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Namecoin (Abbreviation: NMC; sign: ) is a cryptocurrency originally forked from bitcoin software. It uses proof-of-work algorithm. Like bitcoin, it is limited to 21 million. Namecoin can store data within its own blockchain transaction database. The original proposal for Namecoin called for Namecoin to insert data into bitcoin's blockchain directly. Anticipating scaling difficulties with this approach, a shared proof-of-work system was proposed to secure new cryptocurrencies with different use cases. Namecoin's flagship use case is the censorship-resistant top level domain .bit, which is functionally similar to .com or .net domains but is independent of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the main governing body for domain names. In practice, the top level domain is used by a handful of functional websites. As of 2019, OpenNIC no longer supports the .bit domain. A peer-to-peer network similar to handles Namecoin's transactions, balances and issuance through a based proof-of-work scheme (they are issued when a small enough hash value is found, at which point a block is created). Each Namecoin record consists of a name and a value. Each name is actually a path, with the namespace preceding the name of the record. The key d/example signifies a record stored in the DNS namespace d with the name example and corresponds to the record for the example.bit website. The content of d/example is expected to conform to the DNS namespace specification., the fee for a record was 0.01 NMC and records expired after 36000 blocks (~200 days) unless updated or renewed. bit is a top-level domain, created outside the commonly used Domain Name System, and is not sanctioned by ICANN. The .bit domain is served via Namecoin infrastructure, which acts as a decentralized domain name system. Proposed potential uses for Namecoin besides domain name registration include notary/timestamp systems. In September 2010, a discussion was started in the BitcoinTalk forum about a hypothetical system called BitDNS and generalizing bitcoin.

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Blockchain

A blockchain is a distributed ledger with growing lists of records (blocks) that are securely linked together via cryptographic hashes. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, a timestamp, and transaction data (generally represented as a Merkle tree, where data nodes are represented by leaves). Since each block contains information about the previous block, they effectively form a chain (compare linked list data structure), with each additional block linking to the ones before it.

Alternative DNS root

The Internet uses the Domain Name System (DNS) to associate numeric computer IP addresses with human-readable names. The top level of the domain name hierarchy, the DNS root, contains the top-level domains that appear as the suffixes of all Internet domain names. The most widely used (and first) DNS root is administered by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). In addition, several organizations operate alternative DNS roots, often referred to as alt roots.

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