Making it Easier to Get Into Web3 with Social Login

Web3 can be a tricky field to navigate, especially when it comes to choosing between using a wallet or using a social profile to log in. The first option, using a wallet-first login offers the roots of Sybil resistance and anonymity, but it can be tough for people new to web3. The second option is easier and more familiar but does not directly let users or communities gate by token thresholds. Moreover, the identity itself is not self-sovereign, as the saying goes, “not your keys, not your coins identity.”

As Commonwealth expands to serve not only the most hardcore, we’re trying to balance offering sybil-resistance and ease of use. We want to help communities onboard more members and make it easier to participate.

Keeping these challenges in mind, we're excited to share a big update to our login system. While we’ve offered Magic login, as an email-only solution to give users addresses, we're now adding the ability to log in with social. This lets you log in with your favorite platforms like Discord, GitHub, Google, and Twitter. It makes things easier and more user-friendly, while still keeping the spirit of web3.

When you log in, an address is automatically generated no matter which social platform you choose. This makes it simpler for you to join any community you want without the hassle of a complex sign-up process. We're blending the easy-to-use aspect of the social option with the privacy part of the address option to make your web3 experience more straightforward.

We're also removing an additional step in our login process, which removes another set of clicks prior to creating a post or exploring the site.

For Existing Users

If you’ve logged in with web3 wallets only, you’ll be able to associate new logins from web2–such as GitHub and more— via the universal navigation menu at the top, or on the page used to edit and manage your profile. Once those accounts are associated, this means you should be able to use the social login methods across devices across platforms and use traditional login methods even if you don’t have access to your wallet.

We’ve heard from users that this is especially useful on mobile!

Future

In the near future, there are some additions that we’ll make to the login system.

1. First, we'll be using ENS, ICNS, or whichever name service you prefer, to make your user experience more personalized.
2. Communities will be able to better use their token gating and other requirements to create new roles. This means even if anyone can use social login, communities can still have token requirements or apply other rules to ensure high-quality conversation
3. Communities will be able to choose which methods, both web2 and web3 can be used to auth into their community

With those changes, we feel that communities and users can have the best of both worlds—ease of use and staying true to web3 values. With our new social login feature, we're taking a big step toward a more inclusive and active web3 community.