Reece said:
Now I'm in a real tight position replying to that as both the mobi and short domains mod...
As much as I like .mobi, there aren't even close to as many developed .mobis as there are short dotcoms, which average about 25%+ across all categories .....
There's very little speculation with short dotcoms... I receive enduser offers every week on my top LLLL.coms and have already had 2 people interested in buying BQB.com prior to developing it.
Reece, the niches you have decided to focus on and the reasoning behind it are valid and have enormous potential. You have contributed greatly to this forum and to the monitoring and promotion of the LLLL.com space. And now you have started BQB.com to provide a service to a segment of the domainer world. You have put your money and lifeblood where your mouth is and work very hard and smart to drive toward your goals. Huge kudos and respect for that.
Where I disagree with you firstly is in your premise that many of the 450,000 LLLL.coms plus all the other CCC/CVCVC/etc in .com/net/org that I referred to previously will be much more than domainer currency for some time to come. I find it hard to believe a stat that 25% of LLLL/CVCVD/CCC/CC-C/LL-L, etc .coms are currently and will ever soon be developed out. As time goes on yes, just like the LLL (3L) .mobis and many of the keyword .mobis will be built out. But in the last year or so they have been snapped up by old and new domainers because they are THE hot item. Look at how many subforums and threads and stickys have been created by domainers asking when the .net LLLL or .org LLLL or .com LLLLL will run out. All trying to get in on THAT next hot run.
And I DO understand and realize and agree that LLLs are a given. Of the other short ones, the LLLL .COMs have the most potential for success and some are drawing nice sales figures. I do see the better ones being used for websites. The same is true of LLL .mobis. Companies and individuals will use LLL acronyms. There have been some end-user nice sales.
But your statement that "there's very little speculation with short dot coms" ????? LLLs maybe, but LLLLS, LLLLLs, CCCCs, etc - come on it's very domainer driven. Again, look at all the new short domain threads.
I am skeptical of non-word acronyms in the other TLDs beyond the LLL level though. Unless someone - as you said - puts the EFFORT into building out the site with whatever name and extension.
The article mentioned in the OP is positive on .the mobile web and mobi's place in it going forward. I agree with that premise.
Other posts referred to the subject of the youtube video which is the big dot com domains are parked and NOT built into productive websites. (Garnering PPC revenue from parked pages can be viewed as a valid business model and is productive from a purely financial aspect as posited by others.) At this early point in the mobile web, .mobi sites (especially ones that do not have PC sized content pages and device detection) are more in need of development to bring in revenue because it is such a new extension. But time will change that as it gains more exposure and acceptance. It is not realistic to expect it or any new extension to be comparable yet to ones that have had a 10 year lead.
My other point is that domains in ALL extensions are oversubscribed versus being developed and will have numerous daily drops. Domainers and non-domainers will continue to reg a lot of future drops. It's like the saying about going out looking for your "future ex-wife". LOL We have all been there, a name/idea sounded good at the time. But the assertion by some that all .mobi domainers are newbies and/or don't know what they are doing is arrogant and shortsighted.
There is a lot of activity by .mobi domainers building sites and branding them. And there are numerous businesses large and small doing just that. Day by day by day there are more sites coming out, just as there are in many extensions. The WHOLE web is growing. dotMobi can surely enjoy a nice slice of that pie. SOME people just REFUSE to acknowledge that progress or ANY progress which is right there in plain daylight. Some people are so stuck on mTLD/early-RFP item that they can not just let go of that one single thing. It is blinding them to the bigger picture and solid progress of a toddler tld.
SomeONE who feels character-assassinated constantly finds the need to bring an anti-mobi./anti-mtld tirade into ANY opening in every thread where someone dares mention the word new TLD or .mobi or have any positive thing to say about it. That is also what I was arguing against. A limited mindset is his own loss but our collective annoyance.
Reece, secondly, I realize that you have been vocally negative on mTLD for a long time. I'm sorry you feel that way. They have not had a perfectly smooth run by any means but one must acknowledge that they do have a gameplan for becoming an integral part of the buildout of the mobile web. They are doing so much on many fronts to provide not only the new .mobi TLD but also tools for ALL developers of ALL extensions to make it easier to building good mobile websites. NO OTHER registry has this type of focus and dedication to their customers and t he industry. NONE. Sure they will make some mistakes and disenfranchise a few domainers along the way. But many domainers want everything handed to them in exactly the way they see it. And there are 1000's of different opinions on how to do something. One thing is undisdputable - dotMobi IS attempting something big. You have to give them credit where credit is due along with criticism when appropriate.
Some people did not like the hold back of premium and reserved names by dotMobi. Some people do not like auctions of these names. There are some people do not like ANYTHING at all that dotMobi does or can EVER do. They just can't let it go that there is a new TLD. Or that running a registry is a business that needs to make money in order to grow and offer services beyond just providing domain registrations. For whatever reason(s) just a few people find a need to be jabbing-jabbing "nattering naybobs of negativity", to quote an ex Vice President. And there are some people who just enjoy tweaking others for fun. That is what I don't understand and yes what sometimes gets me disappointed and frustrated with this forum. I do not go into other subsections of NP and constantly post negative things about those extensions or fellow domainers that believe in them.
Running a business involves making decisions and setting policies and structuring services that not all customers and clients and critics will like or agree with. People can be pretty unreasonable as armchair quarterbacks. Look at the heat Moniker has been taking for TRAFFIC submittal auction terms and commissions, the bashing that SEDO and Afternic take for their shortcomings and errors, or the strong feelings from both directions that EVERY registrar and hosting company draws. You CAN NOT please everybody all the time and in this 24/7/365-blogging/forum world. ALL businesses will draw harsh criticisms, a questioning of their competence, and bashing of their integrity whether it be well founded or not.
I would not be surprised if you will come to view the other side of the mTLD coin at some point down the road now that you are offering a service to this domain industry from the business perspective. Best of luck with BQB.com. And as always, thank you for your work moderating on this forum.
Other than that I have no strong feelings or anything else to say on those topics this evening.
-acc
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