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Exactly. We built a registrar for Handshake (https://namebase.io) and our service will automatically handle renewal transactions. That said, anyone can still manage their keys and submit renewal transactions on their own if they want to do that, similar to how you can use Coinbase vs a desktop wallet for Bitcoin.

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Thanks. I’m still wary of the bi-annual renewal requirement. If I register a name today, can I renew it one year later from today to stretch it to two years from then (which would be three years from now) or would I be able to renew it for two years only near the end of the two year period? In other words, can I perpetually have it renewed to approximately two years in the future at all times? If not, that brings the same risk I talked about in my comment above (where families may not have enough time to figure things out and handle it).

It's not even that. It reads like it's a cliff. Currently under ICANN, if you fail to renew a domain, you have ~90 days to figure out that you didn't renew it before it's lost forever. Even if it's scripted to renew, it could fail for any number of reasons (lack of fiat currency, transient network failures, lack of crypto-currency, etc).

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