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

 

[jmcc]

Ugh....76 million active dot coms.

That's another argument - active domains versus domains merely in the zonefile.

I believe that the top 20 or so CCTLD's don't even come close to adding up to the number of dot com registrations.

At a guess, the ccTLD count would be over 20M. That does not exceed .com and the gTLDs but it is significant.

The Verisign Domain Industry Brief tends to be useful for general trends. Apart from that it is necessary to collect stats from the individual ccTLD registries.
http://www.verisign.com/static/043939.pdf

The stats for .de show it as over 12M:
http://www.denic.de/en/domains/statistiken/index.html

Your parity theory is iffy except for maybe a small handful of countries..again...maybe 5%. That's a very small portion of the world.

It is a theory based on facts, data and observation rather than opinion.

No need for a "but" because that's all you have to say. First you say that a person has a US-Centric view of CCTLD's then you admit that dot com is the GLOBAL BRAND. Which is it?

Strange as it may sound, both. The .com has global recognition but over the last few years, the ccTLDs are catching up in their own markets. This change is slow but the figures are there. The hard part is breaking down the .com and gTLD registrations on a country basis.

So how does anyone even dare think another set of TLD's opening up is going to make my friend Mr. D. Com flinch? He is rich and he is arrogant. He will not be moved from the top position by a dozen wannabe's.

The real competition for .com is not these wannabe TLDs but rather the ccTLDs. As the country markets mature, there is greater emphasis on the ccTLD. This trend is what people are missing because they think in purely dot com terms.

Regards...jmcc

 

[labrocca]

It is a theory based on facts, data and observation rather than opinion.

What facts? You haven't presented any that uphold your argument.

The real competition for .com is not these wannabe TLDs but rather the ccTLDs. As the country markets mature, there is greater emphasis on the ccTLD. This trend is what people are missing because they think in purely dot com terms.

I would like to see some facts to substantiate that.

However I can certainly produce facts that prove you wrong. A simple tool like Google Trends works.

http://google.com/trends

Try .com vs any CCTLD...the growth of com has been significant the past few years. Stronger than any other TLD or CCTLD.

On what facts do you stand to say that CCTLD are growing at a faster pace than dot com? While CCTLD are of course growing....it's not nearly at the same rate.

The trend is clear to me. The more TLD's the stronger dot com gets.

All the discussion about ICANN opening up TLD's and how CCTLDs are the future is mostly nonsense. They are small players in a growing GLOBAL market. Do you think that the world is becoming one giant marketplace? Because if you do...then dot com makes perfect sense to be the market leader. Companies for the most part will continue to use dot com for their online presence. Yes companies such as Sony do have sony.co.jp but where do they have their internation global presence? It's Sony.net actually. It's not a CCTLD.

CNO baby...CNO

 

[jmcc]

What facts?

You presented some of them yourself in the link to the .kr registry - the growth of ccTLDs.

I would like to see some facts to substantiate that.

I'll post some stats later tonight.

However I can certainly produce facts that prove you wrong. A simple tool like Google Trends works.

http://google.com/trends

No. All that Google Trends displays is the search volume queries for various terms but without any numerical indication of the volumes. The .com vs .fr, .com vs .de and .com vs .ie are interesting trends especially when you limit the queries to their target markets of France, Germany and Ireland respectively. Without those crucial numbers, the Google Trends graphs don't apply to domain registations figures. They apply to search volume on particular queries - two different things.

Try .com vs any CCTLD...the growth of com has been significant the past few years. Stronger than any other TLD or CCTLD.

I am aware of how significant the growth of .com and the other TLDs have been since I use the zonefiles to generate the stats. You are not comparing like with like and that is where we differ. I am talking about ccTLD growth as compared to .com growth in those ccTLDs. You are talking about .com growth as a whole.

On what facts do you stand to say that CCTLD are growing at a faster pace than dot com?

I'm not sure if you are misunderstanding the argument on purpose. But some ccTLDs are growing faster in their countries than .com registrations.

All the discussion about ICANN opening up TLD's and how CCTLDs are the future is mostly nonsense.

The ccTLDs have an awful lot of growing left to do. The .com is a mature extension and its global nature is maintaining a lot of its growth.

Do you think that the world is becoming one giant marketplace? Because if you do...then dot com makes perfect sense to be the market leader.

I think that the world is still a set of marketplaces and will continue to be a set of marketplaces for the immediate future. Treating the world as a single, global, market for business purposes is naive.

Companies for the most part will continue to use dot com for their online presence. Yes companies such as Sony do have sony.co.jp but where do they have their internation global presence? It's Sony.net actually. It's not a CCTLD.

So tell me again why Google places so much emphasis on ccTLDs. And why does Sony tend to use ccTLDs when selling to country level markets? The domain business is not just domainers. Companies and businesses use domains to target specific markets and ccTLDs are, more than , .com or the gTLDs, effective in targeting those markets. As I said earlier, ccTLDs are growing and will continue to grow. In some countries, the ccTLD will become more important for that country than the .com and gTLDs. In some countries such as Germany and the UK, the ccTLD dominates the market and .com is second to the ccTLDs.

Sony's .eu points to its sony-europe.com portal and that allows users to select the relevent Sony ccTLD site:

http://www.sony-europe.com/PageView.do?site=odw_en_EU

Sony seems to get the whole ccTLD/country level market concept.

Regards...jmcc

 

[GoPC]

You're dealing with fiction. NBC has NBC.com. If NBC bothers to get their own extension I will eat my underwear. Why would NBC bother to create an extension for themselves?

You'd better invest in some Ketchup, my good friend.

Why? Because it's a Marketing Match made in Heaven, that's why.

NBC would NEVER, EVER have to worry about cyber squatters again. It's like the 3D VISA % MC logos on your credit cards, Man. If it's not .NBC brother, it's not the real deal.

It's the stamp of authenticity. It's proof of the real McCoy. The .com is the place holder now, .NBC is where the action is.

It's ENDLESS.... Whatever they will think of, WHEVER they get around to thinking of it... they've got the domain. They don't have to search, or buy, or employ a lawyer or fight with anyone.

Just build it, advertise it and drive traffic to it.

Look at all the CRAZY domains being used by TV and Movie promoters now. Why in the world would they be using 4 and 5 word domains with abstract meanings to market their Multi-Million Dollar productions if they had ANY inclination to by the proper .com?

Because they BELIEVE in marketing and driving traffic to where they want it to go. It's INGRAINED in them. It's marketing 101, Brother!

"If you build it, they will come" is only the Domainer's prayer. Big Business subscribes to "Market, Market, Market, Market... and they will come"

NBC is going to market their programs anyway... exactly HOW MUCH MONEY does it take for them to simply say "Dateline.NBC... the new place for NEWS" or "SNL.NBC... the New Place for Laughs" or Jay Leno to say "LateNight.NBC... the new place for Leno"

They do stuff like that anyway. They simply need to change their message and BAM... they've branded their new domain and ensured a trouble free future for... well, forever.

I tell you what, there are some Marketing Execs that are going to make a TON of money in selling these new extensions to business. The gold rush is on, and I'm sad to say that we domainers are not invited.

I'm not saying .com is completely DEAD, I'm just saying that the BIG money buyers/end users have been given and option that greatly reduces the .com value.

I'm also suggesting that NOW, more than ever, is the time for the Domaining community to find a way to meet traditional marketing in a place they recognize and stop trying to get them to think "our" way about domains.

Because like them, we have an educational curve to deal with. We need to teach them how to come to us just as they are teaching the viewing public how to come to them.

In their world, "generic" has less value and the sooner we realize that, the sooner our worlds might come together for mutual growth.

GoPC

 

[bizcorp]

I dont think it will be the end. Domaining will be around for a long time in my opinion. But these new extensions will certainly have an impact on the domain industry.

 

[nrmillions]

Dot com is a proven viable business extension where having a brandable dot com can lead to riches. Digg.com, Youtube.com, Myspace.com, and Facebook.com...all huge sites born of recent years now worth BILLIONS. Did they start as facebook.info and myspace.org? Nope. They used the best location on the internet...dot com.

Fifth Avenue NYC is always going to be prime real estate no matter how big NYC is expanded.

If a company is brandable and is developed properly with venture funding and not some crappy developed page that a domainer makes then the extension doesnt matter and .com becomes irrelevant. Do you think Craigslist.org, Del.icio.us and Last.fm are worthless? The people who developed on those domains are worth $100 million or more now. Is one of your developed .coms worth more? It seems like brandable domains which are developed are the ones worth all the money, not the generic ones as much. That means that generic .com domain values might not be worth much in the future too. Which is worth more generic SearchEngine.com or Google.com? Videos.com or YouTube.com?

 

[Zeeble]

If the day comes when I can simply create my own extension for the same as today's registration fee then we will see the end of .com

A great system would be for me to be able to create a domain name with an extension quickly and easily which is relevant to my business and local area. (e.g. webdesign.exeter)

Personally, I think this would be a great solution as it would give more choice to businesses, and crate more memorable domain names for visitors.

 

[cityforums.com]

You'd better invest in some Ketchup, my good friend.

Why? Because it's a Marketing Match made in Heaven, that's why.

NBC would NEVER, EVER have to worry about cyber squatters again. It's like the 3D VISA % MC logos on your credit cards, Man. If it's not .NBC brother, it's not the real deal.

It's the stamp of authenticity. It's proof of the real McCoy. The .com is the place holder now, .NBC is where the action is.

It's ENDLESS.... Whatever they will think of, WHEVER they get around to thinking of it... they've got the domain. They don't have to search, or buy, or employ a lawyer or fight with anyone.

Just build it, advertise it and drive traffic to it.

Look at all the CRAZY domains being used by TV and Movie promoters now. Why in the world would they be using 4 and 5 word domains with abstract meanings to market their Multi-Million Dollar productions if they had ANY inclination to by the proper .com?

Because they BELIEVE in marketing and driving traffic to where they want it to go. It's INGRAINED in them. It's marketing 101, Brother!

"If you build it, they will come" is only the Domainer's prayer. Big Business subscribes to "Market, Market, Market, Market... and they will come"

NBC is going to market their programs anyway... exactly HOW MUCH MONEY does it take for them to simply say "Dateline.NBC... the new place for NEWS" or "SNL.NBC... the New Place for Laughs" or Jay Leno to say "LateNight.NBC... the new place for Leno"

They do stuff like that anyway. They simply need to change their message and BAM... they've branded their new domain and ensured a trouble free future for... well, forever.

I tell you what, there are some Marketing Execs that are going to make a TON of money in selling these new extensions to business. The gold rush is on, and I'm sad to say that we domainers are not invited.

I'm not saying .com is completely DEAD, I'm just saying that the BIG money buyers/end users have been given and option that greatly reduces the .com value.

I'm also suggesting that NOW, more than ever, is the time for the Domaining community to find a way to meet traditional marketing in a place they recognize and stop trying to get them to think "our" way about domains.

Because like them, we have an educational curve to deal with. We need to teach them how to come to us just as they are teaching the viewing public how to come to them.

In their world, "generic" has less value and the sooner we realize that, the sooner our worlds might come together for mutual growth.

GoPC

GoPC I would have to agree 100% with your post ... by ICANN changing the

zoning laws, BIG companies will be able to build even bigger empires on the

other side of the dot while squeezing the little guy a little more. It evens out

the playing field back to their age old advantage.

 

[john_karr]

Im In!

 

[Idees]

I'm in.

 

[cityforums.com]

Heh, I saw this and recalled back to the auction at the last DomainFest, where I believe it was Taxicab.com or Taxicabs.com that was in the auction with min bid $40k and no one grabbed it. If I had the money I would have gotten it but it was literally just out of reach financially for me.

Anyways, here's my stance: .com is to extensions like Google is to search. There are tons of different search engines out there, including niche ones (the ".mobi"s of search), barely used ones (the ".name", etc.), and of course Yahoo and MSN trailing Google by a mile like they have for eons. My prediction is that other extensions will affect the value/prices of .com the same time that other search engines will affect the success of Google. In other words, don't hold your breath.

I personally think this is ICANN's way to incite stupid unknowledged companies and investors to throw their money away, the same way that new extensions like .im (anyone remember the buzz over that one on here?) and the like do to domain investors every time they come out. That's not to say EVERYONE doing it will lose money. Just like someone probably got poker.im, travel.im, etc., someone will undoubtedly get a really solid word or set of letters such that they can make their money back and possibly some profit. But it will be a tiny percentage of the companies that start these extensions, and look at what 100+ non-.com extensions have done to the value of .com over the past 10+ years...anything? Anything at all?

I would sooner worry about the downward spiraling economy and its continuing affect on domains and what people will pay for them. That HAS been affecting domain prices and will continue to.

Steve you feel .Geos will be a wasted investment for a company ?

 

[labrocca]

am talking about ccTLD growth as compared to .com growth in those ccTLDs.

And yet once again you provide no evidence of this trend.

I'm not sure if you are misunderstanding the argument on purpose. But some ccTLDs are growing faster in their countries than .com registrations.

Right..that's where the 5% comes in...forget did you? I am pretty sure in Germany that .de registrations outnumber .com but so what...that's a small portion of the overall internet. It's also the exception not the rule.

I'll post some stats later tonight.

Looking forward to it. I am always happen to see proof in a discussion.

NBC would NEVER, EVER have to worry about cyber squatters again. It's like the 3D VISA % MC logos on your credit cards, Man. If it's not .NBC brother, it's not the real deal.

It's the stamp of authenticity. It's proof of the real McCoy. The .com is the place holder now, .NBC is where the action is.

It's ENDLESS.... Whatever they will think of, WHEVER they get around to thinking of it... they've got the domain. They don't have to search, or buy, or employ a lawyer or fight with anyone.

Now that's a very valid point. It's a good perspective. I can certainly see that take on it. I am just still not convinced companies overall will take the steps needed. Also will ICANN allow extensions that are closed off to public registration? That imho is a good question since opening up the extension rules imho is to allow greater public access. We shall see.

Do you think Craigslist.org, Del.icio.us and Last.fm are worthless?

I was absolutely sure that someone would bring those sites up.

Craigslist.com
Delicious.com
Last.fm <- the only one not to have a CNO. Again an exception not the rule.

You forgot one too...wikipedia.org but again...they have the .com version too.

That means that generic .com domain values might not be worth much in the future too. Which is worth more generic SearchEngine.com or Google.com? Videos.com or YouTube.com?

What's your point? Seems out of the scope of this discussion. We are discussion the new TLD rules by ICANN and how it might effect dot com values. If you are trying to convince people that Generics won't be valuable because brandables will be the hot-ticket then maybe you need to have a look at dnjournals weekly sales chart. The vast majority are generics and acronyms with a small mixture of brandables in the $x,xxx range. I respect greatly brandables for future prospects but I am not convinced they will ever be worth the $xx,xxx range.

 

[ecigs.net]

Google =/= COM

Heh, I saw this and recalled back to the auction at the last DomainFest, where I believe it was Taxicab.com or Taxicabs.com that was in the auction with min bid $40k and no one grabbed it. If I had the money I would have gotten it but it was literally just out of reach financially for me.

Anyways, here's my stance: .com is to extensions like Google is to search. There are tons of different search engines out there, including niche ones (the ".mobi"s of search), barely used ones (the ".name", etc.), and of course Yahoo and MSN trailing Google by a mile like they have for eons. My prediction is that other extensions will affect the value/prices of .com the same time that other search engines will affect the success of Google. In other words, don't hold your breath.

I personally think this is ICANN's way to incite stupid unknowledged companies and investors to throw their money away, the same way that new extensions like .im (anyone remember the buzz over that one on here?) and the like do to domain investors every time they come out. That's not to say EVERYONE doing it will lose money. Just like someone probably got poker.im, travel.im, etc., someone will undoubtedly get a really solid word or set of letters such that they can make their money back and possibly some profit. But it will be a tiny percentage of the companies that start these extensions, and look at what 100+ non-.com extensions have done to the value of .com over the past 10+ years...anything? Anything at all?

I would sooner worry about the downward spiraling economy and its continuing affect on domains and what people will pay for them. That HAS been affecting domain prices and will continue to.

You can't compare COM to Google. It sounds nice, but it isn't accurate. People go to Google because it is the best Search Engine. People go to COM out of habit. Choice versus ignorance. That's not the same thing.

You also can't compare ccTLDs to gTLDS. You are right, IM doesn't effect COM at all. Neither does DE, the second most popular domain. That's because IM, like DE are ccTLDs and COM is a gTLD. I bet you wouldn't say that NET & ORG do not effect COM. If you have a COM and somebody developes an ORG or NET with the same name, it usually makes the COM counterpart traffic go up. More traffic means more value. That's really obvious, isn't it? [Example: I bet Archive.com gets a lot of bleed over traffic from Archive.org. True or False? Archive.com is more valuable because Archive.org is one of the top 2000 sites in the world.]

Do you really believe this line that you wrote NameTrader: "I personally think this is ICANN's way to incite stupid unknowledged companies and investors to throw their money away." Isn't that kind of a crazy theory? Why would ICANN do that? [Elvis was captured by spacemen, too. ] Your .IM example doesn't provide proof of anything except of people not understanding what they were buying. The Isle of Man had a right to have a domain extension. ICANN provided them with .IM. It had nothing to do with greed. It had nothing to do with domaining either. Nobody told domainers to buy .IM and put crappy parking pages there.

 

[jmcc]

And yet once again you provide no evidence of this trend.



Right..that's where the 5% comes in...forget did you? I am pretty sure in Germany that .de registrations outnumber .com but so what...that's a small portion of the overall internet. It's also the exception not the rule.

Well these are some recent stats using webhosting.info's less than reliable gTLD figures and more reliable ccTLD figures from the ccTLD registries:

Country - TLD/gTLD - ccTLD
.uk 3555629 - 6941940
.de 5745656 - 12133637
.fr 2273012 - 1172565
.jp 1291085 - 1033412
.mx 145469 - 258565
.ca 3130792 - 1047985
.kr 840079 - 932001
.se 288735 - 744812
.dk 339681 - 927013
.fi 169865 - 183234
.it 939443 - 1549441
.br 300174 - 1387453
.au 2380417 - 1168506
co.za 67066 - 410813
.il 80456 - 129494
.es 1165454 - 970580 (May/08)
.nl 885122 - 2997668
.cn 2854920 - 11821635

Some of these countries have transnational registrars hosted and this tends to drive up the numbers of CNOBI domains. However strong ccTLDs do exist beside CNOBI registrations and in some cases, there are more ccTLDs than CNOBI domains.

This is a more closely tracked set of figures for .ie (Ireland) Versus Irish hosted gTLDs:

Month - .ie - CNOBI - .com

01/Jan/2008 - 91352 - 95817 - 76250
01/Feb/2008 - 93634 - 98394 - 78336
01/Mar/2008 - 96201 - 100545 - 80031
01/Apr/2008 - 98241 - 102545 - 81604
01/May/2008 - 101156 - 105095 - 83625
01/Jun/2008 - 103156 - 107208 - 85292
01/Jul/2008 - 105167 - 108813 - 86583

Far from .de being the exception to your rule, its ccTLD dominance model is actually more common than you think. Some of these countries are more advanced in terms of connectivity and as such when that happens, the ccTLDs grow rapidly. Where internet connectivity is not so good, many of those countries' gTLD domains will be hosted outside of the IP ranges of those countries, typically in the US or Canada. The registration and hosting business tends to follow a particular track in that when there is a significant development of connectivity in a country that country's non-locally hosted domains will move back. In a mature ccTLD market, over 80% of that country's domains will be hosted locally.

Regards...jmcc

 

[leftfielder]

People not buying domains because they think it is a poor investment isn't a boycott. There is no protest going on, people just don't think the names are very good. I think you'll see that naturally these new domains will have little speculative success like the prior releases.

+1

I just hope that the true reason of the "boycott" is to truly dispute the junk extension because one thing domainers lack is banding together BEFORE the sale.

There are no junky extensions, just junky domains and some of us have allowed our online friends to register total rubbish. As a result, deep down I'm think domainers are scared of other extensions because the domaining business will lose it's integrity and be over-saturated with junky domains. NewsFlash: it already is IMO.

ICANN is a business and it needs to make more profit here lately and since when does ICANN gave a care about the public opinion? That hits a nerve but look at an enduser POV when they try to register the lamest domain and they see UNAVAILABLE UNAVAILABLE UNAVAILABLE

Go with the flow and spend this time preparing ways to have a leg-up on the competition instead.

Bottom line is we all make money from speculation. ICANN sees it's opportunity and will run with it.

Competition and change are bound to happen and the average domainer is too resilient.

 

[raredn.com]

Go with the flow and spend this time preparing ways to have a leg-up on the competition instead.

Unfortunately if new extensions come out the only people benefiting will be the people selling the extensions IMO, the companies that put up the minimum $100,000 to get a foot in, not you, not I, not a bunch of newbie domainers either. This same sentiment has been expressed by namepros user estibot.com and also by Domain Name tycoon Rick latona on one of his latest blog posts. Rick Latona is even going to be on the serving end of the domain name extensions making a partnership to buy some extensions next year, but Rick Latona expressed that domainers on the buying end will be getting a dud deal. This has also been my sentiment all along, or this boycott thread would not have been started in the first place.

Personally, I think an overwhelming majority that try to release a new novelty domain name extension are going to fall flat on their faces, seriously and when they do, I wouldn't want to be holding any domain names in their extensions either. Trademarked names like .ibm .cnn .msn and city geo domains aside of course, I have little problem with trademarked and geo extensions myself personally. I have a lot of issue with future novelty domains though like: .cool, .fun, .travel .shop .jobs .film .name .trash .biz .dontbeasucker .pro .cars etc

 

[leftfielder]

I have a lot of issue with future novelty domains though like: .cool, .fun, .travel .shop .jobs .film .name .trash .biz .dontbeasucker .pro .cars etc

:lol:

I see what you mean. Where ever there are big profits to be made, implosion is likely. The internet is very young and this in inevitable. If it doesn't happen now, it will happen later. We all want to sell that million dollar domain before the domain name business implodes.

Your quote get me to thinking about how this will effect advertising and consumer loyalty. How will we all fit in Google's top ONE HUNDRED for our keywords? How do I pick the best site for a cell phone out of THOUSANDS? I can hear my mom saying, "What's their website? .cool? wth?" :lol:

On a serious note. thanks for the clarification of your view. People who know nothing about the internet except for checking email have absolutely no clue and ICANN is acting like everyone is a domainer when we're just a fraction of the world's population. How much damage can a fraction do?

 

[raredn.com]

Indeed pseudo_mod, what the average mom, friend, sister, brother can understand is what to aim for when buying domain names IMO

 

[SonnyCooL]

anyone have the static of DOT com VS cctld Park site static/ratio ???
I heard there is a lot value for dot com but most (ratio/percentage) generic/brand/keyword domain in dot com is PARK site compare with cctld (develop)....

 

[DomainMayhem.com]

Boycotting new markets is usually as effective as boycotting entropy. Good luck with that. Both Entropy and Free Market dynamics are based on large numbers. "Boycotts" are already taking place within the market via the individual decisions of those that comprise the market. If a tld fails that is a natural market result.

Personally I love to see competition in the market, regardless of whether it hurts my own market position... that just means you need to adjust your position. I am hoping for some new excellent tld's to change the market. New markets create new opportunities for investment.

Very well said!

 

[estibot.com]

I agree. The more TLD's, the more confusing the namespace will get to the average user, and the more .com will benefit. Search engines don't always help; competition for Google top spots is so fierce, often when I'm searching for some information, all I get on the first SERP is that "compare prices and read reviews" crap. Often I'm tempted to try the .com just in case there is a good directory or other informative page, even PPC ads - they are often right on the money...literally

.com will keep its value, it may even benefit from this, some new TLD's (.nyc) will succeed, most will fail.

 

[jkennedy]

End...no
Impact....yes
Kill .com....I don't think so.
I keep hearing how .com values will fall drastically, but I say there might be a short period when the value decreases a little, but com will always be king and will bounce back. These new changes will hopefully be a big boost to the domain business, and hopefully there will be money to be made all around.

Hang on, it's gonna be a wild ride.

 

[IAmAllanShore]

Poetic, and I'm late to the game, but spot-on :tu:

And yes, much like new.net or web.com promoters lost my business, so will any registrar who attempts another .ws late night MLM scheme that these are destined to become.

-Allan :gl:

It's already that way - And "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. Most of the news we see that supposedly is proof that "This company supports this extension" is actually not proof at all - It's "This company is trying to protect it's Brand by registering any approved extensions it can". With the latest ICANT news ... The sky is the limit !
There can be a new "Grand Illusion" every week now for people to drool over.

 

[kemjika11]

We already have some crazy threads on NP about this...

I don't think it will affect good+ premium names much, but it will weaken really poor names.

 

[Ronald Regging]

This whole ICANN thing has been exciting. The forums have transformed from a relaxed business setting into one of those end of days, apocalyptic doomsday forums. I'm just waiting for people to start handing out the Kool-aid. (We really need to add a Kool-aid Man smily!).