Boycott Icann's New Domain Name Extension Release, Thread

[unholygod]

The end of domaining ?

Biggest Expansion to Internet in Forty Years Approved for Implementation

26 June 2008

Paris, France: The Board of ICANN today approved a recommendation that could see a whole range of new names introduced to the Internet's addressing system.

"The Board today accepted a recommendation from its global stakeholders that it is possible to implement many new names to the Internet, paving the way for an expansion of domain name choice and opportunity" said Dr Paul Twomey, President and CEO of ICANN.

A final version of the implementation plan must be approved by the ICANN Board before the new process is launched. It is intended that the final version will be published in early 2009.

"The potential here is huge. It represents a whole new way for people to express themselves on the Net," said Dr Twomey. "It's a massive increase in the 'real estate' of the Internet."

Presently, users have a limited range of 21 top level domains to choose from — names that we are all familiar with like .com, .org, .info.

This proposal allows applicants for new names to self-select their domain name so that choices are most appropriate for their customers or potentially the most marketable. It is expected that applicants will apply for targeted community strings such as (the existing) .travel for the travel industry and .cat for the Catalan community (as well as generic strings like .brandname or .yournamehere). There are already interested consortiums wanting to establish city-based top level domain, like .nyc (for New York City), .berlin and .paris.

"One of the most exciting prospect before us is that the expanding system is also being planned to support extensions in the languages of the world," said Peter Dengate Thrush, ICANN's Chairman. "This is going to be very important for the future of the Internet in Asia, the Middle East, Eastern Europe and Russia." The present system only supports 37 Roman characters.

Upon approval of the implementation plan, it is planned that applications for new names will be available in the second quarter of 2009.

SOURCE

 

[Keral_Patel]

And who will type in that joe.fun :D

Who will spread the message across 15% users that it is .fun not .com?

People can't market their .coms properly and How will they market their domain as well as different TLD with it?

 

[SonnyCooL]

There are only so many of these "average LLL.com" domains you speak of, do you really think the average Joe Dingle Johnson will spend $15,000+ on jdj.com (or $300,000 on joe.com) when he can get Joe.fun for $10? Sorry but you're not going to convince the "average joe" of anything.

This isn't 1990 anymore where .005% of the population of the planet has access to the internet. It is more like 15% now ( i'm pretty sure i read recently 1 billion people have internet access, maybe not, even so the point stands). That number is only going to go up. Com is king only because that's what people learned with. For my son I got hisname.us, his favorite arcade site is a .co.uk, and he's not phased when he sees cc extensions. He asked me if I could get him hisname.mn rather than .us since we live in Minnesota, he's only 9 and i've never mentioned that there was a .mn tld, he simply thought you could just get any tld that you wanted. He didn't grow up with .com, in his mind anything is possible, if I told him to go to the site great.superfun he wouldn't hesitate. I think alot of people severely overestimate how internet dumb the general populus is, and how much younger it gets every year. In 10 years it will be dominated by people like my son who grew up without the .com training.

Not to say this new tld thing will be a success. I think the obvious tlds will be snatched up (web, sex, fun, xxx, etc), and none of tha bothers me. But that's probably it, there will be no .tld squatting, there will be no microsof.tcom or namepros.con, in fact it sounds like they're doing it right, and don't try to claim you didn't see this coming, this is a natural progression of internet tlds. With millions of possibilities did you really think we'd be stuck with com/org/net/gov forever? Of course not.

well said ....
The reason of this boycott, is really too much, they hate anything that will harm their own pocket money ... They hate the future, they hate the kid grow ...

 

[Keral_Patel]

well said ....
The reason of this boycott, is really too much, they hate anything that will harm their own pocket money ... They hate the future, they hate the kid grow ...

Yup really from bottom of my heart I hate it

You might love it and new domainers might love it. But money is money and business is business so I will boycott it I am not even ashamed of telling it that I am boycotting it because my own money lies in the established TLD's

 

[-REECE-]

64 of the Top 100 according to Alexa are .coms, I think that tells everyone how dominant of an extension .com is. Assuming the next generation is anything like the current generation of teens + young adults, they'll enjoy using services like Facebook, Myspace, Youtube -- all .com for the record.

Almost half (16 out of 34) of the non-.com websites in the Top 100 are Google.ext -- not exactly convincing me that .com is going to be anything other than equally dominant in the future.

There are only so many of these "average LLL.com" domains you speak of, do you really think the average Joe Dingle Johnson will spend $15,000+ on jdj.com (or $300,000 on joe.com) when he can get Joe.fun for $10? Sorry but you're not going to convince the "average joe" of anything.

This isn't 1990 anymore where .005% of the population of the planet has access to the internet. It is more like 15% now ( i'm pretty sure i read recently 1 billion people have internet access, maybe not, even so the point stands). That number is only going to go up. Com is king only because that's what people learned with. For my son I got hisname.us, his favorite arcade site is a .co.uk, and he's not phased when he sees cc extensions. He asked me if I could get him hisname.mn rather than .us since we live in Minnesota, he's only 9 and i've never mentioned that there was a .mn tld, he simply thought you could just get any tld that you wanted. He didn't grow up with .com, in his mind anything is possible, if I told him to go to the site great.superfun he wouldn't hesitate. I think alot of people severely overestimate how internet dumb the general populus is, and how much younger it gets every year. In 10 years it will be dominated by people like my son who grew up without the .com training.

Not to say this new tld thing will be a success. I think the obvious tlds will be snatched up (web, sex, fun, xxx, etc), and none of tha bothers me. But that's probably it, there will be no .tld squatting, there will be no microsof.tcom or namepros.con, in fact it sounds like they're doing it right, and don't try to claim you didn't see this coming, this is a natural progression of internet tlds. With millions of possibilities did you really think we'd be stuck with com/org/net/gov forever? Of course not.

 

[raredn.com]

There are only so many of these "average LLL.com" domains you speak of, do you really think the average Joe Dingle Johnson will spend $15,000+ on jdj.com (or $300,000 on joe.com)...Continued...Continued...Continued...

Quote from you Rob J: "For my son I got hisname.us, his favorite arcade site is a .co.uk, and he's not phased when he sees cc extensions"

My Answer: This thread is in NO WAY BOYCOTTING COUNTRY CODE DOMAINS I even have country code domain names, they serve a purpose and are readily available now .co.uk, .cr, .de .nl, .be, .ca etc etc they all REPRESENT A HOME COUNTRY AND THAT IS USEFUL :tu:

This thread is about icann's new domain extension sales (supposedly next year if they ever bother to become a reality) particularly novelty extensions, like a 'theoretical' .fun, .shop, .movies, .village, .fruit, .whatever nonsense

your quote: "I think the obvious tlds will be snatched up (web, sex, fun, xxx, etc)"

My Answer: As for adult extensions it looks like they are not going to be permitted at all, so that rules out the adult part of your post

Another quote from you Rob J: "Joe Dingle Johnson will spend $15,000+ on jdj.com (or $300,000 on joe.com) when he can get Joe.fun for $10? Sorry but you're not going to convince the "average joe" of anything"

My Answer: There are plenty and plenty of .com domain names that are a quality investment other thant jdj.com, or joe.com anything from LLLL.com to quality keyword.com's and other good .com investments IMO

Also as for joe.fun, it is not just unlikely that a company that bought into the new extension thing with a minimum $100,000 starting bid would sell you joe.fun for $10 it pretty much impossible, they would make you cough up as much money as they could possibly get out of you for it

 

[Rob J]

And who will type in that joe.fun :D

The generation that isn't old and stuck in their ways?

I think domainers have this narrow minded profit motivated view that the number of peope online and the demand for domains will continue to rise and ICANN will be content sitting back and watching us all make a killing on all our regfee junk just for the hell of it.

Well you're wrong, they decided to make the killing themselves.

 

[Keral_Patel]

The generation that isn't old and stuck in their ways?

And who will teach this generation? I think the old and stuck ones and the market itself. Which you can already see is occupied by .com itself.

I think domainers have this narrow minded profit motivated view that the number of peope online and the demand for domains will continue to rise and ICANN will be content sitting back and watching us all make a killing on all our regfee junk just for the hell of it.

Why don't you understand that every domain name is a reg fee domain name when it was registered first. So is this all Junk? I am fed up of naysayers my friend. Nothing else. Please don't try to create panic situations that was my point to everyone. If you think new generation. Then okay new generation. But who cares about new generation and domain names as far as domaining is concerned. Domaining is not about domain names it is about dollars. I can't be more clearer then this. And the motive behind this thread is also simple. We as domainers are majority and the driving force so we can decide what to do and what not to do. We cannot break our huts that we built with hard work and efforts by just seeing penthouses in dreams. If new generation is interested in this domains then let the new generation domainers buy them and invest in it. Why to throw our domain names off and run for the next big hype?

 

[Rob J]

Nick, I already explained why I think this is changing, using my son as an example. You and me are unique my friend, we witnessed the birth of the internet and for a long time websites were identifed by www.whatever.com, for our generation anthing that starts with www. and end with .com in our minds is immediately a web address. That's where the .com fixation comes from, it's a unique result of the birth of the internet. But that perception that www.com is the internet won't last forever, the thought that .net or .cx or .me will confuse people is just an excuse now. The internet isn't new anymore, people get it. My parents get it, and they're the least techological people I know. But more importantly the kids get it, and the kids don't care that domainers love .coms, and kids grow up and earn money and buy things, like domains.

Look, I love .coms, the majority of my money goes into .coms. I don't want .coms to devalue, and I don't think they will specifically because of new tlds, although I think over the next decade they will devalue significantly simply because the people taking over the internet were not brainwashed with ".com is the internet". I'm not a millionaire and I won't be registering my own tld, and i'll certainly take any new tld's with a grain of salt before dumping any large sum of money into them. I'm not a champion of this, but I do think this was an inevitable step for the internet, and IMO it is a positive one. And not as some arrogant asshat said that "i love the idea only because I don't have any good .coms", i don't even necessarily love the idea nor do I think it will be a huge success, I think there will be perhaps a dozen, maybe two new publicly available tlds, and perhaps a dozen or two private tlds (particularly pro sports .nhl, .nba, .mlb, .nfl, .mls). Actually the private excite me the most, it seems like a totally intuitive system that i can just type in anyteam.mlb or anyplayer.nhl and know i'm getting official information.

 

[Keral_Patel]

No personal stuff friend but as I said I am not ashamed of telling that .com is good because I have .coms. Yes It might be a success or not but I will still have to compulsorily say that .com is good because my own money is in .com

That is why I mentioned about majority of domainers and the driving force they have.

No it isn't politics but it is the way the business goes

Thanks.

 

[SonnyCooL]

ROBJ well said ..
holly shit ...
my msg got deleted, this i call internet free...
this is the future, everyone looking toward ...
That is nothing wrong with new extension, what wrong with new extension ? what wrong with joe.fun ? how many percent of internet user (out of 15% internet user), understand of the power of DOT com ? how many % of new comer believe in easy, pharse, brand extension as they new domain ?
Is perfect for end user, they have more choice to choose ...
how many user is buying the domain just because they like it ? i buy .ST cause i love to own the ST which i can't afford in real life.
The kid is grow now and the new era is coming.
i'm standing up on the point of internet user. (i do keep few domain, for the fun of having it) .

 

[Keral_Patel]

holly shit ...
my msg got deleted, this i call internet free...
this is the future, everyone looking toward ...

And this is why I hate newbies talking without knowing where they stand. None of your message has been deleted from this thread. Yet you are whining. what a shame. No one can tell me that I don't respect opinions of others because sometimes they themselves make it look like they know nothing at all about the internet.

i buy .ST cause i love to own the ST which i can't afford in real life.

So you accept you are beating your own drum. So are we.

how many percent of internet user (out of 15% internet user), understand of the power of DOT com ?

Every Joe and Jack and John knows the power of .com

Note: Sorry if I am offending some people. But no intent on offending them. Please let me know if you think I am writing something offensive and I will check on it.

 

[Rob J]

Quote from you Rob J: "For my son I got hisname.us, his favorite arcade site is a .co.uk, and he's not phased when he sees cc extensions"
My Answer: This thread is in NO WAY BOYCOTTING COUNTRY CODE DOMAINS I even have country code domain names, they serve a purpose and are readily available now .co.uk, .cr, .de .nl, .be, .ca etc etc they all REPRESENT A HOME COUNTRY AND THAT IS USEFUL :tu:

.la is marketed as .losangeles, .mn is marketed as .minnesota, .tv is marketed as .television, .me is marketed as ... .me, that's just off the top of my head, there's probably a dozen more. Whether or not they server a purpose, the purpose is being lost. And my point wasn't to attack cc codes, it was to point out that today's generation, my son, doesn't think twice about visiting random tlds other than .com, contrary to the "birth of the internet generation"

This thread is about icann's new domain extension sales (supposedly next year if they ever bother to become a reality) particularly novelty extensions, like a 'theoretical' .fun, .shop, .movies, .village, .fruit, .whatever nonsense

If people don't like them they'll go the way of .biz, if people do like them they'll buy them. I don't see the big problem...

your quote: "I think the obvious tlds will be snatched up (web, sex, fun, xxx, etc)"

My Answer: As for adult extensions it looks like they are not going to be permitted at all, so that rules out the adult part of your post:

Ok, although I think that's a big mistake. I think people who are not looking for porn don't generally want to see porn, people who ARE looking for porn don't want to see sites that are NOT porn. I'm not a prude, i've been on both sides of the coin. A way to filter porno, even if it's optin, is a benefit to everyone, but then the bible thumpers will start thumping i guess...

Another quote from you Rob J: "Joe Dingle Johnson will spend $15,000+ on jdj.com (or $300,000 on joe.com) when he can get Joe.fun for $10? Sorry but you're not going to convince the "average joe" of anything"

My Answer: There are plenty and plenty of .com domain names that are a quality investment other thant jdj.com, or joe.com anything from LLLL.com to quality keyword.com's and other good .com investments IMO

Everyone in the world is not a domain invester, the average person doesn't want to buy a domain as an investment, if they want one at all they want their name or something catchy or cool for a blog. Virtually everything that fits into that category in the .com tld is either already taken/developed or being squatted by domainers, and the asking price is probably about $5,000+. $10 alternatives start to look pretty good when faced with reality.

Also as for joe.fun, it is not just unlikely that a company that bought into the new extension thing with a minimum $100,000 starting bid would sell you joe.fun for $10 it pretty much impossible, they would make you cough up as much money as they could possibly get out of you for it

We have no clue what they'll ask for any new tlds, but I think the only way any tld will launch with any success will be with domainers on board, and it seems that domainers aren't very fond of tlds that cost more than $10 .

 

[Keral_Patel]

Here is truth about new generation.

If my son, daughter or nephew asks me where should he or she invest. My answer will be in .coms

Ask this question to yourself and you will know the answer.

 

[estibot.com]

Pointless.

I agree.

..."Domainers" are still the driving force causing newer extensions and fads to keep going around in circles. Face it , it's nothing new in this industry.

Again, agree.

This seems to me an inevitable development.

This has already been happening, though in a more regulated way, in recent years. MOBI, ASIA, and so on. I see nothing different. The point of .mobi is to make money for the mTLD Top Level Domain Ltd, and the point of .asia is to make money for DotAsia Organisation Limited. All funded by us domainers.

As long as the viability and funding of a tld is dependent solely on domainers, it is a sure sign of an unhealthy market. Signs of a "market correction" can already be seen for some of these tld's. "Market correction" is something that is usually heard shortly before a crash. Dotcom will not crash, because the market is real, there is a real end user demand for names, and there is substantial type-in traffic that can be used to drive real business.

I believe the current development will cause a drop in domain name values across the board, with the exception of the .com tld and well-established ccTLD's. The old tld's such as .org and .net might keep their value, at least initially. In my opinion, the value of unestablished namespaces such as .mobi and .asia will dwindle; they are built on nothing but speculation. They remind me too much of the Internet bubble of 2000: A lot of money being invested into nothing but promises of riches. The old tld's are different because they have been around for so long, and have a solid, developed namespace with widespread public recognition.

This time around, maybe something will really change. Maybe not just another fad: For instance, .NYC, .LONDON - these are tld's that are immediately meaningful, memorable and useful. Much more so than .asia, .mobi. Still, they won't have such a wide resale potential, apart from perhaps the most premium of keywords, because there is much more supply to meet the demand.

I do see the deregulation of the tld's as an opportunity not only for many individuals and small businesses to get a meaningful and brandable online presence at a low cost, but also for domainers to enter the tld game. Who knows what will happen, but if you can afford it, might be worth the risk to be among the first to set up a new tld. When this becomes possible, it will happen: Big companies will reserve their own tld's, big investors will set up generic tld's - it's no use boycotting or ignoring this fact.

As long as the domain name and tld market is heavily regulated, and only selected tld's are given licences, prices are driven up artificially, which plays into the pockets of tld companies, ICANN and registrars. In the long run (and in many cases, the short run, too) domainers will lose. The market is not real. It's meant to last a few years, until all the money that is to be made has been made. Domainers are the suckers that pay the bill. While some succeed in making a profit during that time, most do not.

In other words, ICANN is granting rarity power to a selected few companies, and it's an artificial kind of rarity.

You don't see many of the extremely successful domainers touting .mobi, .fm, .asia, etc. They mostly focus on type-in traffic, and that's in the .com tld.

With deregulation of the tlds, the market will start to remotely resemble a free market, and perhaps we'll finally know which tlds and domain names are good investments, and which are not.

The current development should be embraced, not boycotted. We as domainers need to adapt instead of fighting back, we need to start thinking: This will happen, so how can we turn this to our advantage?

One thing I'm going to do personally in preparation for this is clean my portfolio of all but .com and .cctld names, also leaving some premium .net and .org names.

 

[Krossat]

good read and i definitely agree for the most part.

But one thing is for sure, unsure times are closer than we expect.
Already the sales have dropped considerably across boards.

The introduction of the "vanity" extensions in such an open and limitless way is kinda unnerving. Earlier, whenever an extension was to be released, there was speculation and discussion, people talked about it. There were opinions formed and the domain market took a stand and valued some more over another (look at .info vs .mobi etc). If the extensions are opened to public and we see 10-12 getting regged every week (100K is peanuts for a lot of big companies looking to market themselves big time), think of the confusion and craziness it might bring forth; I cant even imagine.

I agree.

Again, agree.

This seems to me an inevitable development.

This has already been happening, though in a more regulated way, in recent years. MOBI, ASIA, and so on. I see nothing different. The point of .mobi is to make money for the mTLD Top Level Domain Ltd, and the point of .asia is to make money for DotAsia Organisation Limited. All funded by us domainers.

As long as the viability and funding of a tld is dependent solely on domainers, it is a sure sign of an unhealthy market. Signs of a "market correction" can already be seen for some of these tld's. "Market correction" is something that is usually heard shortly before a crash. Dotcom will not crash, because the market is real, there is a real end user demand for names, and there is substantial type-in traffic that can be used to drive real business....

 

[paleoglobe]

I know this opinion will have opponents, especially since I am not a specialist domainer. In the past world, you all grew up with domain names. In the present world search engines take a much more important place.

I have invested in some domains myself, but if I am honnest, I use the adress line in very few occasions. Many people have google as a startpage and type in what they want. Ofcourse I understand that a good and catchy domain name is interesting in the listings and ofcourse also if you advertise the site offline. Since a few years SEO is much more important than a premium name.

Also I find it quite stupid that many of you have very little respect for new extentions. Although these could be toppers in search results. Many of you would pay a lot more for a 3 word .com than for a fair or good for example .asia. If you follow the current evolution, this seems stupid. Why would a .fun or a .asia not appear in your searchresults? Also for offline marketing a name like have.fun would be easy to remember!

I am NOT planning on buying any of these new names, but all I want to say, is that it is possible that they reach a broad public if your SEO is done well. .com does not have a monopoly on the market. Prices go high because .coms are more rare. But lets face it, rare only makes value when there are no alternatives. And that is something that seems to be changing...

Christophe

 

[resto]

Good thread..

I agree with the above posters about times are changing and kids are growing up.

I think .com will always be cool but that is just me will the new kids think it is so cool? Probably not.

I think this new internet real estate will make .com prices drop drastically..this is going to be a major thing much bigger then a group of old guys stuck on .com.

I will always love .com to me in the future it will be like the car you see with the old license plate from 50 years ago.

 

[Keral_Patel]

I will always love .com to me in the future it will be like the car you see with the old license plate from 50 years ago.

Okay lets agree but yet you know those oldies do sell for a lot of dollars though.

Is someone seeing what I am seeing? The trend? The new domainers?

I was more or less right about the next BIG HYPE.

 

[raredn.com]

Okay lets agree but yet you know those oldies do sell for a lot of dollars though.

Is someone seeing what I am seeing? The trend? The new domainers?

I was more or less right about the next BIG HYPE.

I think the new domainers, 'think' they have missed the .com boat, so they jump at any new domain extension hoping that it will peform a 'feat of alchemy'. Just IMO of course

 

[estibot.com]

Okay lets agree but yet you know those oldies do sell for a lot of dollars though.

Is someone seeing what I am seeing? The trend? The new domainers?

I was more or less right about the next BIG HYPE.

I think the new domainers, 'think' they have missed the .com boat, so they jump at any new domain extension hoping that it will peform a 'feat of alchemy'. Just IMO of course

Yup, and of course that's already happened with .tv, .mobi and .asia (to name but a few examples), so nothing new there. That's why the only way to make money out of this is to own a TLD instead of throwing money at those who do own one..

If that's not your cup of tea, then I think it's worth keeping a keen eye on the market, and trying to understand how this will affect the value of your current portfolio, and take appropriate action. Mostly this means anticipating a value drop of all but the premium tlds.

This is potentially not "just another hype" though - it is a bit different from the sporadic introduction of new tld's - if there is a sudden massive increase of tld's, then the whole market will be affected. Lots of hype to be expected, new TLD owners luring in domainers to register thousands of names, but that's not what I mean. I mean the impact that this change will have on the market as a whole.

Just IMHO of course.

 

[tipsfromthetop]

I think the new domainers, 'think' they have missed the .com boat, so they jump at any new domain extension hoping that it will peform a 'feat of alchemy'. Just IMO of course

No your right mate, i hope the new domainers boats do come but if your a realist no matter how your boat floats they will never hold the prestige/value the .com and the .co.uk, .de etc etc does today.

Every enduser either has the .com or country extension for there business why because thats the way the internet has moulded these companies. How many adverts do you see on telly.. Confused.com.. google.com, yahoo.co.uk, CNN.com ... have you ever seen any of these new extensions imprinted on your eyes through magazine ads, tv comericials etc etc if you have its rare..

Everyone has there own views and i will only advise its down to the individual at the end of the day how they want to spend there money.. but for 99% of domainers being a domainer sure is a hobby but its also a business like property you invest in the hope to make a profit.

I wish you all well

Steve

 

[DnFloorCEO]

Out of the 14 domains listed, only 2 taxicab companies are represented here. So please, who is being greedy?

If I was the head of the National Taxi Association, I think it would be a service to my members to start dotCab and limit it to TAXI companies.

However, limited .extensions increase competition. What do you think the 12 parking sites hope to accomplish? Their ultimate goal would be to find a taxi company end user. If people are going to get these crappy extensions instead of buying already regged domains, it's just going to end up hurting the domain industry as a whole.

 

[scandiman]

Here's a break down of Taxi/TaxiCabs -

Taxi.com Owned by A & R company
Taxi.net NL Taxi Company
Taxi.Org NL Taxi Company (same as Net)
Taxi.info redirects to 1maia.com
Taxi.biz redirects to hopescience.com
Taxi.us redirects to SEDO auction page where domain is being auctioned for $35,000 (reserve met)
Taxi.de Owned and being used by Taxi company
Taxicab.com (Parked and ugly)
Taxicab.net (Parked and ugly)
Taxicab.org (Parked and ugly)
Taxicab.info (Parked and ugly)
Taxicab.us (Parked and ugly)
Taxicab.biz (Parked and ugly)
Taxicabs.de (Parked and ugly)

You left out TaxiCab.mobi, a very useful developed website.

 

[ecigs.net]

Don't Panic.

You left out TaxiCab.mobi, a very useful developed website.

Wow. Cool Site!! Great Format too. Right where you need it too -- on a mobile phone. It was definitely not my intention to leave out MOBI. I was in a hurry and forgot it.

FGClips, you wrote:

However, limited .extensions increase competition. What do you think the 12 parking sites hope to accomplish? Their ultimate goal would be to find a taxi company end user. If people are going to get these crappy extensions instead of buying already regged domains, it's just going to end up hurting the domain industry as a whole.

Are you nuts? In a free market, competition is always good. No competition means monopoly and higher consumer prices. Besides that, since when has a new TLD effected COM in any way except positively? Premium domains will always be the best you can get. So why worry? More people getting into the industry is good for everyone. So why the panic?

PS - Those parking sites do not help domainers in any way. Not one of the parked sites I mentioned shows up in Google in the first 5 pages for the terms, "taxi" or "taxicabs". A domain should easily be in the top ten searches fora search of its own name. Therefore, parking houses are not helping the domainer make money. The sites would sell faster if they were in the top three search results on page one. So, I disagree. Parked sites are not there to find endusers. They are there to make parking companies money.

 

[AndyR]

I think that I am with the majority here in thinking that this was probably inevitable and now that it has been announced, certainly inevitable. With corporations becoming bigger than countries, why should they not own a TLD.

The growth in the market is to be welcomed, as has been often stated, the market is king, protectionism for any sector is to be avoided. If internet users are now at a billion and much of this number in the last few years, adapting moores law says that probably this will double in the next five, where are the millions of names that new users will want as their personal domain.

Every large ISP will probably be looking at their own top level domain .virgin etc. The churches will see this as a route to more bucks, political parties. You will get a free hosted yourname.ford if you buy one etc. Competition prizes, advertising, the skies are the limit on this one and I see little virtue in closing ones mind to it. There is money to be made here methinks,

andyr