The truth

[Nic]

You Want the Truth...You want the Truth..

Well here it is....

I think .infos (dot infos) now are worse off than they were before the 2nd round crap.

Why?
Because every Speculator from here too china has aquired the majority of the best generic .infos that will probably never be developed and sit there collecting dust waiting for that special buyer to come.

Why is that important?
Well without a real* development , they (dot infos) will never be known to the general public.
You will not see ads on Tv (cnn, fox , nbc) for businesses advertising their info sites.


*real= non amateur crap, professional business

(I am an info owner, so i am not doing this out of spite )

You can't handle the truth !


p.s Look at how many generics are trying to sell on auction sites
WOW

[mole]

True.

.info will cost a lot more in the aftermarket.

Companies who thought they could get great names for 8.88 at GoDaddy will realise real soon that it is no fun getting Not Available messages when they start looking.

That will only raise the perception of value for .info.

.info has already hit the 900,000 mark, now that's plenty of good names all gone.

Serious developers won't mind paying a reasonable sum ($1k-$5k) for the names they really want to develop anyway, since they buy only 1 or a few selected names. That's hardly a pin-prick compared with the number of names speculators buy.

IMO, .info will continue to grow, and the naysayers will slowly start to regret they weren't interested enough to have bothered to have worked hard pre and into LL.

The larger problem is that all the extensions beyond nation-state country domains and one international domain (which by default is currently ".com") are unnecessary, and largely unworkable in terms of ensuring niche content adherence.

If you want information on, say, treatment for kleptomania, you go to a search engine and type in "kleptomania." That's want seach engines do.

So if there was, say, a kleptomania center in Mountainview California (also, oddly enough, the worldwide headquarters of Verisign) that wanted to establish itself as one of the global leaders in kleptomania research and treatment and they needed a good, memorable domain name, they could try to buy "kleptomania.com." But failing that, they could also get "kleptomaniacenter.com," "mountainviewkleptomania.com," "kleptomaniatreatment.com," "kleptomaniainstitute.com," etc. There are a lot of workable domain names for this fine institution to choose from. As for getting found by internet searchers, that's what search engines and other media are for. And if they really want to be number one in the world, well, then, they'll just have to dig deep and buy the prime domain for their industry, "kleptomania.com." But they can still be tops without it. Microsoft doesn't own "software.com," and they've managed to make some decent headway into that market. (Full Disclosure: the Mountainview Kleptomania Center doesn't exist...I made it up as an example. Hope everyone's okay with that.)

As for the perennial cry from new extension enthusiasts that we're "running out of names" in .com...please. 67-character domain names offer many, many times more unique domain name possibilites then there are underlying numeric IP addresses, which currently offer over four billion possible addresses. There is no shortage of domain names, and I would say no shortage of even "workable" domain names...and most registered-for-resale domain names outside of the top and second-tier are available for a few thousand, or even a few hundred dollars. Plenty of domains for all.

The other problem of "specialty" extensions is, who's going to pay for compliance? Ensuring that hundreds of thousands of specialty domains are being used only for that "specialty" purpose is very expensive: you have to monitor, make decisions on infractions, communicate and arbitrate, and be prepared for litigation. Will the business model provide enough revenue for that? Who will ensure that every .info domain is being used to offer real, genuine, bona fide "info?" Who will protect the ".info" brand? Where will they find the money to do it?

And why bother?

Take ".aero" for example...what possible use is a specialty name to airlines? If people need an airline, they find it through a type-in guess at the company name URL, a search engine, or from media. If they get to a website that's not the one they're looking for, they leave pretty quick.

No one in aviation needs ".aero." and the same goes for every other new extension, including .biz and .info.

So why all these new extensions, and talks of even more? It's all because of the domain registration industry. Domain registration is world's first genuine license to print money. Other than the basic IT and admin and marketing structure you find in any business, the "product" of the domain industry--domain names--requires nothing to produce. There's no manufacturing, no research, no development. Get license (from ICANN) and print...this was all about the money.

I think the speciality extension part of the domain industry will ultimately collapse under the weight of its own uselessness. The registrars and speculators in this particular market will continue to howl about the wonders and necessity of all these new extensions, and the big corporations will continue to register their own brand names as a necessary form of TM protection (TM law requires continuous vigilance of TM rights in order to maintain TM rights), but this will result in very little long-term business.

Nic made a good point as well about the non-development of specialty domains because of speculators holding them will significantly limit their visibility to internet users. Sometimes, greed cancels itself out.

Speciality Extensions: they're not technically necessary, they can't be properly administered to ensure appropriate content compliance, and they don't have any marketing momentum.

I think ten years from now, if we still have the DNS, the specialty extensions will be rememberd as one of the nutsy little jokes of the internet.

Miles

www.registrargreedandspeculatormisjudgement.nutsyj okes

[mole]

Originally posted by Namethink

Speciality Extensions: they're not technically necessary, they can't be properly administered to ensure appropriate content compliance, and they don't have any marketing momentum.

I think ten years from now, if we still have the DNS, the specialty extensions will be rememberd as one of the nutsy little jokes of the internet.

Sorry, bu that's goobygookletalk.com, think.

As the internet matures, there will be a need for names that better represent content description. Just because everyone is familiar with .com, does not mean it represents what the internet was, is, and will be. The internet, in relative terms, is a new phenomenon to the masses. .com happened to be relevant for the time and place.

.info and .biz is not 'speciality' by any standards, these are generic functions that motivates people to use the web. These are real gTLDs that rival and equal .com in stature, not just another ccTLD.

I hate to sound like an old broken record, but what constantly amazes me is the inability for the mind to accept and profit from change. Laggard thinking can be disadvantageous when dealing with the internet. The Linus security blanket syndrome can often be a liability to foresight.

Sure, nobody said that you should adopt the same strategies of acquiring 'anything remotely generic' namespace like in the good old days. That doesn't seem to hack like it used to. Buying strategies need to be a lot more focused, if you are to even think of competing for the best names.

I think there is a great future for .info and .biz in building new namespace addressing, but these will be pocketed successes, not the one-size-fits-all model of past business models that rose to heady prominence in the late 90s, only to squirm like fish today in the drying and cracking bed of dreams all drained away.

As the internet matures, there will be a need for names that better represent content description.

Why? Like I said, finding different types of content is what search engines and directories do.

And who's going to ensure that a particular type of extension (say, ".info") only has the appropriate type of content (say, "information")? We'll see how well ".pro" does in keeping its registrants honest.

These [.into & .biz] are real gTLDs that rival and equal .com in stature, not just another ccTLD.

Not sure what you mean by "stature" here...all TLD's registered with the main root perform exactly the same technical function, which is why microsoft could use "microsoft.ws" as its main URL instead of "microsoft.com," and its site would still function the same.

If, by "stature," you mean public and business awareness, then, no, ".info" and ".biz" have nowhere near the same "stature" as ".com." That's why there's over 30 Million ".com's" registered, and only a few hundred thousand of the new TLD's.

I hate to sound like an old broken record, but what constantly amazes me is the inability for the mind to accept and profit from change. Laggard thinking can be disadvantageous when dealing with the internet. The Linus security blanket syndrome can often be a liability to foresight.

It's called reality. Most domain investors, brokers and developers have no special love or sentimentality for the ".com" extension. It's just a result of historical forces that ".com" became branded in conjunction with the public and commercial explosion of the world wide web as the internet extension. ".com," as I've said before, is the human mnemonic default in domain names, just as people, when talking about toll-free numbers, will refer to them as "1-800" numbers, even though other area codes (877, 866) are used.

(That being said, I nevertheless believe that cc's in first-world nations will continue to be well-utilized and valuable, because of traditional national dynamics. German companies use ".de." Canadian companies small and large are increasingly using ".ca." There's a real market there.)

You can't "profit from change" if the particular "change" you're hoping to profit from never happens. The businesses that buy domain names and the public that uses the internet will determine if the new extensions ultimately hold any significant value. domain brokers can only analyze the situation and make their own business decisions. I (and many others) don't see current or future value in the new extensions, for the reasons I've given above and in my previous post. Bottom line: people don't need the new extensions, and not enough of them want the new extensions: there is simply no sustainable market.

Mole, you say "the Linus security blanket syndrome can often be a liability to foresight?" So can "wishful thinking."

Miles

[fizz]

Originally posted by Namethink
I think ten years from now, if we still have the DNS...

[mole]

I respect your views, think. My point is very simple, the LSB syndrome still holds for many. There is no way you can argue against a paradigm without going around in circles as safe once pointed out.

I'm not saying that's bad, all I'm saying is that it blinds and fogs the thinking process. It limits the ability to see the next gold vein buried in all the thickets of .com comfort.

I could be wrong in all this, but that's not the point. My heart tells me that there is something here. Wish my heart told me that way back in 1995 about .com. My head at that time said, dang, too much hassle, what the ... is a name server that I had to provide???

Were you with the rest of us toiling in the madness and stress of credit card commitments to tens of registrars during the LL last year? Or even this recent LL2. Some people forget how difficult it actually is to get good .info names.

And in the .info landscape, only the best generics will suffice.

I respect your views, think. My point is very simple, the LSB syndrome still holds for many. There is no way you can argue against a paradigm without going around in circles as safe once pointed out.

I'm not saying that's bad, all I'm saying is that it blinds and fogs the thinking process. It limits the ability to see the next gold vein buried in all the thickets of .com comfort.

And I respect your views.

But like I said, your LSB syndrome is no less blinding than "wishful thinking" syndrome. And be careful...there's a good reason pyrite was called "fool's gold."

I just don't see a good business case for the sustained value of the new extensions. I still say it boils down to "not needed, not wanted."

I could be wrong in all this, but that's not the point. My heart tells me that there is something here.

I guess you have to go with your instincts. But enough with the LSB thing. Like I said, there is no sentimentality, or lack of courage or vision involved in my and many others' decision to avoid the new extensions. It's a straight-forward, measured business decision.

But like with all business decisions that forecast the future, only time will tell

Were you with the rest of us toiling in the madness and stress of credit card commitments to tens of registrars during the LL last year?

No.

I only have three .info's/.biz's, and they're all parts of sets that I and a web-designer business partner are developing into websites. We regged them because we may want to sell these sites once developed and launched, and want to ensure the brand is well-protected. (First site should be launched in Sept 2002...If Dan will let me, I'll post the URL in the Lounge or Related Offers when we launch.)

Miles

[mole]

"It's a straight-forward, measured business decision.

But like with all business decisions that forecast the future, only time will tell"

Exactly, it's a calculated risk. But instincts hold the key to that critical leap. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Best wishes on your site development.