This old toad warming up to new gTLDs

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Funny story but true - I found this forum because I was ranting about the new gTLDs and how ridiculous they were, and did a google search related to them, and ended up here.

But I have since registered 2 .rocks, 1 .chat, and 1 .training.

I am going to try to register several .blog when they become available - and I want to register two .radio too if that ever actually happens, looks like there has been a lot of drama over .radio.

I still think most of the new gTLDs are ridiculous but I think some are warranted, and even though I still think .rocks is ridiculous it was cheap enough that grabbing two to play with isn't a big deal.

I'm not a domainer nor am I a customer of domainers, usually I just register what I plan to use and if .com / .net is taken I try .io or .cc

But a few of the ngTLDs I registered, I registered to use as affiliate sites until I find someone I know who really would benefit from them.

It is actually kind of fun to look up a nice single word that would be long gone in .com ages ago, and see it still available.

 

[RogueWriter]

I like being able to, occasionally, pick up a domain with a major city as the keyword. For example, LosAngeles.supply .

 

[garptrader]

I believe this is why investing is new TLDs is so risky. The attraction of a new TLD is that hey you can get a decent keyword without paying a ridiculous price to some "domain squatter" as domain investors are also referred by those who detest the concept of selling a domain for a profit. So the folks interested in buying another extension are generally those with a $25-$50 budget and as an investor you cannot hold a portfolio of domains which only turn over at a low single-digit ratio annually, pay premium renewals and market to that group of buyers expecting to make a favorable return.

 

[RogueWriter]

I believe this is why investing is new TLDs is so risky. The attraction of a new TLD is that hey you can get a decent keyword without paying a ridiculous price to some "domain squatter" as domain investors are also referred by those who detest the concept of selling a domain for a profit. So the folks interested in buying another extension are generally those with a $25-$50 budget and as an investor you cannot hold a portfolio of domains which only turn over at a low single-digit ratio annually, pay premium renewals and market to that group of buyers expecting to make a favorable return.

I think that is quite a leap, you pull conclusions out of thin air. You decide with no conclusive evidence that 3 or 4 or 5 years from now 'people' will only be willing to pay 25 or 50 bucks for a relevant keyword. You don't know that, you cannot know that.

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

I think what will happen is many of the gTLDs will be seen as rubbish no one wants, and there will be value in having a portfolio that has keywords in the gTLDs that people do want.

ninja for example is one I think no one will want, it will have as much value as keyword.geocities.com from the late 90s.

but keyword.web *might* for example have value especially if the portfolio has several other keyword.tld on the gTLDs that do have value.

I think keyword.radio will have value (in some markets), keyword.chat, keyword.help (does .help exist yet?)

So it is a matter of picking which ngTLDs have promise and which don't.

I suspect the best new gTLDs will be short (3 to 5 letters), easy to pronounce single syllable, and somewhat generic.

The longer less specific frequently mis-spelled ones like .pharmacy etc. I think are mostly a waste.

--- While in the past I haven't always said kind thing about "squatters" I think most people like myself realize that free market is necessary, and domainers are a part of that that help determine value.

Would .com's be < $15 now if there hadn't been people buying them as investments? I doubt it. That's the free market value of them.

 

[garptrader]

Research how long .Net and .TV have been around. Note the number of registrations in those extensions and how many reported sales you see on the weekly sales reports. Yes, there are occasional $XXXX+ sales in extensions other than .COM but they are not the norm relative to the number of registrations (most of which are speculative). I can only recall one .Net sale in $XXXX territory while most of my .Net sales have been low $xxx. At least with .Net renewals are under $10/year. That is not the case with most of the new TLDs - particularly premium keywords. And if it has taken 15-20 years for .Net and .TV to generate occasional $XXX sales which don't even even pay for renewals, I don't see end user demand for new TLDs mushrooming within the next few years. There is just too much supply. Rather I see the new TLDs being nothing more than a way for those launching these extensions to print money at the expense of those investing in them.

 

[Grego85]

I don't think it's only going to be some gtlds that people really want and all the others are just useless, that to me indicates were still thinking in the past when new gtlds are the future and will change how this all works. With new GTLDs it's really all about what is behind that dot and how it relates to what is in front of it, the gestalt value as I call it, is what will make or break future domain names.

So sure some of the gtlds will be widely used and considered more successful than others, but even the lowly and seldom used gtlds will have some very valuable names, depending on how that little dot brings the two sides together and the meaning it creates. Going out and registering popular search terms in random and not relatable extensions (like you would a .com or .net) is a waste of time and money (unless it's "hotels" for some reason). Things don't stay the same, you can't approach the new game the same old way or you will never catch anything worth getting.

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

I think the value of .com will drop, I don't think anything will ever match what .com was.

.com value will drop because the generation with buying power (buying power for products sold on the web) aren't as impressed with .com - as evidenced by how successful some startups are with .io.

yes, it is what's behind the dot that will give it some market value over others. hotels.com will always be worth more than hotels.io but it may not be worth that much more than hotels.deals for example (is there a .deals yet ?? too many to keep track of)

I also think how the gTLDs are managed matter. I may have been interested in .adult or .porn but hell no am I going to pay > $100 a year for one, so those domains will be very hard to sell because the registry running them (IMHO) has their greedy head up their arse.

And the same with .pro - I think .pro had a lot of potential until I looked at how it was being operated.

And the TLDs that are reserving tons of names to sell at premium prices. Let the free market decide or I don't want anything to do with it.

But I think the .com domain value bubble is over, and I think most of the new gTLDs are never going to be worth very much.

.web and .blog are the most promising to me personally, if they are run right, and then the short with slightly more specific but still relatively generic - like .chat and .radio and if it exists .deals and maybe .tech but I have some doubts about .tech - it is too nerdy for many without being nerdy enough for nerds. .io is better for tech, I really like .io and I'm a geek / nerd.

 

[namezest]

You know .com has issues when you see adverts for domains that should have R on the end but instead have RR.

 

[brandnow]

I also think how the gTLDs are managed matter. I may have been interested in .adult or .porn but hell no am I going to pay > $100 a year for one, so those domains will be very hard to sell because the registry running them (IMHO) has their greedy head up their arse.

What ICANN should have ruled was ALL nGTLDs should be required to cost less than a .com. AND most importantly, that there should not be any nGTLD "reserved" or "premium" priced by the registries. The way some registries are operating their new strings now it is like the registry IS the new domainer because the registry has made sex.tools (for example) a premium name and charging $10,000 / year for renewal. How outrageous! It stands completely contrary to the whole thinking behind WHY the nGTLDs were introduced in the first place!!!

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

AND most importantly, that there should not be any nGTLD "reserved" or "premium" priced by the registries. The way some registries are operating their new strings now it is like the registry IS the new domainer because the registry has made sex.tools (for example) a premium name and charging $10,000 / year for renewal. How outrageous! It stands completely contrary to the whole thinking behind WHY the nGTLDs were introduced in the first place!!!

Yes, it is a conflict of interest. A blatant conflict of interest.

When they reserve a name, they aren't risking anything to be a domainer. When I register a name, I am paying to do so, so that limits how many I can register hoping they turn into something and involves risk because if I don't find someone to buy it, I either keep paying or it expires, and I lose.

People who can prove a trademark should be able to register during sunrise. But other than functional names like nic.tld - there shouldn't be any reserved by the registry. I believe functional domains like nic are defined in some RFC somewhere, but if not they should be. But those should be it.

 

[RogueWriter]

Research how long .Net and .TV have been around. Note the number of registrations in those extensions and how many reported sales you see on the weekly sales reports. Yes, there are occasional $XXXX+ sales in extensions other than .COM but they are not the norm relative to the number of registrations (most of which are speculative). I can only recall one .Net sale in $XXXX territory while most of my .Net sales have been low $xxx. At least with .Net renewals are under $10/year. That is not the case with most of the new TLDs - particularly premium keywords. And if it has taken 15-20 years for .Net and .TV to generate occasional $XXX sales which don't even even pay for renewals, I don't see end user demand for new TLDs mushrooming within the next few years. There is just too much supply. Rather I see the new TLDs being nothing more than a way for those launching these extensions to print money at the expense of those investing in them.

I don't think that demand in general maintains an even growth. Look at the growth of streaming video usage, it is exponential, not linear.