That could actually work for the host ID part of the address (not so much the network part). You could do it today with v6 just by extending getaddrinfo() (e.g.

That could actually work for the host ID part of the address (not so much the network part). You could do it today with v6 just by extending getaddrinfo() (e.g. with an NSS plugin on Linux). But L3 addresses aren't the place for naming. They're meant for computers, not humans. DNS supports names longer than 2-8 characters, descriptive hierarchies, multiple address families, other useful info types like SSH keys, and in general operates at the right layer for it.