Are any actually more valuable than their .com counterpart? I can't think of many.
Not sure whether the OP meant
better in sense of aesthetics, or domain value, or both. Anyway, to your point, I would argue that a number of new extensions with the word My probably are more valuable. The sale last month of
My.Life for $175,000 would be an example. I would value that name higher than MyLife.com. I realize some domainers would not. I think it is essentially an argument between elegant design, only include elements in the name that have a function, and the familiarity / respect of .com, particularly in the US market.
I totally agree with your point that who it is being marketed to (e.g. age group, geographical, application) influences the value of new and legacy extension options. A name for an investment company in the USA aimed at seniors probably would value differently from a gaming app in Asia aimed at teens, to use an extreme example.
It was an interesting choice when Shopify, a hugely successful and large company, chose to pay
$200,000 a month or so ago for shop.app, even though they had ShopApp.com. I suspect the branding and marketing folks in the backrooms discussed exactly the argument of what type of name is accepted by what groups of people. Anyway, Shopify already have the name in use, so we will see. Shopify have now taken over from RBC as the highest valuation of any company on the Toronto stock exchange.
Bob