events It's bad. No worse. It's sad.

[betthelot]

OK imagine you run a domain business and you sell $7.9 million dollars a year worth of domains but it costs you $18 million dollars to operate the business.
What would you do?
Well MMX owners of such names as .work .beer .london .boston decided to pay the CEO $1.1 million and stop outbound sales.
Did you hear that guys, the main stream bloggers will not pick that up THEY STOPPED OUTBOUND SALES OF PREMIUM NAMES.
They had 13 sales people whose only job was selling premium names in 2015 and it didn't work. These sales people could negotiate the price given they own them and had millions to choose from, a big advantage but it was not financially viable; endusers were not interested.
So a $10million operating loss. They are one of the biggest pure play new gTLDs company and they are hurting like many of them. Will be sold for cents on the dollar within 2 years. Their only hope is .vip launches next month in China.
Invested? Strong sell.
Announced today by the CFO reporting 2015 audited accounts to the London Stock Exchange

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

That's right, a good name automatically instills more confidence and credibility. People don't always realize that, but they gauge URLs when looking for products/services.
What's your very first impression when you are looking for web hosting and you have a few providers URLs in front of you, before you even check out their respective websites:

hosting.com, 1sclasstwebhost.com, easyhost.net, superhoster.info, superbweb1.com

Which one would you instinctively perceive to be the most professional and trustworthy, just looking at their respective domain names ?

I use linode.com and the word linode meant absolutely nothing to me before I started using them. Now it means a lot to me because they have been absolutely fantastic.

The new gTLDs give opportunity for the professional sounding domain names without needing to get them from a domainer. Sure some are premium and some are taken but the odds of finding an affordable one in a TLD that makes sense for your business is a lot higher.

Some may look down on it not being a .com but others may see it as an indication of freshness.

 

[garptrader]

If you plan to become a billion dollar business, you should go with a premium .COM.

If you have a $25/year in Adsense revenue idea go with .XYZ, .TOP, etc

 

[Recons.Com]

I use linode.com and the word linode meant absolutely nothing to me before I started using them. Now it means a lot to me because they have been absolutely fantastic.

The new gTLDs give opportunity for the professional sounding domain names without needing to get them from a domainer. Sure some are premium and some are taken but the odds of finding an affordable one in a TLD that makes sense for your business is a lot higher.

Some may look down on it not being a .com but others may see it as an indication of freshness.

Interesting site. Never heard of them before. Do you know what they mean by "per Linode" here:

"Enroll in Linode Managed with no obligation or contract. Pricing is $100 per month per Linode on your account"? Can I have two or more sites on "a Linode" whatever it means?

 

[Kate]

The new gTLDs give opportunity for the professional sounding domain names without needing to get them from a domainer. Sure some are premium and some are taken but the odds of finding an affordable one in a TLD that makes sense for your business is a lot higher.

That begs the never-ending question: why aren't new extensions more popular then ? Why do we see so few prominent end users using them for large-scale projects ?
What's the hold-up ? It's already old news, hundreds of extensions are available to choose from. What are they waiting for.
Obviously they are not perceived to be credible enough, no matter what the reasons are, but this is the present reality.
Where you say freshness, many would allege latecomer-ness or 'too cheap to get a good domain'.

We domainers do not influence the global domain preferences of end users, quite the opposite in fact: by decreasing the supply we are literally pushing end users away from .com. Yet they still shun new extensions. As an investor that tells me something.

Also, the domainers tend to be early adopters of new extensions (they buy anything that moves). But how many practice what they breach and run a critical, real life business off a new extension ? Do they even believe in the stuff they sell ?

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Interesting site. Never heard of them before. Do you know what they mean by "per Linode" here:

"Enroll in Linode Managed with no obligation or contract. Pricing is $100 per month per Linode on your account"? Can I have two or more sites on "a Linode" whatever it means?

A linode is what they call an instance of a virtual machine - you have full control over the linode including operating system, software, etc. - you can start with one of their existing images or upload your own. It's really nice. They also have managed hosting but I don't use that.

They have data servers in major data centers all over the world, which is really nice. For example, on one of my projects I started to notice a lot of UK users so I was able to quickly set up a VM in London to better serve Europe.

 

[garptrader]

Everyone wants a cheap domain for their website. From time to time we see newbie domainers on NP who want to create a portfolio site. They have a bunch of recent handregs and ask which would be the best. They are generally all pretty bad and I ask, if you are in the business of selling domain names, why would you brand on a crap domain? It is like an obese personal trainer at the gym trying to sell you on the idea of helping you get in shape.

A prime location is no guarantee of success. Here in downtown West Palm Beach we see lots of restaurants and retail stores open and close as rents are just so expensive. But there is a lot of foot traffic even if it is not necessarily targeted toward a new niche business (restaurant patrons already have their own favorite places so a new restaurant will struggle to gain customers while there are cheaper retail stores at a nearby outlet mall where leases are probably less costly)

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

That begs the never-ending question: why aren't new extensions more popular then ?

There are many reasons.

.xxx for example isn't popular because the company behind it was offensive to many in the adult industry. And momentum has a lot to do with it. Some of the new domains will never be popular, others may become very popular.

Google is giving more exposure to them and as much as I personally loathe Google, that may be a game changer.

I think premium domains are a problem with the adoption of the new gTLDs and it wouldn't surprise me if some of the registries started to realize that and axed them.

 

[Recons.Com]

If google is giving exposure, it should redirect google.com to com.google or search.google or www.google

The rest of the stuff it does is pure fad. They were also backing .mobi, how did that turn out? Google is no kingmaker in domain space.

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

By giving exposure I mean in their search results. They are no longer penalizing the new gTLDs as it appeared they initially were.

People will see them and exposure leads to acceptance.

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Oh and .mobi was a dumb concept. Good design doesn't have a different site for mobile vs desktop.

 

[Kate]

People will see them and exposure leads to acceptance.

Now this is interesting. Exposure is needed of course, but it's not enough. There has to be critical mass, and the domains need to be advertised. I repeat, domain names need to be branded and advertised repeatedly to be ingrained in the minds of consumers.
Everybody has stumbled upon alternate TLDs on the occasion while surfing the Internet, but people don't pay attention. Everybody knows that TLDs other than .com exist. Which ones ? An average American could probably quote at least .org .net .edu .gov and a few others but they couldn't quote dozens of TLD. Anyway, just because I know that .horse exists, doesn't mean I would want one.

So, we have a 3-stage process like this: awareness => acceptance => embrace.
Right now, we are still struggling with step #1. Good luck to the believers.

 

[garptrader]

Just because some tightwad developers like new TLDs so they can avoid having to pay for a .COM doesn't make investing in new TLDs with premium renewals a great investment. On the contrary the very fact that so few end users are willing to pay a premium price for a domain makes it difficult to justify investing money in an unproven extension. Real estate developers don't build hotels and condo complexes in the middle of nowhere far from restaurants, shopping centers, schools, parks, and places of employment. Instead they look for vacant lots nearby these attractive destinations which make them a desirable place to live. A new TLD domain is fine for a hobby project but a serious business trying to raise capital and capture the mindshare of new customers should not be branding on names which will impede their success.

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Now this is interesting. Exposure is needed of course, but it's not enough. There has to be critical mass, and the domains need to be advertised. I repeat, domain names need to be branded and advertised repeatedly to be ingrained in the minds of consumers.

Yes, you are correct.

I'm planning to have T-Shirts made with this on it -

https://deviant.email/

If I'm lucky, Google will sue me and the EFF will come to my defense giving me lots of exposure.

But probably not, probably it will just be hip kids with an anti-google mindset that wear them. You know, to rage against the man...

 

[brandnow]

This is too funny
Kelowna.com is gone, so I will get the .horse instead

don't forget to pick up the .vodka and .protection variants too.

 

[DNScholar]

don't forget to pick up the .vodka and .protection variants too.

And many more available gTLDs

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

don't forget to pick up the .vodka and .protection variants too.

That reminds me - .security is a joke.

All my web servers already exceed the standards they say they require, paying the boatload of money they want serves no actual security enhancing purpose to anyone.

I suspect .security will fail fast.

 

[MasterOfMyDomains]

.protection and .security are $2,079 at namesilo per

and whats with .university and .college? Next will be .elementary and .preschool

 

[Recons.Com]

.protection and .security are $2,079 at namesilo per

and whats with .university and .college? Next will be .elementary and .preschool

Don't forget .k12, .teach, .learn, .course, .training, .professor

 

[MasterOfMyDomains]

Which do you prefer?
.accountant $1.89 per year
.accountants $73.99 per year

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Which do you prefer?
.accountant $1.89 per year
.accountants $73.99 per year

Not being an accountant, I don't have a preference.

However I do prefer .photo over .photos but I wish there wasn't both.

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Don’t be fooled, although the massive influx of the new gTLDs haven’t really changed the top-end .com domains they have sorted out the wheat from the chaff with a lot of the others.

http://whizzbangsblog.com/index.php...y/stop-pricing-burger-domains-at-crazy-prices

That's the problem that is being solved by the new gTLDs.

He mentions a domainer with large quantity of domains, not selling. Those are domains that are simply not available for use because we (the consumers) don't want to pay the ridiculous prices (ridiculous in our minds anyway) that are being asked.

The new TLDs give us other options.

That article is bang on.

-=-

I don't want to sound like I am anti-domainer, I prefer you guys to what is being done with premium names. I just think a wake-up call with pricing is needed.

One of the nice things about the new gTLDs is that since most of them are 2x or 3x the renewal fee of .com it is a lot more expensive to continue to renew domains that are not being used. That benefits those of us that think $1,000 for a domain name is too much.

 

[bmugford]

I don't want to sound like I am anti-domainer, I prefer you guys to what is being done with premium names. I just think a wake-up call with pricing is needed.

Tell that to the new gTLD registries.

You can debate the value of a specific domain, but at least .COM has a track record of value. Many registries are sitting on garbage domains they classify as "premium" with not only absurd registration prices, but often absurd renewal prices as well.

Many new extensions are trying to be the domainer. Most are doing a sucky job at it though, mainly because they are offering products with far less demand.

Brad

 

[Alice Wonder Miscreations]

Tell that to the new gTLD registries.

You can debate the value of a specific domain, but at least .COM has a track record of value. Many registries are sitting on garbage domains they classify as "premium" with not only absurd registration prices, but often absurd renewal prices as well.

Many new extensions are trying to be the domainer. Most are doing a sucky job at it though, mainly because they are offering products with far less demand.

Brad

The biggest problem I have with premium is that the high fee is every year, not just when first purchased.

The other problem is that it is not a fair market. Domainers have to risk losing money if it never sells, but the registries don't pay renewal fees on the premiums.

I hope so few premiums sell that some of them go under causing the others to wake up and be more like .com in that respect.

 

[Recons.Com]

Not being an accountant, I don't have a preference.

However I do prefer .photo over .photos but I wish there wasn't both.

Why is that? I thought you were for more choice? Let there be .photo, .photos, .photography, .photograph, .foto, .pho, .phtgrphy etc.

 

[brandnow]

Why is that? I thought you were for more choice? Let there be .photo, .photos, .photography, .photograph, .foto, .pho, .phtgrphy etc.

.F0T0
.P1CZ
.polaroids
.polaroid
.33mm
.dslr
etc