: 3:45

All right, so until before we get into the main topic, I first would like to touch on some industry news, as typically the biggest news and really the only news that I'm going to mention that's happened in recent is, if you're anywhere near our ecosystem or my world, you'll know that Freename, who I also work for as their customer and community success manager, just raised $6.5 million in their latest series A, which is a humongous feat. Expect a lot of communication and kind of what we call it different content from our founders and other members of our team. You know now and for the next couple of days, or at least the next couple of weeks you also the strength of FreeName and what they've been building in this past couple of years, and also that they are now well-funded to continue to build into the future. So, again, proud to have been an investor in FreeName from the very beginning, owning one of the very first TLDs I'm in the first 50 TLDs that was ever issued on their platform, so very proud to be aligned with them. This is a proud moment, not only for them but for me as well. And then, obviously, getting to be on the team is kind of like a little dipping.

Speaker 2: 5:11

So, anyone, if you're not familiar with the Freename ecosystem, please feel free to reach out and ask any questions you have. Anything, I mean anything. There's a lot of opportunity there. There's a lot of opportunity everywhere. Learning about the opportunity here doesn't negate the opportunity that exists somewhere else. You've heard the term diversify your bags, put your eggs in more than one basket. Well, if you want to learn about this basket, I'm definitely here for you.

Speaker 2: 5:45

Announcement which is the? Uh, the, the what do you call it? The announcement that's posted to the ball every single spaces is that registrations are available for our dot dgenexchange and dot d5 wallet tlds iheartdomainscom. If you visit our website, you'll see an easy to click tab. They'll allow you to register from either of those three tlds and, of course, if you buy your name once, you own it forever, no renewals. And, yeah, any available coupon codes that Freedom has out are usable on our TLDs, all right.

Speaker 2: 6:12

Well, that being said, I'm very excited about this space. This is a long time coming, but, as you can see at the top, the title is On-Chain Education with three dot X, y Z, and it's not going to be I'm not going to, it's not going to be focused specifically just on learn web three X, y Z. I really hope that during this space, I'm able to convey the narrative of on chain credentials in general, right, the value that I believe that is going to bring in the space, the future of it, and you know kind of why you want to get ahead of the curve now. But then again, we're going to explore why this matters Again, proving your credentials on-chain. We're going to talk about what on-chain actually means and, again, why it may change your community, your career, your community access and even personal opportunities. So again, let's talk about the big picture.

Speaker 2: 7:06

Why should anyone care about putting their name on or putting any educational credentials on chain? Well, right now, proving you've completed a course or gained certain skills, it usually involves traditional certificates, pdfs or a resume, your CV. But those things can be lost, they can be forged and they can especially be questioned. I would think that probably the most common things that happens is people embellish their CVs or their resumes or their LinkedIn accounts right. But enter on-chain credentials right, something that's permanent and immutable. Your credentials that you earn live securely on a blockchain, so they can never be altered or deleted. These things would be instantly verifiable, so that now employers, communities and others can instantly verify your credentials without having to contact that institution or waiting for those documents or the documents to be active Right. But then the other part is that these things are also completely owned by you, so you get to control these credentials directly through your digital wallet. No centralized authority can revoke or alter your achievements.

Speaker 2: 8:15

This isn't just a slight improvement. It's a revolutionary leap forward for education, personal credibility and digital identity. Now here's why I'm excited to learn or to launch our new course, which is titled the Fundamentals of Web 3 and Digital Identity. I know the LearnWeb3.xyz is kind of what gets branded out there and gets stuck, but the course itself is called the Fundamentals of Web 3 and Digital Identity and of course we're launching that. It's going live on the first. It'll be launched not only as a course, but there will also be a community group where students who are both learning right now, as well as mentors and other community members, will be welcome to come, kind of collaborate and build with each other. So if you're listening to this and you wanna belong to that group and wanna join that community, I would be happy to have you there.

Speaker 2: 9:04

But why is this course so important, right? Well, it offers a comprehensive understanding of blockchain, crypto, nfts, web3 domains, digital ownership and decentralized identity all in one. Upon completion, students will receive a unique on-chain verifiable credential directly linked to their digital identity. That means no more lost certificates or chasing down records. Imagine applying for a job or joining an exclusive online community. All you need is a single verifiable credential proving your skills instantly recognizable and credible worldwide. That's the power of on-chain education that I'm both trying to unlock and inspire with LearnWeb3.xyz. But let's talk practical benefits right, like why would an employer or community leader prefer on-chain credentials as opposed to the way that we're currently doing this?

Speaker 2: 10:04

And this is where it takes some belief right, but it also takes some common sense as we see where this space is going. We've spent all of these years pretty much beating down the door to let people know the value of blockchain, digital identity, crypto, web3, and it's a landing right. So when it does land right, the benefits of Web3 or blockchain, are what employers are going to seek to look for, and one of the things with on-chain credentials that it offers for anyone who is looking to hire someone is it offers one instant verification, so there's no more waiting for references. They'll still may have to perform a background check, but in web 3, you might get past that. If the skill sets enough, employers can instantly validate your skills and credentials. On chain right, there's increased trust and transparency. So, of course, on-chain credentials are tamper-proof. If you're receiving credentials from a credible source, they know that they can take that as base value. Employers and communities can trust that your achievements are genuine if they're coming from a genuine place. Again, that's the beauty of blockchain. Blockchain enables them to trace back the origin of that credential to its original source, again making it easier for employers to get through the weeds and not be misled by people who are again embezzling the resume, companies can quickly identify top talent and skilled candidates without having to sift through lengthy resumes or waiting for validation, and it really can speed up the hiring and create fair opportunities for everyone involved. Last thing and this is the part that we're, you know, I'm really going to see, I think we're going to see a benefit in is that there are going to be exclusive or professional communities that can verify their membership instantly. So imagine, again, an employer that needs to create or wants to create some sort of incentive or community group for a certain group or segment of employees. Or let's say that there is a professional community for people that have a certain type of experience and if you hold this certificate, you can enter it.

Speaker 2: 12:09

We've long talked about one of the biggest benefits of blockchain is being able to token gate things and experiences. Once someone has a credential in their wallet, you can use it to token gate things and experiences. Once someone has a credential in their wallet, you can use it to token gate something and, again, this on-chain credential will prove your skill or status and will be your instant key into that group. So another exciting angle as well is how on-chain credentials can tie directly to rewards and incentives. So, going back to how companies may use this right, companies might actually reward or promote employees who complete specific on-chain certified courses. One of the markets that we intend or one of the product market fits that we see for this course is not only for up workers, meaning people on their own independent time and their own independent, I guess, initiative wanting to excel in their career or leave what they consider a dead career and go into something else. Right, that's one product market fit for us. But another big product market fit is for existing companies, not only existing Web3 companies who want to recruit from the current talent pool and want to bring them up to speed to Web3, but even existing companies who they themselves may be being initially introduced to Web3 and they want to bring their customer base up to Web3.

Speaker 2: 13:31

For employees who actually go through this and complete these on-chain certified courses, there may be a benefit or reward that your company you know may assign to you, or it may make you eligible for a promotion that the next person doesn't have Again. Imagine earning an instant bonus or a promotion because your new skill set is instantly verified. Also, of course, we know the power of badges. We work with badges constantly in a lot of different ecosystems. We know how it feels when you receive an on-chain badge or POAP. On-chain credentials can unlock special privileges or statuses within professional networks or communities. They can also grant access to exclusive events or content or mentorship grant access to exclusive events or content or mentorship. So, again, the things that you earn and can prove on chain do more than just sit there as a document that can be verified, but it also can be used as an actual token that can grant access to things that has a real physical benefit. And then, last but not least but this is, of course, thinking way further into the future institutions or projects could automatically distribute things like scholarships, grants or even crypto rewards to students who achieve certain verifiable milestones.

Speaker 2: 14:47

Again, crypto has now started to become something that is being talked about in public, especially here in the US. Our government is talking about it, our banks are talking about it. The large company here are talking about it. At some point. The next step is to start educating people about it and incentivizing people to onboard into these different things that these companies are going to start launching. Again, when you start thinking about things like Amazon when they launched their stablecoin, or Walmart when they launched their stablecoin. I know this is a little bit unrelated to the credentialing, but my point being is that each one of these entities is going to have their own way of onboarding and incentivizing people to start using it. And the same thing, at some point there are going to be companies or there are going to be institutions who, internally, are going to see a benefit in having students or people learn or become enrolled in these things or have these types of certifications, and they potentially may incentivize you to do so.

Speaker 2: 15:44

And it's extremely easy to find out who to incentivize because your credentials are on chain. And if you don't understand how this kind of works, as far as like credentialing POAP, communities, nfts, any of that good stuff, the Solana phone and this is just a little off topic, I'll get back on, but again, just understanding the power of being able to find a community or a tribe or a group of people or whatever on chain and instantly interact with them and create a customer base or market to them without having to go through the hard work. Look at the Solana phone, right, so I think there's like 149,000 of those things deployed. Or even look at the Runestone too. That's another good example. But these. And runestone is actually a better example, because salonophone you had to buy, but the runestone could be considered an on-chain credential.

Speaker 2: 16:39

So to earn a runestone and I say earn, right, essentially to qualify to get airdropped to runestone you had to have been what they considered quote, unquote, an ordinals or a yeah, I guess it was an ordinals OG, right? So someone who minted any of the early ordinals during or before a certain date right, you got to automatically airdrop this thing. That served two purposes right, it served as, obviously, what it became, right, the ecosystem behind Doug and all this kind of stuff. But initially it was a badge that symbolized that you were again an early believer in Ordinal's technology, and what it's become, which hasn't really gone far since then. Whatever, my point being is that this credential right, this thing that you didn't have a choice of getting, but now that it's sitting in your wallet, everyone knows that the people who hold these things are basically Bitcoin OGs. You started seeing projects now build towards it.

Speaker 2: 17:39

Right, you saw projects creating NFTs, free NFTs, different airdrops, all kinds of different things that they focused and pinpointed directly at the holders of these runestones. These runestones because they A were able to, again, because there is an identity behind the people who are holding these credentials. It's not hard for you to look at your product, look at that identity and see if it aligns and then say, okay, yeah, that consumer base is who I want to airdrop or interact with, but B everybody was easily findable because these things are sitting in your wallet. So, again, when it comes to on-chain credentials and it comes to where this can expand, what if one day, you know, the NBA wants to have an initiative for everyone who's completed a certain course? That may or may not be crypto related, but the credential itself may be on-chain and you may get an airdrop one day because they want to do like nurses week. Right, there's all kinds of things that we come up with on a daily basis, especially here in the US, to honor certain types of people, et cetera. And what if it was something like a nurses week and anyone who's completed this particular you know challenge or whatever, a company just wants to airdrop lunch to them one day? It's not hard to see where this can go. So again, all right.

Speaker 2: 18:53

So, getting back to learn Web3.xyz, again, right now you can actually go to learnweb3.xyz. You can sign up to be notified when our platform goes live fully, which will be on the first. There's going to be a few different ways that we launch this or that we start marketing this, but one of the first things again that we're going to do is give people access to our back-end community so that they become familiar with the community of their peers and ask any questions. Also so that others that are, you know, kind of OGs in our community can interact with students and onboard them. You never know, you might find your next employee there. But, yeah, it's super easy to sign up. All you got to do is go to learn Web3.xyz type in your name and then, of course, you'll be on the waiting list.

Speaker 2: 19:43

Then also, the modules itself, or the course itself, is learn at your own pace, so any student that comes on and enrolls will be able to go through our clear structural modules and, again, it's covering everything from blockchain basis basics to digital id and nfts. There are everything from lectures to, again, curriculum tests all that good stuff and then, at the end of it, you will earn your on-chain credential, which will be issued to your web through domain, or your crypto wallet, which, uh, of course, you'll learn how to set up and understand the value of during this course and you will now have a permanent and globally verifiable proof of your knowledge and skills. Another thing that we're going to launch again in addition to the course and in addition to the community, is likely a weekly mini course so that people can come for free, kind of get a quick catch up on the space, the opportunity that is out there, and then they can choose whether they want to go to the full course or not. The end goal, so the end goal of all of this again, you know everyone is going to set up credentialing for different reasons. Poaps already currently exist. Credentialing to some extent already currently exists. Everyone again is going currently exist. Credentialing to some extent already currently exist. Everyone again is going to set up credentialing for their own reason. But for us we want to help create more Web3, job ready people, right, more people who at least have the basic skill set that if you walk into a company that is hiring for a marketing consultant and they are a Web3 based company, that you can demonstrate that you have both enough marketing expertise and enough basic Web3 expertise that you're the best candidate for the job. And the cool way to show them to do that is with an on-chain credential right. So that's the ultimate goal of all this for us. But again, the goal for everyone else for credentials and the benefit of credentials is easily spelled out, and I hope I've done a great job of doing this so far. And even going back again to a real world scenario. You know, imagine completing this certificate Right and receiving your on-chain credential, applying for a Web3 developer job, and then, instead of a long interviewing process, your credential gets instantly verified, the employer immediately recognizes your skills and you get instantly hired.

Speaker 2: 22:02

Same thing with communities right. If a community creates an exclusive group for Web3 certified members with an on-chain credential, you can instantly gain access to mentorships, events and networking opportunities, accelerating your career. These aren't distant possibilities. These are rapidly approaching realities. On-chain credentials create opportunities that we've never seen before. So yeah, bottom line is why did on-chain education and credentials matter Again? Instant and trustless verification, no more waiting, no more uncertainty, total ownership and control. Your credentials are owned forever. You build basically your resume, your on-chain resume, with your wallet, and then there's some clear career and community advantages. If you didn't already know, there is a site called web3.career. There's actually many more, but that's one of the big ones. It is a humongous job board of Web3 employers that are begging for people to fill jobs, and some of them are putting some crazy salaries on there. So, again, putting yourself in a position where you are hired, or more hired, by these companies is our goal and is a clear advantage of having something like this on chain.

Speaker 2: 23:17

Um, but, yeah, hope I didn't bore you guys too much. Thank you guys for joining my tech talk again. Uh, we do these now bi-weekly and we'll do these, uh from now on, bi-weekly. We record these and, um, these will be posted, uh soon, to our podcast. So, if you want to listen back to this anyone who missed this and here's a glimpse of this later if you do want to listen back to this or share this with anyone, you can share it to them on any major podcast player, including Apple or Spotify. And then, of course, this will be uploaded to our website in the next couple of days and you can see it there as well as an easy read blog overview.

Speaker 2: 23:54

But, yeah, super excited to launch this course again, learnweb3.xyz. Please sign up if you're interested in either going through the course itself or being a part of the community to lend your expertise. Everyone that's going to be on board into this community, all of these new students. They're going to need somewhere to go, some help, some mentorship, something from some of us you know once they get past this course and again, you never know if what they need is your product, your service, your mentorship. So, yeah, I want to create a nice collective community of both of those. But yeah, I'll see you guys a little bit later. Thank you for attending my Tech Talk always a pleasure, as usual, and I hope you guys all have a great weekend. I will see you guys in two weeks.