A year or so back, ICANN (the group that current handles Internet domain names) rolled out a new set of TLDs (Top Level Domains) to supplement the overharvested .com, .net, and .org TLDs (well, really to supplement the .com TLD, because the others are really under-used).
These new TLDs included .biz, .info, .name and .museum. And they evidently have roundly been a flop, at least to the extent of people actually using them.
In part, I blame the break-up of domain registration services. Like the break-up of Ma Bell back in the day, the idea was that different registrars could compete, and since some of the TLDs have requirements behind them (not just anyone can register a .museum domain), it then made sense to limit who could issue them.
But that merely created confusion. Like with the break-up of Ma Bell, eleventy-dozen successor companies have popped up to offer a dizzying array not-terribly-differentiated-but-poorly-presented services. And everyone with a business still looks at .com, not .biz.
I also blame, from an international perspective, using clearly English suffixes. Come on, folks — everything points to English no longer being the majority Net language in not too many years. Let’s not be Ugly Americans about it.
The final (if anything can be said to be final on the Net) nail was the dot-com implosion. The big growth trends being identified in domain name registration suddenly plateaued. Most companies who were looking for TLDs were just looking to park them, not use them.
I’m not sure if there’s a solution to this. I don’t even know that I think it’s a problem. But it is interesting.
(Via Boing Boing)