48 replies to this topic

[saschaeh]

What do you guys think about not using .com. I have posted twice already about the .com frustration. I.E.: not having any decent .coms available and they are mostly not doing anything. Well today i thought of a very cool concept and the name that was just right. OBV it was not available and it is just sitting doing nothing. (It is strange funky name none industry generic but two English words stuck together...)


So my question is this: Why dont we just use others. Like .info .biz .fun .whatever? And make it easy to remember for site users by really branding yourself with that extension. So the logo will incorporate it and in your copy you always drive it home: "MYSITE.BoycottTheDOTCom"?

:ph34r:

You think it could work?

On another theoretical note - ultimately if enough of us move away from .com it will loss value and it will just come down to good branding and good websites. will it ever happen? Could the .com neighborhood go to waste and become as good as the rest?

Edited by saschaeh, 05 October 2007 - 09:20 AM.

[Autocrat]

Well... I thought thats what .Net and .Info were for... were they not the replacements for .coms ???

the web name should always be well established/branded/pushed... made integral to headed paper, compliment slips etc... even if it isn't actually a functional part of the business.


I'm not sure boycotting will solve the issue - so long as there is even a moderate amount of support for DNFarming or Prospecting, the problem will not go away.

[saschaeh]

1: well in this world im thinking dns farming would be obsolete becasue there would just be to many variations and those variations could evolve over time, adapt is actually a better word. It might happen over many generation that .com will become worthless and will see a revival much later. (like real property often does)

2: At the moment we only really have one maybe 2 head honcho (.com .net). If we had like 10 and everyone knew you would be one of 10 then dns farming would go down the drain to the power of 10. At the moment most of the public dont really consider anything outside of .com and there local extensions.

3: DNS farmers in this world of myn have to start waging and competing against each other. Its the whole monopoly issue. .com has a monopoly and the sooner we move away from that the better.

Another point is this:

is it harder to recall:

> Cre8aSiteForums.com or

> CreateSites.new

hmmm

Edited by saschaeh, 05 October 2007 - 09:40 AM.

[DCrx]

There is only one way I've seen which moves away from .com well.

There is a site, perhaps you've heard of called del.icio.us

[Respree]

How do you pronounce that anyway?

Is it ... del dot eeceo dot you es?

[JohnMu]

It looks like .me is coming -- how about that?

If you just need a cheap domain name, .cn names are going for 15 cents (first year) at the moment.

John

[saschaeh]

.me sounds like its got legs...

[Autocrat]

? Are you being funny?

just in case you are serious...
ignore the "dots"... = delicious (as in tasty).

incase you are being funny....

[EGOL]

I was at my registrar this morning and found that they were registering domains like...

www.widgets.us.com

My reaction was... phooey... another variant of these things to confuse the unsavvy web surfer.

But I registered a few good ones. :-)

[Autocrat]

1) I would have thought that .me would have caused some issues for certain people with a condition... "me".

2) I wouldn't have thought it good for "business" as in companies/corporate etc... but for personal/bloggs etc... fantastic (what about non-english language people/sites?).

3) ."country".com havebeen around for a while (at least in the UK).

4) Tell me you didn't just go "farming" again

[JohnMu]

I want "to.me"

http://please.link.to.me/

hehehehe

John

[saschaeh]

us.com still country specific we need universal ones.

confuse the unsavvy

isnt it going to confuse everyone anyway if we start making up obscure domain names?

Edited by saschaeh, 05 October 2007 - 11:25 AM.

[Autocrat]

ROFLMAO @ JohnMu


I think that people really do down on the public (understandably in most cases)... yet are they really that stupid that they cannot read and remember .xxx and .xx.xx (by the way - does anyone else think that ".xx", ".xx.xx" and ".xxx" should be for porn?).

The extension shouldn't make that much difference.

[Respree]

? Are you being funny?

just in case you are serious...
ignore the "dots"... = delicious (as in tasty).

in case you are being funny....

Actually, both. :-p

Of course, one can easily see how it should be pronounced. They've done a fine job marketing their website, so anybody that's been around for a while recognizes it.

I'll expand upon my serious point (which I perhaps made too subtly). Let's say it was a brand new website with zero invested (thus far) in marketing or SEO. Nobody knows who you are. How do you tell people (through offline networking, word of mouth, or over the telephone) how to get to the site without spelling all of the letters and letting them know where the dots go, without completely confusing people? I can just hear people saying, "Well I tried to get to your site, but it wouldn't come. Did I put the dot in the wrong place?"

Of course, del.icio.us is an exception, but I wonder how many others have tried to use the same clever technique, only to experience what I described above...

Just some food for thought.

Edited by Respree, 05 October 2007 - 12:20 PM.

[JohnMu]

.me is the new one for Montenegro, it's a ccTLD. However, it'll likely end up like ".tv" ...

I don't think we need more "vanity" TLDs (eg. .xxx), it wouldn't really change things. Imagine if we suddenly had .xxx -- it would just force all the existing adult sites to buy the other domain in addition to their existing .com one. Then what? Twice as many adult domains...

John

PS I'll take "for.me", "with.me", "without.me" and "and.me" while I'm at it. Too bad they'll all be gone by the time I come (it'll be interesting anyway). ".rs" is coming too - what could that be used for?

[bobbb]

... yet are they really that stupid that they cannot read and remember .xxx and .xx.xx

No but you are thinking like a computer guy or someone who is computer savvy.

Why should they remember or care? The regular mortals just want to hit the net and go to CNN or whatever. Dot com or dot smom who cares? And when they use a search engine like Google they really do not know the dot this and dot that of where they are going. It's just the title and maybe the snippet and a click. The public has been conditioned to recognise that WWW and COM mean the Internet and that's good enough. Let the nerds and geeks worry about all that mumbo jumbo underneath.

We do it on other levels. Does everyone understand the DNS system or how TCP/IP works. No and who cares (depending on what you do). Do you know the ins and outs of your router or modem? Same answer: No and who cares (depending on what you do).

What do you know about your car? Turn the key and it starts. Press this pedal and it goes. Open the hood (or bonnet)? AHHH.

does anyone else think that ".xx", ".xx.xx" and ".xxx" should be for porn

Yes

Edited by bobbb, 05 October 2007 - 01:32 PM.

[Autocrat]

...Respree...
Taht would be a ice statistic too knw... the success/failure rate of ".com's" who went for the unusual name...


...JohnMu...
Didn't realise it was for a place... I actually thought it was "me" as in the statement of myself.
(Wonders how many others don't realise.)


...bobbb...

No but you are thinking like a computer guy or someone who is computer savvy.

I think we are lookig from two different sides.
I'm refering to when you are dealing with people directly/indirectly... talking, post, headers etc.
Not the unknown element that encounter your site through Google etc... in which case they may not pay attention to the DN - then again, it's not a major concern as they are already there!

(Oh... and to make it clear, I happen to think most people are ignorant until they prove otehrwise.... means I'm seldomly suprised )

Edited by Autocrat, 05 October 2007 - 01:30 PM.

[Jem]

How do you tell people (through offline networking, word of mouth, or over the telephone) how to get to the site without spelling all of the letters and letting them know where the dots go, without completely confusing people?

Just tell them to go to delicious.com, it redirects

[A.N.Onym]

Ignoring .com won't remove the default status is has. How many people of the millions can you make forget about it?

I've seen companies use .net with success, though I bet they lose a fair share (10-20%) of branding searches/direct navigation to .coms.

[Autocrat]

The simply solution is to emphasise the alternate extension...
So either make it
www.mysite.NET
www . mysite . net

OR

if the business type and branding permits, make it part of the name...
www.del.icio.us
www.news.and.info
www.buyacheaper.tv


The only reason that people automatically go for the .com is, as with many of these things, simple ignorance - they don't realise there are 4+ standard types avaialbe (.org .net . info . com), as well as several alternates (.co.uk, .uk.com etc.).

So make sure you hit them round the head with it - people tendto pay attentio when something is pushed right into their face (sometimes any way )