You're absolutely right -- this is going to turn into a nightmare for most small or mid-sized businesses. I speak from experience, as I had to do the registrations for a moderately sized media company that had just acquired an internationally-known brand when the .xxx TLD opened up. We had to grab it so somebody else didn't, and it was neither cheap or easy (and yes, the joke is obvious, so I'll ignore it). There are times when you wish things wouldn't change, but nothing ever stays the same. Even rock is worn away by wind and water over time. Imagine how something with no real substance will respond to the sands of time.
mhhfive - I don't know if dotcoms will continue to be tops. Everything is temporary.
If ICANN can pull this off, I certainly can see value to restoring meaning to TLDs. 20 years ago, if a domain ended in .com or .org, it meant something. Still does with .mil and .gov, and mostly with .edu.
That's the vision that ICANN has: That you'll one day see a domain ending in, say, .nyc, and know that it's for some organization or entity or person in New York City.
It's a good vision. The question is whether ICANN can execute it.
Agreed. ICANN seems to be able to print money with the ability to sell TLDs at will. These new domains are probably the most valuable "virtual goods" that exist, and it seems crazy that they're limited in such arbitrary ways. (Who came up with their $185K price tag?)
Dotcoms will probably continue to be the most popular domains, but maybe we'll have easier to remember URLs in the near future?
That's another thing that's been coming up; some other countries are upset that the U.S. essentially controls ICANN and there's a movement to change that. That should be interesting.
Everybody wants a .com domain, and nations license out their national domains for revenue.
Which brings up another point... what nation's laws will control the new domains? Recently, for example, Kim Dotcom announced that he was rebuilding MegaUpload under the me.ga domain; Gabon Telecom (presumably responding to the wishes of its owners and the Gabon government) revoked the domain. For good or bad, how would such policing work when there are thousands, rather than just dozens, of top-level domains available?
First of all, congrats on your first blog, Sharon!
Secondly, IMHO, these new top-level domains strike me as little more than a blatant, reprehensible way for ICANN to extort millions of dollars by striking fear of competitors, pornographers, and other would-be brand damagers into the hearts of organizations and brands.
Maybe I'm a cynic, but cynics are sometimes right.
slfisher - I'm not saying get rid of domains. I'm saying get rid of TLDs.
Second, we need domains for the same reason we need indices and area codes and exchanges and country codes and so on -- to help determine who "belongs" to who and to make them easier to remember by having some sort of structure.
Which the current system does not do. Everybody wants a .com domain, and nations license out their national domains for revenue. For example, I don't know if any of the services using the .ly TLD are actully based in Libya. Bit.ly sure isn't.
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