Telegram has developed a new marketplace that doesn’t involve NFTs. The social messaging platform said that it is all set to launch its marketplace for auctioning unique usernames for social platforms, an idea first floated in August.
The firm said that the development phase of the marketplace is near its end. The marketplace is based on its native blockchain called The Open Network.
The idea was first teased by the company founder Pavel Durov when he proposed a marketplace that could utilize NFT-like smart contracts to auction highly sought after usernames. Durov made the suggestion after the success of domain name auctions by The Open Network, a layer-1 blockchain originally designed by the Telegram team.
Durov said at the time that a new marketplace, where username holders could transfer them to interested parties in protected deals with ownership secured on the blockchain via NFT-like smart contracts could become a sought-after service in Web3.
Telegram started its Web3 and crypto endeavour with hopes of launching a digital payments platform for Telegram. However, like many other platforms from the initial coin offering era, Telegram also ran into trouble with the United States regulators for the unregistered sale of its Gram token.
