gTLD – Fad or Here to Stay?

[manyagem]

I'm optimistic that the sheer number of extensions will work in our favour. It will take time, but eventually end users will begin to realise that almost anything is acceptable right of the dot, so why not choose something meaningful rather than a convoluted dotcom. The big question is how long do you have to wait?

 

[katherine]

The big question is how long do you have to wait?

Exactly, domainers generally cannot afford to hold and renew portfolios for a decade or two, in the hope of making a big sale and retire on it. That kind of pipe dream just doesn't materialize.

The best bet is to invest in domains that are already worth something today.

IMO those TLDs will never be valuable because the demand will never step up to the supply. A few exceptions may confirm the rule though.
Anything else carries less risk and higher rewards.
Regardless of what we think, everybody can observe the current trends and they do not suggest that the revolution is taking hold of reality yet.

 

[DomainsInc]

I'm optimistic that the sheer number of extensions will work in our favour. It will take time, but eventually end users will begin to realise that almost anything is acceptable right of the dot, so why not choose something meaningful rather than a convoluted dotcom. The big question is how long do you have to wait?

i don't get why people think these new gtlds are any more meaningful than any other domains. domains are as meaningful or meaningless as you make them. having a word on the other side of the dot does not accomplish this any more than having 2 or 1 words before the dot.

 

[Ulysses]

Australia seems to have been pro active and embraced .builders (only gtld I looked at)

Just type site:.builders into google and see most of them listed are Oz businesses.

 

[amplify]

I've come to the conclusion that they're here to stay, one reason being government deregulation. They're gonna make mucho dinero pushing these to mom and pop shops over lets say, hankandwatsonsolutions.com $10 -> haw.solutions $19 (available). However, with that being said, domainer's are going to take the biggest risk for the first 2-3 years with renewals of these domains as the registry must break even with their application, legal fees, marketing, etc. At that point in time, the price will drop dramatically to let others in the market (too late for those who failed to recognize the potential then, and too late for me on some great pre-registers).

Having said that, those that held a great hand in the beginning popping out $60 over those 3 years and subsequently $30/yr for the same names are going to be the winners. There can be an unlimited amount of gTLD's made, but only a few fit a business model: .com, .net, .org (great generics already taken) and .theirindustry. A plumber is not going to register .recipes. This will not apply to companies with the gTLD in the name Plumbing Recipes[?].

I've seen some terrible business names and told people over the phone that their name is poorly descriptive and misleading ('House' Consulting, thought it was a real-estate agency to help me make a smooth transaction with a furnished house). Will businesses like this hack their names down to .consulting and save some typeface on a business card? Will they go to a more generic term like house.consulting / home.consulting?

Only time will tell, but I think they're here to stay-and there will be high ROI sales (most likely not .com, but flipping 100+ $10 names for $1500 each isn't a bad deal). It's who has the budget to keep going and who doesn't.

I know back in the 90s, I had the names, but no budget-which would have kept me way ahead of the game as I did pick up some LLL's on drop lists, but NS was too pricey for a tween without a job to pick up the bill.

Deeper pockets this time around and no reason to give up now. I'll register what I see fits and pass over those that don't. If I have the slightest respect for the name, I'll still grab it. This is because the simple concept that there are 7 billion people on this world and I'm not the only one with the same idea (it's who gets to it first).

 

[Gerry]

Seems like the Aussies are definitely embracing this extension and building out the sites.

Australia seems to have been pro active and embraced .builders (only gtld I looked at)

Just type site:.builders into google and see most of them listed are Oz businesses.

 

[amplify]

Seems like the Aussies are definitely embracing this extension and building out the sites.

Considering the sexiness they're spreading on YouTube with AKB48 in advertisements, I imagined that .Tokyo and .Nagoya would take off. All this time, it's a bomb with 4 results each-all of which are to register the gTLD's. I assumed that they would have been a little bit more business savvy and match the registration fees of .info, .com or at best beat .jp ($100).

I'm presuming they spent so much God damn money having to pay them girls, they're charging a $145 SETUP FEE and a $220 annual fee (first year $365) for any domain (strictly speaking .tokyo).

So, I decided to do some additional investigation. I went to the main registry that shows examples of FASHION.com -> FASHION.tokyo. I wanted to see if it was available for registration, so went to 101domain to check it out. It turned out it was unavailable. I thought that was interesting and wanted to see the "lucky" owner; so with the 4 listings of .tokyo, I went to the whois page and ran one on FASHION.tokyo: DOMAIN NOT FOUND.

Clever, DOMAIN NOT FOUND, but unavailable for registration. I'm assuming they're restricting a list of domains to be registered. So, I decided to check trademarks. Especially theirs. GMO.tokyo: Status: BANNED. I figured they were protecting all Japanese trademarks, but just to be certain, I did a check on one. I chose to do a search on of JAL (one of the largest airlines in Japan and smart enough to buy the 'king'). It's available for registration and has the same status of DOMAIN NOT FOUND. My only assumption is that JAL.tokyo is available to be registered and trademark holders of Japan will likely have difficulty with all the ggTLD's (geo-generic) because there are 3 or 4, and more to be released in the future.

Moving on, I wanted to check generics with the example of HOTEL.tokyo given. Same results, DOMAIN NOT FOUND, but unavailable to register.

What else do Japanese people like to do? Drink beer, and lots of it. Where? Bars. How many bars are there in Tokyo? Simple mathematics, take 13 million people and give it a 1 to 1000 ratio: 13,000 bars (and that's probably low as there are dedicated buildings with 50+ snack bars; there are probably 1000+ in the city of 450k I live in alone).

So, I did a search for bars.tokyo. Available & DOMAIN NOT FOUND. Looking at pricing on 101domain, bars.tokyo would be $360 for the first year. In spite of this bars.nagoya is $1399 as it's a premium domain.

Interesting that generics such as FASHION and HOTEL may be restricted, but the most popular thing people like doing (going to) BARS is available and ready for registration. Normal fees for .tokyo and premium fees for .nagoya (17% population of Tokyo, but maybe more bars there?).

With that in mind, BARS.CO.JP can be acquired. .CO.JP is restricted to legal entities only. Nonetheless, it merely takes residency, a nominal fee to register a company and a trademark (I don't know if you have to trademark BARS or BARS.CO.JP to be able to obtain it). However, you can get BARS.CO.JP for $147 as it's available as well. Why spend $365/$1399 and be restricted to one area? (Possibly similar to .CA and .COM.AU restrictions)

Unless GMO Registry changes their business structure, they will never break even out here as .INFO is even used due to its price and is also recognizable. This could be a factor that was brought on by the largest retail chain here, Max Value (AEON, probably a holding company as they do banking and have other names under them as well) prints receipts with AEON.INFO on them, and they don't own the .com (most likely because the .com owner is looking to retire), although they are earning the highest operating revenue in Japan's retail industry.

I don't know about other ggTLD's, but these ones are going to tank. Though, it's the early stages (1 month open registrations) and with 4 developed websites (many unavailable to register, but don't respond), they only need 510 more to break even. We'll see what the future holds for the Land of the Rising Sun.

So with @Gerry 's findings of Aussies developing under gTLD's instead of restricted domains (that may be taken and SQUATTED on) makes me wonder how others are going to do (e.g. .Sydney & .Quebec). This could also go along with the history of re-branding of .LA for Los Angeles, and we all know how that went.

gTLD's here to stay, ggTLD's going to take much more time (at least here) IMO.

 

[MobileDesigner]

Some of the good names are taken for the .tokyo.

 

[domainoid]

Many experts think all the confusion caused by similar extensions and potential new ones such as in the .plumbing versus .plumber versus .plumbers cases will actually confirm that .com is the only extension to stand above all others going forward.


With so many gtlds coming out any extension at all no matter how insignificant is now possible.

 

[Gerry]

The consumer will decide how the internet will be used going forward.

Expect anything

 

[MobileDesigner]

Very well said, Gerry

 

[amplify]

2nd that motion and going to steal @MobileDesigner 's analogy of gTLD's being IPO's going forward, then once progress is made, determine the bulls from the bears.