new gtlds New gTLDs, are they about to blow?

[betthelot]

Investors need to know what the risks and rewards are. You may not like to hear the risks if they don't fit with your bias, once invested. Confirmation bias being a very common psychological effect on investors: confirmation bias is a tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's invested interests, leading to investment errors.
OK if you are invested in .xyz or .top you are not going to like reading this, only 100 domain investors account for 44% of all registrations (excluding privacy registrations) and over 72% are registered in Asia. Reported by Colin Campbell CEO dot Club.

Thats one hell of a lot of names being held by a few speculators, who could drop them at any time, as they flight a string with very little confirmed aftermarket sales.

We know .xyz names are being shill bidded at auction, as it now appears all notable sales at West.cn, 2 weeks ago, never actually completed.
Colin also made the point that usage not registrations will mean success for a new gTLD and China has driven the market for many but is highly speculative.
This is what he says "So clearly we have a highly speculative market. Those of us who have been around the block a few times, know that hope and prayer is not an investment strategy."

Colin is being a little hypocritical giving that he is selling .club for $1 in China to bolster numbers but he knows his stuff and hes sees hype and overvalued names, due to unwarranted high speculation.

Article at CircleID

 

[bludex]

Anybody know the numbers for dotcom, how many dotcoms are owned by the top 100, or let's say top 10000 domain investors?

 

[betthelot]

Anybody know the numbers for dotcom, how many dotcoms are owned by the top 100, or let's say top 10000 domain investors?

It will be around 4-5% .Com domains owned by the top 100 domain investors.

 

[doubleU]

.xyz alone will not bring down the entire new gTLD namespace

Most people will comfortably use other new gTLDs before they even know .xyz exists.

Shill bidders have no bias when it comes to TLDs, all of the tradable TLDs are effected by this dishonest activity.

 

[disaac81]

The whole gTLD space has created confusion for end users.

The people who actually want a domain name that will help them succeed are putting their new venture(s) at risk by using tld(s) that make them look inferior.

There was never a need for so many new tlds, perhaps a few more select ones, but the whole thing has become a joke.

 

[DOMAIN ILLUMINATI]

I can't confirm an appreciable confusion outside.
Some investors may lose, but people (end users) still love to choose.
Equal what - so also (or especially) domains, beside many other things in life.

New TLDs are simply new, it takes time* - like most of new things.
And more time.

 

[doubleU]

The whole gTLD space has created confusion for end users.

The people who actually want a domain name that will help them succeed are putting their new venture(s) at risk by using tld(s) that make them look inferior.

There was never a need for so many new tlds, perhaps a few more select ones, but the whole thing has become a joke.

It will take time for each to build their reputation, some seem destined to fail right from the start and others will slowly gain or lose over many years.

ccTLDs took a long time to become as successful as they are today.

 

[disaac81]

Agree @doubleU and also ccTlds have a clear purpose as they represent services within that geo location.

I am sure some Gtlds will do well and have a clear use too. Right now it is the bombardment of hundreds (thousands?) of them that is causing a headache.

 

[betthelot]

Shill bidders have no bias when it comes to TLDs, all of the tradable TLDs are effected by this dishonest activity.

I know of no other extension that sells 20 names above $5,000 in ONE auction and ALL are shill bids. Do you. That is pump and dump on an industrial scale.

 

[betthelot]

The people who actually want a domain name that will help them succeed are putting their new venture(s) at risk by using tld(s) that make them look inferior.

So so true. And that becomes more of an issue, as the only thing the public will know about the new gTLDs is for spam and malware.
If ICANN could do this all over again they would seriously restrict the strings to be launched, it has added nothing or little in expanding the namespace, very few are being used, SO WHERE WAS THIS PENT UP DEMAND FOR MORE NAME SPACE!!

 

[disaac81]

@betthelot I actually thought about this for ages, about ICANN starting this over again, then realizing that I have no power to make it happen lol.

As you say, even if they wanted to, they cannot due to legal issues and the names already registered. But in hind-sight I bet they wish they only released say 5 of the new gtlds, as that way they would have had some credibility.

 

[HotKey]

10, 15, 20 years from now we are going to see many of these gTLD's in mainstream use. There will most certainly be one's that come out ahead with more popular results, just as COM did against NET/ORG/BIZ/PRO. There will also certainly be massive fails. You can't launch the most massive namespace venture in the history of the Internet without some hiccups. Filtering out the duds is an important part of the operation.

I think we will also find 20 years from now as the Internet gets more and more sophisticated the namespaces will also reflect that. It's probable ne gTLD releases will become a common, affordable everyday event, suited to each individual or business needs.

I can't wait for the day of the elimination of the dot.

 

[doubleU]

I can't wait for the day of the elimination of the dot.

You won't have too, because it's not going to happen.

 

[disaac81]

"without some hiccups" is a HUGE understatement.

There will always be a "dot" since IP and DNS are always going to be around.

 

[betthelot]

You won't have too, because it's not going to happen.

they will not all fail - the ones that think about the long term brand value of their new gTLD like .news will survive but not be the second coming or the pot of gold or fortunes created as we were led to believe.

Godaddy are buying portfolios aggressively and if those portfolios contain any new gTLDs they strip them out first before doing a deal. Speaks volumes what the biggest retailer of these names think they are worth.

 

[garptrader]

It is true that the more you have invested in something (a growth stock you thought was a great investment, pre-construction condos 2006 or a domain in any TLD), the more difficult it can be psychologically to take a loss. It is actually easier to let domains expire that I know I only paid reg fee a couple years ago than ones that I won in auction five years ago and have been paying $25-$30 renewals on since. But if it seems no one is paying more than reg fee for Spanish domains, I have had to let many decent but not exceptional names go - particularly in alt TLDs but even in .COM.

No doubt there are many low-budget developers and end users who will experiment with alternative TLDs. That does not mean that limited adoption by end users makes investing in these TLDs a great investment. Some registries recognize that most domain buyers are domain speculators and keep renewals low.

However, limited end user usage still is not enough to ensure a TLD as a good investment. .TV has ample end user adoption and I even see occasional TV ads using the extension. I saw an end user using a .TV at the West Palm Beach boat show recently. That does not make .TV - an extension which has existed for more than fifteen years a phenomenal investment. $30 renewals make profitability difficult when sales ratios are abysmal and buyers' budgets are low.

Before the new TLDs were launched there were many millions of aftermarket domains available for end users to acquire - for a price. While one-word .COMs might have been too expensive for smaller businesses, the reality is even small businesses can easily afford $3-$5k for a domain name if they prioritize its acquisition as critical to their brand. Thus there was no need for new TLDs as there were already millions of aftermarket domains available in this price range (and many at $XXX). The new TLDs only offer a cheaper alternative for end users who continue to place trivial value on domain names as critical to their business. So why invest in a TLD when the only reason someone would consider buying it is to pick up a domain for $25?

 

[BrandingModel.com]

IMO 95%+ of end users have no idea about nGTLDs they have most knowledge about .com or cctlds. The end user knowledge about the nGTLD domains usually comes from their IT or web developer as I talk to a lot of end users daily about their websites and domain.

I deal with over 950 pharmacy accounts and most of them rely on the information from their IT or web developer and all they care about is that their website is getting traffic.

A lot of them don't even know that shorter domains is better unless it is a large corporate company who have a great marketing team who understand the advantages of branding. They like keywords and that the domain isn't too long and fits well as an email.

It's us domainers who buy and trade nGTLDs with great speculation they might have great future potential value and we are trading mostly with each other.

How many nGTLD sales were actually to end users? IMO we as domainers treat them like stocks and trade them with each other...

The registries are the winners and occasionally us domaniers can make a good flip or end user sale. I'm a speculator and don't mind investing in a few nGTLDs and very aware that the investment might not pay off... If we don't try we might never know and I haven't made a ROI with nGTLDs at present time and that's okay...

 

[Griss]

Although the web is flooded with all these new gtlds (and many thousand are still to come), there will be certain cases with great value, maybe a dozen or two for each new extension for most of them.

 

[Name Trader]

I know of no other extension that sells 20 names above $5,000 in ONE auction and ALL are shill bids. Do you. That is pump and dump on an industrial scale.

Just to be contrary for a moment. Didn't .CLUB recently do this with their LL.CLUB sales and complete all sales?