What will be the biggest flop in '08?

[jacal1]

By the way, this IS an "official" thread - in case you were wondering :hehe: .

My guesses for biggest flops:

dictionary words with no commercial connection

.us

.tv

"brandable" nonsense words

LLLLs in anything but .com

all but the 4-5 biggest silent auctions (or was that '07?)

.biz (or was that '06?)

 

[firefly]

Dot mobi is going to be as useful as ejector seats in helicopters :imho:

Dot tv will get some mileage if names are appropriate for the extension.

Country specific extensions will grow (except for dot us)

Dot asia is the latest way to rob newbs and the overly hopeful of their hard earned cash.

Just my opinions

 

[Spade]

.mobi will continue to be a disappointment to all the investors. There will be a huge lack of development, and new technology cell phones and pdas will make the need for a mobile site, just about obsolete.

 

[xman]

LLLL.com will be the biggest flops. Even if they do sell out I see many investors holding on to bulk llll.com domains. I just dont see an end user using a domain like wpsr.com or 6Yu8.com or 9IXZ.com. These have to be the biggest flop.

Its like the Shares. The resellers keep on buying the LLLL.com and keep on talking about it so that there is a abuzz about and prices tend to go up but at the end of the day when the truth is out it seems and is the biggest scam ever on earth.

Thats just my 2 cents.

FYI: 6Yu8.com and 9IXZ.com aren't LLLL.com but CCCC.com

Take your 2 cents back

 

[thetruman]

LL-L and L-LL have no intrinsic value irrespective of what letters they contain.

They are worthless now.

They will still be worthless in 20 years time.

I am big on acronyms myself but I have mainly gone for single Unicode Characters, yes IDN and they actually get type in more than top IDN Generics.

Acronyms are valuable in as much as they are in short supply in demand and intuitive. These LL-L frankly are none of these things. All it proves is that you are totally devoid of investment inspiration.

Please read this recent sales (and there are more). Personally I own one so I am not into this kind of domains. Just a note on your sentence telling that those domains are worthless:they are not and you are wrong

few sales i found on namebio

be-b.com $400 sedo 2007-07-03

i-cy.com $246 sedo 2007-06-05

e-na.com $2k buydomains 17-01-07

 

[Rubber Duck]

I didn t say is a good or bad investments. Just giving sales figures that are evidently in contrast with the previous statement LL-L and L-LL have no intrinsic value irrespective of what letters they contain.

They are worthless now.

They will still be worthless in 20 years time.
Just isnt true. Do you agree?

Have it your way. Invest aggressively and be the King of Contra-Intuitive. Personally, I would sooner go an alternative extension and I haven't gone for those either. Following your dream. Just don't hang around my street corner with your begging bowl.

 

[mwzd]

Don't just assume it or assert it. Prove it. The truth is out there. Lets have some facts.

What facts do you need?

The fact that there are English speakers everywhere in India? Come on down for a visit... the boatman who takes you around on the Kerala backwaters speaks English and his local language, not Hindi. So does a taxi driver in Mumbai or even the 'boy' who delivers tea at most offices all over India.

The fact that there are 26 official languages in India and most language scripts are remarkably different from each other. IDNs would get lost, specially with like sashas saying that most youngsters can't spell in their local language. More's the shame but that's how it is.

The fact that English medium schools are at a premium here. In fact, a lot more students pass out each year from English medium schools across India than through language mediums.

The fact that all major business, government and so much so even road signs across the country are in English.

The fact is that of 1 Billion people - at least 200,000,000 speak English. Online users who use other languages would be a single digit percentage as of now. And I don't see it changing dramatically for the next few years.

While it's true that in terms of sheer numbers the local language speakers are more, but that is not to say that local language speakers cannot or will not communicate in English, even with a choice to use their local language.

Yes language offerings like newspapers, magazines and even tv channels far outsell English ones but I don't see any of them using IDNs because while most people speak the local language they write in English...

The fact, language sites account for less than 3 in the top 100 sites visited out of India - check alexa.

Fact, the largest local language portals use English as the primary access language -
http://www.webdunia.com/
http://www.oneindia.in/
http://www.rediff.com/

 

[mwzd]

Mwzd can speak English and Marathi well. He can speak Hindi a bit, but not too much.

Your point is well put but a clarification here.

I speak Hindi fairly well, if a bit bambaiyya. I also speak Punjabi, Derawali, Marathi, Gujarati and a smattering of Urdu, Tulu, Konkani, Bengali and even Sindhi.

However, correct spellings I'm confident of only English. Not to mention the fact that thought process and "speaking to loved ones" is also English.

 

[equity78]

I love the IDN pumper is arguing with actual Indians about their own country, Classic

 

[bricio]

I do not know the Portuguese market at all. I was just wondering why there are some words that have more results with the accent then without. Such as Dimensão vs Dimensao? Would that be more Portuguese from Portugal, rather than Brazil, using that word with the accent? I think that the reason many people would automatically type it without accents into the URL, might be because there are so many developed sites without accents. At least people are putting them on their pages with accents. What do you think?

hi Sleepys,

the words in portuguese are the same in brazil, portugal, angola, mocambique (moçambique - IDN) and any other portuguese-speaking country; so, the correct word is dimensão (IDN)
brazil's internet is more developed than portuguese one as we are almost 200 million people and i am almoest sure, 50% access internet... you have more results typing dimensão as it is the correct writing, so when we are typing in word, excel, power point, etc and it is something important it will be surely typed as the grammar rules but when we are typing a web address we just "forget" the accents; it can seem strange but it happens like this
i really dont know how it works in portugal and it would be nice to know
what i know is portuguese people translate many more words than us... for example we say "mouse" as we were english-speakers instead of sing "rato" (the portuguese translation) and it happens with hundreds of words
the IDNs in brazil using .br have rules to be reg'd and sometimes it can bring troubles... the word "maca" in portuguese means stretch but the word "maçã" (IDN) means apple and the brazilian rule says only the owner of "maca" can reg "maçã" (IDN) but the words have different use

i really dont believe in IDNs in (in portuguese) -> brasil

 

[Jeff]

:imho: .MOBI will fall flat on its face.

Flat as a pancake ... eta., April 1st Fool's Day 2008! :red: :imho:

Merry Christmas. :santa:
-Jeff

 

[jmcc]

1: miniflop hits .com and .net
Dell court action succeeds and triggers other court actions against domain tasters and dropcatchers. The orders locking domains at registry level slows growth in .com dramatically. As the domain tasters have been eliminated, the cost of frozen domains (they have passed their five day grace period) will bankrupt the affected tasters.This will lead to a major hit on .com and .net from October 2008 onwards.

2: Lemming Domains (LLLL.com/.net)
The rush to register LLLL.* was not driven by any real business plan but rather by a herd mentality. Most of these domains will be dropped when they come up for renewal in 2008.

3: .asia (miniflop)
A possible downturn in the US economy limits the amount of cash available for speculative registrations. There will be some high profile generics sales but it will not be the mess that .eu was. Growth in .asia may resemble .mobi (steady but small) rather than .eu.

4: .eu (Rotten Registry Flop)
Many people did not understand the Stone Age Belgian registry system used by .eu/EURid. Consequently, domains that would have been dropped at the first anniversary of the landrush were not dropped. At the second anniversary (April 2008) the drop rate will be high. Cyberwarehousers, who possibly hold over 1M .eu domains, decide to cut their losses. More court actions follow and EURid does not have registry contract renewed due to incompetence.

5: Toolbar Wars Hit Direct Navigation
The rise of ISPs diverting NXDOMAIN (no such domain) traffic to their own sponsored search pages increases through 2008. Toolbar software also begins to redirect users to search engine results pages when domains are on a "parked" blacklist. This will be billed as "improving" the user experience.

6: Astroturf Sites Get Hit Hard By Search Engines
The trend of some large scale domainers to build sites with content backfires because the search engines tweak their algorithms to distinguish these astroturf websites from real websites.

7: A High Price Sales With Many No Sales
There will be some high value sales in 2008 but most of the domains at auction will not sell at anything close to their reserves. This bloodtrail of sales failures disturbs confidence in the high end of the market.

8: Keyword + Geo domains
Improving search engine algorithms integrate a Yellow pages function with the search engines to such an extent that they provide the phone number and location of the nearest plumber/lawyer/flowershop etc.

Regards...jmcc

 

[Andrei P.]

I don't see any reason why to use .mobi for mobile site... Any big company should have autodetection of mobile devices and redirect visitors to a proper page. If I know that there is a company ABC.com I will go to ABC.com because I don't know about ABC.mobi anything. It can belong to any other company or more likely to domainer and is a parking page. If ABC.com would want a mobile version of the site I think they would create it at m.abc.com and simply redirect mobile visitors to it silently.

Domainers didn't give .mobi sites a single chance. The number of developed mobi sites is so few that it's even worse than .biz

 

[newdomainer.mobi]

Mobile web: You heard it here first!

To clarify my thoughts about .mobi. I don't think they are bad. They are very good. At least I think not much worse than .biz

Hi Ergo

I think the important thing to note is that no one actually knows the answer when it comes to the mobile web.

I think most people accept that whichever side of the fence they are on... however, it does seem that those who believe that it is doomed always refer to existing, established websites (usually .coms) that have an established presence & they assume that users will either type .com into their PDA etc.. & get the auto detect version of the site, (this assumes that this is what the PDA user wants which removes the element of choice: a major consideration in itself)

The doom-mongers also assume that users are somehow more likely to be aware that they should key in m.site.com or mobile.site.com site.com/mobile than they would be to use site.mobi....
This is an oversight, especially as mobile devices are now coming onstream that require no extension to be used for .mobi sites.

The other assumption is that there will not be a 'cover-all' attitude by site owners who will wish to capture as much of their target audience as possible; by allowing access on all the available routes such as like Fox have done... any route you like; you get there.

Then there is a blind assumption that the mobile web is just 'desktop web' viewed on a small screen device... this to me is the most ridiculous assumption of them all.... large sites = big data volume = slow loading = visual overload = messy = complex = NON user friendly experience.

The mobile web will develop as a close relation of the desk-top web but it will not be the same.... some sites suit desk-tops & just desk tops... I wouldn't want to try & use an autocad programme on my phone for example.... or spreadsheets come to that!

For social uses, video, audio, contacts, GPS, maps, locations, reviews, food, quick reference, impulse buys, last minute info, gifts, traffic, games, etc. etc. etc. there will be a new breed of web site....

The only extension that will ever guarentee a suitable site for a small screen device is .mobi.... all the other extensions will be hit & miss; not every site will have auto-detect, not every site will render well - even with the appropriate software; especially older sites, complex sites etc..

Using m.site.com just gets you to a site that may or may not be suitable for mobile (by that I mean that if you choose 100 random .com addresses & stick an m. in front of it - how many sites resolve as mobile sites & how many servers return no results? - In other words; in order to use m.site.com etc. you need to be aware that the site has a mobile site available, whereas any address that has a.mobi is a site that you can be assured of getting to render on your small screen.

Add to that the fact that this will become more apparent to end users after a period of time; more & more people will start to key in site.mobi in the expectation of seeing a mobile site... when that happens, site owners will not want to lose this traffic & they will need to register / buy the .mobi domain in order to do so, even if they redirect to an m.site.com address.

Then it gets serious; .mobi's become as much a part of the mobile web as .coms are on the desk top.... m.site.com & mobile.site.com will become to the mobile web what the .net / .org / .info is to the desktop web today... the same of country codes; there is a realistic chance that country code mobiles will be released in the next 5 years; so site owners of .co.uk may end up with .uk.mobi or .mobi.uk or .m.uk who knows, but what is for sure is that the original extension (.mobi) will be the .com of the mobile web.... if you have the .com, the logical thing will be to have the .mobi to go with it or the competition will beat you to it.... defensive it may be but its nothing we haven't seen time & time again with every other extension...

In my (humble) opinion I think that the need to have the .mobi will be secondary to your main domain & be ahead of the list of other domains you will need to serve your client base & to protect your market... the only one that comes close is the country code for where you happen to be.

Lets just read this sentence a few times until it sinks in:

"4 devices with small screen web access sold to every large screen web access device sold"

..... that figure is growing; it'll be 5 to 1 before long.....
How long does it take for people to drop their preconceptions and look at the figures?

Of course, all the techies are protective of the internet just the way it was in 2006.... they don't like change!
Forward thinking people accept change, learn the new technologies & embrace the next big thing...

It's not lost on me that most techies that I know (& respect for their knowledge & skills) are still wearing clothes & sporting hair-styles that went out in the late 1980's.... maybe thats a clue as to how long it takes them to get 'with it' :hehe:

And finally; the other mistake the doomsayers keep making is that they forget that sites are built every day, businesses are set up every day, domains are developed every day.... in time, there will be many sites that don't have a desk-top presence; they will be site.mobi & thats it... no need for anything else, it's taken a long time to populate the internet (& 75% of that is utter crap).
The mobile internet will be populated in half the time (my guess) just remember that nothing stands still, nothing stays the same for long.... the 'mass' internet itself is barely a generation old... it's just a toddler itself... & now it has a baby brother!

Nice Flares by the way Jeff! but the pony tail has to go... :hehe:


Regards to all for 2008

Gary

 

[akcampbell]

"Any big company should have autodetection of mobile devices and redirect visitors to a proper page"

Please can a .mobi fan respond to this point made by Ergo. This seems the most likely scenario to me. .Mobi has got a future as an alternative extension for suitable keywords but the .mobi mobile web is a pipe dream used by rampers to offload their mobis to gullible domainers.

.Mobi is an excellent anternative extension for things people are likely to do on the go, listen to music, play games, download ringtones etc and that's been reflected in sale prices.

I can see myself using the Web on my mobile as often as I watch a DVD on my portable DVD player, very rarely. I don't like to spoil a good film by watching it on a small screen because it ruins the experience. Equally, I'd rather wait until I get home to use the Internet for most purposes on a 23 inch screen, full size keyboard, with lightning fast broadband, sitting in a comfy chair.

I think laptop Internet use will become far more popular as wireless connection speeds, battery life, and bootup speeds improve and you don't need a .mobi extension to do that.

I'm a big fan of alternative extensions, they provide single word memorable brands that you can only dream about in .com and that's attractive to some developers. However, betting that people will switch from .com to .mobi when they use mobile devices is lunacy. People are more likely, not less likely, to stick with what they know when connecting to the Internet through a less familiar medium.

 

[Pred]

Until .mobi becomes the default over .com on all mobile service providers (if it has, I haven't seen it yet), then www is not the problem... ".mobi" is. on my phone keypad (not QWERTY), to type .mobi takes entering 10 keystrokes "1 6 666 22 444".
Wow, to get "namepros.mobi" I only have to enter:

"66 2 6 33 7 777 666 7777 1 6 666 22 444"

i don't think it will. it's not a battle of .com and mobi
this tires me too
its an extension in its own right, guarantees you get to view a website, quickly, with minimum fuss

people said the same about texting without qwerty
how do you think that's faired?
take a message and break it down into numbers nad keystrokes, the average teen will text in the blink of an eye

an extra letter, like in .info really is no issue
bookmark if its that big a deal or if a good site worth revisiting

For mobile phones without a querty keyboard, it would be easier just to enter the IP number of 201.101.031.234 and bypass the DNS system altogether.

:hehe:

brandability and memorability not great though
that's where mobi steps up

would 'mob' have been better?
but then i guess we would get all the al capone jokes and people wouldn't relate it to 'mobile'

oh well. we all see things differently :sold:

 

[sunnycoast]

Hi, I am hoping someone here can help me with a question regarding failed extentions. I personally agree that .eu is beyond help. But I hear people talk about keyboard placement having a part in their evaluation of success and failure.

But .ws is about as easy as you can get without it being a multiple character. Yet I see people regestering .asia names that are still avaialble in .ws

Just curious then as to why this might be happening other than hype. I have never bought other extentions aside from .com really but something has made me buy quite a few .asia

I think if most of the domains are just held for sale with few websites created than .asia may head in the area of disaster like .eu

Only time will tell but any thoughts on why .asia is looking hotter than .ws even in .ws early days. I really can not remember this kind of frenzy for .ws or is that like comparing apples with oranges based on the primary country specific purpose of .asia?
I have been wary to purchase any .asia name that is still available in .ws but maybe I am comparing something that should not be compared.

Thanks!

 

[goodkarmaco]

Mobi or.tv cannot even come close to the flop parking is going to end up being.

All the money spent on all the .mobi and the .tv combined is a drop in the bucket to the money domainers are losing with the down slide of parking revenues.

The title of this thread is not which domain extension do you dislike. It is what will be the biggest flop of 2008?

Parking names is a billion dollar industry folks, to my knowledge that money is shrinking. Big bombshells have dropped on certain parking companies and domainers are getting hit in the middle of this. This is a much bigger loss than .mobi or .tv could ever be.

Am I right or am I wrong?.

 

[Pred]

Double :bingo: This is just a no brainer! Enter any domain into your browser without an extension and see where it goes' .com! this will never change! How many extensions do you think the non domainer public will keep track of? Name any search engine who disagree! This was the original intension of all those who invented the internet and everything else was an afterthought.

incorrect

i have actually not done it many times by mistake, but have had the browser give .org.uk and .org sites before, not always com, along with others.
try and you will see. i would imagine com is the most prevelant though.
it seems it finds the most relevant or popular site. not sure whether there is a geo element too in relation to your ip etc

a great keyword with com on the end is the ideal normally but this is the top of the pyramid, there are many options.
its like saying if you cant play for brazil, football doesnt count and you cant make a living playing football

 

[hawkeye]

.mobi catch fire? :lol:

.mobi got some water thrown on it. It already tanked. I think you missed it.

I don't own any .TV but I see more value in that by FAR than .mobi.

..from those with the 'vision' of LLLL.infos! :zzz:

 

[markfromslo]

Regarding .mobi:

The real problem for mobi will be the hardware on the actual mobile device side. Everyone is basing their conclusions on the basis of the size of the mobile device screen being small. Well. within a few short years, that will not be the case.

No, mobile devices are not going to come with 17" displays. However, new technologies are coming that will allow users to view web pages in full scrren mode. For example, coming this year, mobile phones will display a full screen, high-resolution, "display" to any flat surface the small "projector" on the side of the phone is aimed at. Aim it at a wall, a blank sheet of paper, whatever. Another technology is a virtual display where the display is projected into your eye, giving you the feel of a very large screen TV. Another is paper-thin, fold out displays that folded are the size of a current display and then unfold to a larger size. Another is a pull out, paper-thin display, sort of like a scroll of paper.

Don't think these are fanciful technologies that will come in 10 years. They're coming soon. I'm an investor in several mobile technology companies and I know what I'm talking about. If you think things like this are going to take more time than I'm saying, don't forget about the exponential progression of technological advancement -- things develop faster than you think. For example, in the 21st century, we will see 20,000 years of development in the year 2000 rates (the RATE of technology doubling every 10 years); see the Law of Accelerating Returns.

No, in a few years we'll look back on the small displays like we did the huge CRT monitors of the last decade. And those holding .mobi's will become a thing of the past.

 

[goodkarmaco]

The biggest flop is the U.S. dollar

Their stock just jumped the most ever in one day, to over $535. a share!. Now they have the money to pay whatever Yahoo wants.

Btw, the dollars fall is not over folks. We ain't seen nothing yet. The Fed is papering Wall St with bailout money. They are not allowing the losses to occur in a free market way and the news of the Wall St rallies will lull investors, like sheep to slaughter.

All this bailout money is going to bring the biggest inflation we have ever seen. The printing of money and papering the world with it is now in full circle.

The biggest evidence doom is only months away is China, which holds our securities, bad paper, spin off investments from our sub prime real estate fisaco is waking up to what they really own.. useless paper. They are now dumping our dollars.

This dumping of American dollars and flight to other currencies will have a huge impact as the U.S. will free fall.

When it seems the idiot (Fed chairman Bernenke) has outdone himself he tries something else. Does it matter if it makes sense? Not anymore. Witness the progression toward the dollars demise by the constant interest rate reductions. They (the Fed) have full intentions of destroying the American currency. They will place the final nail in the coffin by lowering interest rates to about 2.5%, which means if you have good credit you can borrow at around 3.5 to 4.5 % Most will ponder why bother keeping the savings in the bank at those low interest rates and this will drag the dollar down too.

This economic downturn is worldwide and will be more devastating than the great depression of 1929. Many countries of the world that have never had food riots are having them now. Food shortages and huge price increases are the first signs of the end result of governments creating boat loads of fiat money.

The actors are falling over themselves looking for ways to keep the American economy from total collapse and if that takes destroying the dollars value, so be it. They have been and are trying in vain to keep it together until the nations leader walks out the white house door. Whoever it is that he hands the keys to will inherit mayhem.


The 100 billion to bail out Bearn Stearns and the 150 billion to "give" to all taxpayers is inflationary in of itself. Add to this the trillions that will be paid to keep those who have arms coming due shortly is a nail in the coffin for higher prices coming near your neighborhood soon!

If you have the money pay out your registration renewals if you can. To pay $7.00 or $8.00 bucks is cheap right now. When inflation lifts its ugly head those renewals will be tough to pay. You are not being told this by the media but we in the United States are seeing 10% inflation right now.

 

[cache]

.asia


PS: what made your thread official?

 

[jacal1]

.asia

Yes...great one.

 

[VisualArtistFrankBonilla]

Ain't no biz for .biz!

Has to be .biz!! Has anyone ever sold one? Ha! :hi: Give them the NOBIZ Award! That is my Official opinion!

Frank :yell: