What ICANN's Plan for Unlimited New Domain Extensions Means for Today's TLDs

[Ron Jackson]

The ICANN unlimited extension plan is the sole topic of DNJournal's June newsletter that was emailed to opt in subscribers last night. It is also available online: http://www.dnjournal.com/newsletters/2008/june.htm

Interesting comments from Rick Schwartz, Dan Pulcrano (owner of most major US city domains in .com like SanFrancisco.com, LosAngeles.com, etc.), Michael Castello (PalmSprings.com, Nashville.com, Cost.com, etc), Kevin Ohashi and others.

 

[Mark]

Thanks Ron , I've been reading about this stuff all week (As many others have) and still wasn't sure what to think about it.

I personally think this will benefit the ISP's more than anyone else once it has been online for a while. If people start seeing all of these "weird" extensions , They may get used to just typing in whatever they wish into the Browser address bars. And most of it will not exist - So the ISP's own little "Hijack Traffic" programs will kick in and show the visitor a list of ads earning the ISP more cash ... IMO ~

Remember all of those extensions in the past that you needed a "special" download/installation to even view them ? Anyone who didn't have the download went to their ISP's results page ... Think these new extensions will be immediately recognized by all Browsers ? We'll see I guess ...

If Google takes these new extensions seriously - We may actually see something as far as SEO goes though.

 

[cityforums.com]

Duke ... I loved your piece on this ...

Here are 3 applicants that already started their push.

http://www.dotlondon.net/
http://www.dotparis.net/
http://wiki.dotberlin.de/index.php/Hauptseite

We already heard that Ebay is interested in going .Ebay

We know .xxx and/or .sex should have an impact in changing the mindset.

Registrars should be excited with this news, Google will benefit and I

bet some Big companies are salivating at the thought of all the

Geos they will go for using scale to lower their costs per geo.

Depending on how this new zoning law is applied and executed anything

is possible despite what the .commies say :imho:

 

[Mark]

despite what the .commies say :imho:

If you think this will hurt .com - What in the World do you think will happen to extensions of lower value and less interest ?

As far as GEOS go - They added CCTLD's for that reason didn't they ?

 

[Ross]

Duke ... I loved your piece on this ...

Here are 3 applicants that already started their push.

http://www.dotlondon.net/
http://www.dotparis.net/
http://wiki.dotberlin.de/index.php/Hauptseite

We already heard that Ebay is interested in going .Ebay

We know .xxx and/or .sex should have an impact in changing the mindset.

Registrars should be excited with this news, Google will benefit and I

bet some Big companies are salivating at the thought of all the

Geos they will go for using scale to lower their costs per geo.

Depending on how this new zoning law is applied and executed anything

is possible despite what the .commies say :imho:

Check this out
http://www.namepros.com/domain-name-discussion/487677-not-going-easy-get-vanity-extension.html

 

[staffjam]

Ron Jackson Puts the Domain Extension debate to rest

Fantastic piece - very interesting stats on how many websites are developed with .com

 

[Sir Regalot]

Throw out your cars with your .coms. Your cars will be as worthless as .coms because we will all be using personal flying machines:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7481940.stm

 

[Ronald Regging]

I posted a thread about this back in Aug 07 and I'm very glad to see that the topic is getting a lot more attention.

I will cover a few points that people should consider.

1. I believe that certain specific extensions have a very good shot of becoming popular. These would mostly be extensions that would cover an entire industry, such as .doctor, .realestate, .bank and ones in a similar vein. It's definitely not guaranteed that this will happen, but I think that one of these extensions in the right hands, with the right marketing and sales could create an industry specific extension that is adopted by the entire industry. If you look at the way that the Internet has been progressing, we have created more and more extensions for grouping into specific categories, whether geographical or other. Some ccTLDs are already more popular than the .com in that specific country (.de, .co.uk, etc...) So, I don't think it's impossible for this to happen for a specific industry as well.

2. I think a lot of companies will be applying for their own extensions. If you think about it, even with the application costs and the costs to maintain your own registry, with a few key registrar partners and a landrush auction system much like .asia, you could bank some major profits within the first 3 months. I think we will experience a lot of "pump and dump" operations who are just in it for the initial public offering. But then again, with some of the extensions we have now, you really couldn't say much more about the registry (my example would cause a fight, so I'll refrain from saying it, but theres only one extension that could really do that, so I'm not being too subtle).

3. Aside from the rare cases (if it even happens) where an extension is adopted by an entire industry, I think that generally speaking the influx of new extensions will do nothing but help increase the value of .com and lower the value of other gTLDs.

4. I think these message forums will be inundated with appraisal threads and new extension discussion threads and it saddens me.

 

[Domainator]

Oh boy do I ever agree...

Very well thought out and written -- Thank you RR.

I happen to agree with all your points. Haven't been on in a while but read this thread and found a comment was necessary....

I posted a thread about this back in Aug 07 and I'm very glad to see that the topic is getting a lot more attention.

I will cover a few points that people should consider.

1. I believe that certain specific extensions have a very good shot of becoming popular. These would mostly be extensions that would cover an entire industry, such as .doctor, .realestate, .bank and ones in a similar vein. It's definitely not guaranteed that this will happen, but I think that one of these extensions in the right hands, with the right marketing and sales could create an industry specific extension that is adopted by the entire industry. If you look at the way that the Internet has been progressing, we have created more and more extensions for grouping into specific categories, whether geographical or other. Some ccTLDs are already more popular than the .com in that specific country (.de, .co.uk, etc...) So, I don't think it's impossible for this to happen for a specific industry as well.

2. I think a lot of companies will be applying for their own extensions. If you think about it, even with the application costs and the costs to maintain your own registry, with a few key registrar partners and a landrush auction system much like .asia, you could bank some major profits within the first 3 months. I think we will experience a lot of "pump and dump" operations who are just in it for the initial public offering. But then again, with some of the extensions we have now, you really couldn't say much more about the registry (my example would cause a fight, so I'll refrain from saying it, but theres only one extension that could really do that, so I'm not being too subtle).

3. Aside from the rare cases (if it even happens) where an extension is adopted by an entire industry, I think that generally speaking the influx of new extensions will do nothing but help increase the value of .com and lower the value of other gTLDs.

4. I think these message forums will be inundated with appraisal threads and new extension discussion threads and it saddens me.