The dispute between the Ethereum Name Service (ENS) developer and Manifold Finance regarding ownership of the eth.link domain is coming to an end, as the ENS decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) has agreed to a $300,000 settlement with Manifold.
In a recent vote held on February 26, approximately 88% of the DAO members approved the settlement terms. This agreement allows ENS Labs to retain ownership of the domain while dropping the lawsuit against Manifold. Additionally, 84% of voters approved reimbursing ENS Labs with $750,000 to cover their legal expenses.
This settlement marks the end of an 18-month-long legal battle, during which ENS Labs sued Manifold and domain registrars GoDaddy and Dynadot in an Arizona District Court. ENS Labs had previously obtained a court order preventing the domain from being transferred away from their ownership.
Nick Johnson, the founder of ENS, mentioned in a post on the ENS DAO forum on February 13 that Manifold proposed settlement terms requiring $300,000 from ENS Labs, along with clauses for confidentiality and refraining from negative comments.
ENS, similar to the traditional DNS but on the blockchain, facilitates the translation of domain names into IP addresses for browsers to locate. Since the two systems are incompatible, ENS uses the eth.link domain to make .eth ENS-based domains operational.
When GoDaddy, the registrar of eth.link, let the domain expire, Manifold purchased it at auction on Dynadot in September 2022.
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