Mike Carson is a domain name investor — he buys them to sell later — so naturally, he bought Akron.io in honor of the city of his birth.
Now, the New Jersey resident is putting it to use, naming his new bitcoin wallet Akron.
“It sounded like a good name,” he said. “I named it after my hometown.”
Carson, a Cuyahoga Falls High School graduate, said he practices cypherpunk ideals, a movement using technology to effect change.
He also wants to restart the social networking site Friendster. He purchased the domain name after the previous owner abandoned its trademark. More on that below.
Akron, the bitcoin wallet, is the first that supports the Spaces Protocol, which Carson also founded. Spaces is a decentralized naming system that lets people own their online name in a way they can’t on Instagram, Facebook or elsewhere.
The jewel of Akron is its people. They’re vibrant and resilient. Flawed, yet thoughtful and nurturing. And all of them come with compelling stories. That’s why we launched “Akron in 330.” This series offers a glimpse into everyday folks’ journeys across our many neighborhoods — 330 words at a time. Know someone we should consider? Tell us here.
Carson said he’s gotten plenty of positive feedback since Akron launched in May. He’ll measure success in the number of names registered.
“Right now, it’s building the community, it’s getting more and more people interested,” he said. “It’s not many yet.”
Mayor Shammas Malik, when told about the other Akron, said, “I wish that person the best.”
Carson, 48, said he became interested in bitcoin after witnessing his parents’ financial instability. They constantly contended with overdraft fees, so he liked the idea of accessing money without a middleman.
“I’ve carried that, I think, around a while,” he said. “I was really resentful, when I was younger, of banks.”
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Back to Friendster, where Carson said there’s a 400,000-person waitlist.
He’s still working on the best way to scale it. Carson is considering requiring an in-person connection to join.
After all, he said, it’s hard to distinguish between real people and bots, so why not make people meet in person and touch phones to connect?
“Social media has become poisonous in a lot of ways,” he said. “I thought it’d be nice to return it to some of the good.”