The Rick Schwartz Domain Name and Traffic Blog: RicksBlog.com – Home of The Domain King®

Morning Folks!!

Here are my most viewed posts of 2013.

How to protect yourself from Reverse Domain Name Hijacking

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/04/ricks-magnificent-vaccine-how-to-reverse-reverse-domain-name-hijacking/

Rick's Official Reader Poll

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/12/ricks-official-2013-reader-poll/

I take you right inside the ebet.com deal step by step

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/10/inside-1-35mm-ebet-com-sale/

Schwartz/Schilling Part 1

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/10/team-schwartz-vs-team-schilling-traffic-video-part-1/

I respond to every point to the  Forbes.com article and their flawed, sloppy and biased reporting

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/11/nonsense-responses-forbes-com-world/

The $20 Million domain sale

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/10/top-single-domain-sales-hits-20-million-sex-com-longer-highest-domain-name-sale/

The heavy lift I see. I'd Like to teach the World to Sing

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/09/frank-schilling-id-like-teach-world-sing-perfect-harmony/

Domaining in the very early days. Pure gold!

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/09/my-first-few-days-in-domains-1995-1996-alone-then-the-gold-rush-of-1998/

Possible domino collapse of many gTLD's

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/09/can-the-new-gtlds-have-a-domino-collapse/

Domain Investing vs Domain Gambling

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/12/domain-investing-vs-domain-gambling/

Empirical evidence vs assumptions and talking points

http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/11/empirical-evidence-odds-fallacious-gtld-assumptions-talking-points/

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

When you have to resort to obvious bullshit, you know these guys are in DEEP trouble. See their expenses are on going for a year now and they are taking in no money other than restless investors. And what is worse, when they open for business, many will still not take in any money. Then the investors will go ape shit.

They could have read my blog and your comments first to save them their dollars, but since they didn't......

Now it is really starting to look silly when these guys have to resort to "Dot com is Dead" and "Dot com is your Father's Extension" and even "We are running out of dot-com". This is such CRAP that nobody reading this should allow them to get away with it. PERIOD! Friend or Foe. Facts are facts and they have no connections with personality. This is a business discussion among serious domain investors looking for REAL answers.

It does not help them, it does not help us. And it sure is pissing a lot of folks I know off. Folks that were going to buy into gTLD's and now are thinking twice because they see the bullshit and the weakness of their false arguments. They see they have little else. They see my points can not be just overlooked and ignored, swept under the rug and there are so many of them and 99% are unanswered because they can't be answered. So what else can they really do?

Look, I am happy to have all the dollars and attention coming to domaining and have said it for a very long time. But if you want to resort to this BULLSHIT, I too can MAKE SHIT UP. And my shit is much better than your shit. Just give me a few days and I will give you an example that you might not like. But since we are going down this road, ALL IS FAIR. RIGHT??

And like I have said before, you all own each other. The missteps will cost all of you not just one of you. Why? Because you have positioned yourselves that way. That is what bad marketing can do. Short term gain traded for long-term loss.

I don't have to go down there because I have facts and history and empirical evidence on my side and the best you guys got is "Dot com is dead" as you try to run your empire on .com ? And then you don't think you look silly? Weak? Ridiculous? Desperate?

Well you do! And while you may all be singing the same tune now, that tune has the power and ability to sink all of you including the top 10. One TITANIC of a mess.

Let me show you how.

I think you should ALL AT VERY LEAST announce the date you plan to ABANDON your DOT COM FRANCHISE and HEADQUARTERS and move them to your own new gTLD. Tell us when in 2014 you will be doing that.

When will that be happening? See I can make you all look like FOOLS when you go down this road. So when will you be doing that? Please announce the date this week. I am sure readers and investors want to know that answer. We all do. When??  I will ask that EACH and EVERY time I EVER hear that bullshit. And each time you will either have to make up more bullshit or risk looking foolish. Again and again and again.

See, you are all full of shit. Sorry. You set your own trap and I just replaced your bait with mine so PLEASE don't be angry with me.

.Horse is dead. .Ceo is dead. .Camera is dead. I may not be able to pick the top 10 yet, but there is no missing a DEAD HORSE in the middle of the industry stinking things up.

I will focus on the DEAD gTLD's from now on. Each time I will pull another extension that is DOA baby! I have enough material for years!!

And when they die on the vine, When they ROT right in front of us, When they get aborted, I will show you just how dead dot-com really is. So maybe try to raise your game guys. I keep telling you this dog won't hunt. You can try to fool the end-user, fool the investor but to try to fool this industry of investors? Each group will figure it out in pretty short order. Selling is about your benefits. When you have to resort to nonsense, that VOIDS your benefits. Drowns it right out. Especially when those benefits are hard to find to begin with.

So now you have a poll. My poll. A poll of one.

Want to be "Polled"?

The comment box is the way we poll this!

And for the gTLD guys, again, don't forget to announce the date you will be moving off your dot-com. Many folks will be asking that until you actually make the move. Probably at every opportunity they get. I am sure you can't wait for the day so we hope to make it sooner! :-) See what it tastes like to swallow your own BS?

WARNING: CLUSTERF*CK IN PROGRESS!! PROCEED WITH CAUTION.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

Each new gTLD I will review with the following lens and I will rate in each category.

NEED

WANT

DESIRE

VALUE (And for now, let's stipulate that value is limited until it can be measured in a more meaningful way)

I can score them on a 1-10 basis but seldom will I have to.

So let's start with .London

Let me also make the following blanket statement. Geo's and Brands may be exceptions.

Brands have nothing to do with us as investors. The only relevance is if they will use it, when they will use it and how they will use it. So let's stipulate that .brand is a separate issue. If I were working for .brand I would get the .brand gtld. Maybe never use it, but secure it nonetheless depending on the brand. Some brands can take their time. .CocaCola for example is not in jeopardy. However .apple or .delta could be. So there would be more of a sense of urgency.

.Geo tlds will be determined by how it is embraced locally and whether it is a turn off or a turn on internationally. Gucci.Rome? Maybe. Fendi.Paris. But the "." is very confusing and sometimes catalogued.

Point is, these are different from the generics. I can't say which way it may go. But it is still limited. But there is opportunity depending on the restrictions and adaptation. It may or may not be embraced. The public has the final vote. None of us do. Our job is to predict what will unfold and bet on the outcome.

So then we get to the generics and those are the ones I will focus on.

Let's do .Club

First of all when I apply my test of Need, Want and Desire, almost all will rate very low on "Need". There is little "Need" for any of this. So let's not make false foundations. Need is universally LOW! Bullshit is about to become universally high trying to overcome the FACT that there is no need! We already heard some of it. We are running out of .coms. Bullshit! .Com is your fathers extension. More bullshit. And friend or foe, I am allergic to bullshit and I will point it out each time. If you like stepping in it, then by all means don't let me stop you.

Then we get to WANT! Want is another story. And .Club actually ranks rather well on want. I could see clubs wanting their name. So let's discuss the most valuable .clubs. Those will be famous and trademarked .clubs and that has no meaning to you and me. However there are a number of generic clubs. Problem is most clubs like that would not have a lot of money as a general rule. Now there are exceptions and it will be those exceptions that you would have to focus on. So Bridge.club to a women's Thursday condo club has no value. You need a national bridge club to WANT that domain for a lot of money. Do they WANT it? That is the question?? They certainly don't need it.

Then we go to desire. You really need to desire something before you even get to want. I don't know that folks are going to desire these. They may. There are enough clubs so it could have a basis and a foundation. Will they desire it in time is the only question?

You can take a gtld like that and stand it next to .tatoo for example. Given those two, I would bet on .club. But of course, we have many more choices, so keep your wallet in your pockets for the time being.

Then .sexy is the last one for today. There is only one thing I am 100% certain of when it comes to .sexy. I am certain that sexy.com is the immediate and big winner. There is no gamble there whatsoever. Sexy.com does not have to do a thing. On the other hand the .Sexy registry, needs many thousands of what comes down to "Sub-domains".  That loops right back around to co.com. They seem to be betting that the .com is imperative on the end and are going to be there to take advantage of the confusion factor if that materializes. But don't mind me. I am a simple man who is easily confused. Luckily hundreds of millions know how I feel.

I will match each one against .web. Why .web? Because so far that would seem the one that makes the most sense for any type of wide adaptation in which ANY word or phrase can be used in conjunction with it.

But .web could be another .biz or .net. Could be. I am not certain. I can see scenarios for either. And that is what our job is. Be certain about what we are certain of and be flexible on what we are not certain of. With each new bit of info, even certain has to be looked at again and recalculated. You either become more or less certain. But this is still a process that must be done mentally to get to a conclusion and an answer before others do.

So .web if it had some broad support and advertising could be an extension that puts .net on their heels. A good case could be made to abandon a .net and use a .web if it were to be embraced by the public. My comments on .web go back years and as Franky pointed out during our debate last month, they opted for .info instead. That was a HUGE mistake. Had they used .web at that time, I think things would look a lot different today.

Need, want, desire.

Need to me is universally 1 on the 1-10 scale. It may decline from there. ;-)

Want, comes down to the audience it will attract. .Club could do well on want. .web could do well on want. .London could do well on want. When it comes to desire, that is what they need to instill in folks and that is a TALL order. To instill desire on something you don't actually need. Tough mountain. Depends how the locals embrace and use it. Depends if the locals are not the ones that own the domains. Depends on all types of restrictions that could be in play. That applies to all the geos universally. We know the city is behind .nyc. But what we don't know is who and how many will adapt to it and who basically will reside there. Who will or will not advertise it. All unknowns and most of the unknowns don't end well. And the confusion factor is always there.

Brands are separate and the only thing we need to watch for and be aware of is adaptation and advertising. Whether it will be used as an internal or external platform. Without that, it is nothing more than a patent in a drawer that may or may not have useful value.

Look, I enjoy talking about the unknown. Comparing notes, thoughts and ideas. The elbows will eventually fly with 700 horses in a derby meant for 15-20. They will contradict each other. Stumble over each other and basically do damage to each other. More than my thoughts could ever do. Sorry, that's the way it is likely to unfold. I can't control any of that. I can just see it before it materializes and articulate it beforehand. Tell me next Christmas how wrong I am. Kumbya won't be in the top 100.

Sales are hard to make. But sales make the world go around. Without sales all the 700 die on the vine. No 2 ways about it. A true catch 22. Domainers looking for the second coming are likely to snap up whatever they can afford and if that smothers the end-user out, game over! On the other hand if they are depending on the end-user and startups to support them, could be the same result. A balancing act for sure. It will take a few years to see who survives. There is simply not enough oxygen out there to support them all. Each collapse can only hurt those that remain. Can only cast a shadow on the others. That is why there will be a lot of turmoil to come.

And they will be FORCED to resort to bullshit as we have already seen. They must paint a blue sky or who in their right mind would invest? When selling, there is allowable bullshit and bullshit that is to the point of misleading and lying. See when you have to mislead and lie to sell, that is a very weak sale. That is a sale that may bounce. That is a sale riddled with problems.  That may not be a sale at all. I think we have all been fooled enough with the promises of riches with extensions that have done nothing but suck up investors money.

I really do want to see what they see. Just don't pee on my leg and tell me it is raining. Tell me the benefits of your .whatever without having to resort to silly stuff that will never filter down to your target audience anyways and alienates domainers that could actually invest if they did not think they were getting bullshitted AGAIN! It's all about the .whatever and what value it has to offer. The same people saying this and that didn't see the recovery and BOOM we are in now just a few months back when I started pointing to the reasons we would be where we are now. But it is not about now, it's about where we will be in a year from now.

I really don't care who runs the registry. Network Solutions was perhaps the worst company I ever had the pleasure to do business with. They were so inept back in 1995 and 1996 tat they forgot to put in a cash register and actually charge for each domain name. Did not seem to hurt .com and they were like an angel investor to me. By the time the first bill actually came, I was making money online and I had more income than bills.

This is fun and exciting times for us. However the new registries are under the gun to make money. They have overhead, staffs, rent, attorney bills, ICANN bills and then they have to suffer delay after delay after delay. That is very costly and some of them are in a world of pain. So when I hear domainers say for $185k they could have owned a registry, not so fast. And since we are ging to have 700 under the gun at virtually the same time, IMAGINE the bullshit they and their folks are about to spew. I have written about it for 18 months and now we are seeing it.

Besides that, 75% of "Domainers" and "Domain Flippers" that we all know, will be working for these companies. So friend or foe, it is about the viability of each extension and the opportunity to make money that will be my driving force and the only thing that gets in the way of that is BULLSHIT and that is why you will NEVER see me relent when it comes to BS. No way Jose!

So my advice for each gTLD, is stick with the facts, don't make up sales and don't try to marginalize something else in order to make your case. That dog won't hunt. It's weak and transparent. Really.

Just one last promise.

If you like your .Com, you can keep your .Com. Period! See I think when it comes to bullshit, we have all heard quite enough. So become Joe Friday from Dragnet. Nothing but the FACTS. I point to EMPIRICAL evidence backed by numbers. Ignoring that is not the road to make a sale.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

Are we beginning to see the new marketing campaign for .whatever?

"The days of .com dominance will be coming to an end shortly, says Juan Diego Calle, founder of .CO" in an Inc article that I wrote about yesterday. 

Last Night Paul Stahura explained to me on Berkens Blog that my sale of eBet.com was because I am scared that .com domain values are going down and I was bailing. Of course that is as absurd nonsense and perhaps desperate as you can get!

He went on to say “Dot com is your father’s TLD.”

Really??

Here is my response:

And if that is going to be your marketing plan, good luck with that.
.Com is only like 20 years old and could not be served a drink in many states. lol

You have to show the benefits of those extensions listed and if you folks think you are going to do that by peeing on .com, all I can say is it is weak and you may be questioning why you spent the money you did on these.

All I said was “I don’t get it”

So have me understand. None of us do. You have to sell now not throw rocks at the house we all live in. Believe me, that dog won’t hunt. Not at all. So what are we really missing?

Why .camera and not .cam? I think .cam is much more universal regardless of the current objections. Now that does not mean I think .cam takes off or changes the world. But why is .camera better? I don’t get it.

So are we beginning to see their strategy or lack of one? I have explained in detail about selling something. This ain't selling anything. In sales you have to overcome objections. But you can't do it with empty rhetoric or grand predictions based on HOPING something will unfold even tho the evidence at hand points to the opposite outcome. You have to do it with well thought out LOGIC.

“Dot com is your father’s TLD.”

That is not logic. That is pure emotion. His other examples are flawed because he starts with a premise that I don't agree with. Like all traffic from .whatever comes directly from .com. Sorry, that is flawed. I don’t see it that way.

I think you have to have content on .whatever to increase the size of the pie. That takes nothing from .com the way I see it. It adds to an existing pie. And that is assuming a success.

I even wrote an article and asked what happens if the first 100 .whatevers out of the gate fail and what will it do to the others coming.

Where I ask: So in the event that the first 100 new extensions came to market and fell flat, what exactly would that spell for the other 900? It does not help their efforts it hinders their efforts. Even a winner could be weighed down by the sinking of others. And some are gonna sink right to the bottom.

Here is exhibit A.

I wrote many posts about .whatever over the last 6 months because I knew once it began it would be a few of us against many of them. I need to be on record so I can point to those words like I do today and the next couple years. I did not know their campaign would be based on misinformation.

Let the facts speak for themselves. Let the chips fall where they may. Anything less is desperate.

.com is not the enemy. But if that becomes their focus, they will fail even faster than any of us think.

Look, there are a lot of folks with a lot of money riding on this. But if this is how they are going into the sales arena to do battle, then they have even more problems and fears than I thought. Sales is about overcoming objections not bad mouthing obstacles. I wrote all about it just last week!

Here is an objection I wrote to Paul last night: "Why  .camera and not .cam? I think .cam is much more universal regardless of the current objections. Now that does not mean I think .cam takes off or changes the world. But why is .camera better? I don’t get it."

Okay, now talking about .com is not overcoming the objection. See what I mean? There has to be an answer ready. A good answer. Anything less and you can't make the sale. I am doing these folks a favor by pointing out these pitfalls.

Lastly, I will come at this always 2 ways. First as a domain investor and second as an end user. My focus is limited to that because that is what counts to me and my readers and the future.

A campaign of noise and misinformation will not win the day. Not telling folks about massive leaks to .com will not win the day. I am really trying to keep an open mind about all this. But the reaction says volumes.

We are all on record and time will tell everything. My posts are crystal clear and I use historical facts as my basis. Let's see what develops and we can match my words of 2013 with the reality of 2015 and 2016. I am no match against Calle, Stahura and Schilling. A one man band against hundreds. But thoughts that turn into reality are very powerful. So let the strongest thoughts win. Drinks are on me guys!

Rick Schwartz

PS: Nearly every argument you make will be no different than the argument .mobi made. That .xxx made. That .everything.else.already.made.becaise.the.path.is.the.same.and.so.might.be.the.outcome. See confusion might come into play. Are those urls or typos?

Evening Folks!

"The days of .com dominance will be coming to an end shortly, says Juan Diego Calle, founder of .CO" in a Inc article.

Hey Juan.....Bullshit! :-)

So this is the type of NOISE we will begin to hear. In articles like this one that sounds more like an advertorial than a fact based article.

We are going to be hit with this crap until these folks begin to die on the vine. I have the first 9 candidates right here that Michael Berkens wrote about this morning. As one commenter stated, .crap would be better than these:

.CAMERA

.CLOTHING

.EQUIPMENT

.GURU

.HOLDINGS

.LIGHTING

.SINGLES

.VENTURES

.VOYAGE

.Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

As you know I aim to sell no more than 1 domain per year to bridge that 20 year gap I talk about all the time. In June I stated that the "Financial Recession is over". Now look at the wording. The keyword there was "Financial". That meant that the institutions were back on solid ground. We paid for that as the incomes declined and so did standard of living. But that discussion is for another day. I wrote that on June 9th.

But the one I wrote 2 days later spelled it out even more clearly:

"In 2007 I wrote about it and prepared for it cuz I saw in coming.

In 2008 we were in New York City when they were jumping out of windows.

In 2009, 2010, 2011 we lived thru the fallout.

In 2012 we started rising from the ashes and by the end of 2013 we may be roaring back. My first post about this just 2 days ago."

On June 22nd I write a post entitled:

"I Stated the The Recession Was Over on June 9th! Now Even Bernanke Agrees." That post is here.

On June 24th I asked "What Evidence there was that the recession was over?" That post is here.

On June 28th I talked about the "Great Domain Industry Boom" That post is here.

On July 11th I stated "Keep sitting on the sidelines but this is 2003 all over again!" That post is here.

On July 12th I explained why "Domains were the single most undervalued asset in the world." That post is here.

On August 1st I explained how we were entering a new era. That post is here.

On September 1st I shared the story of my first days in domaining. That post is here.

On September 3rd I explained why this was the most important Labor Day ever! That post is here.

On September 8th, just 10 days ago, I proclaimed that 2013-2018 would be the "Golden Era of Domaining". That post is here.

Point is I spent all summer writing about this during the period of doom and gloom so I would be 100% clearly on record like I have never been before and that is not an easy thing to do as I have been on the record for a very long time.

In 2003 the sale of Men.com ignited things overnight. It was the fuel that gave birth to T.R.A.F.F.I.C.

This time it was not overnight. My new 7 figure sale was preceded by 2 other huge 7 figure sales just in the last 10 week!!

Just a few days ago, on 9/11, IG.com sold for $4.7MM

In July 114.com was sold for $2.1MM

Compare that to 2012 when there were only two reported  7 figure transactions for the entire year. Investing.com at $2.45MM and PersonalLoans.com at $1MM.

So with my new sale that I can make public in the weeks ahead, that makes three reported sales in just the last 10 weeks! That's significant. And what is even more significant is the size of the sales.

So fine, ignore all those posts and sit on the sidelines. But my only question is "How can't you see what is coming?" More importantly, "How can't you see what is here?"

Evidence can't be ignored. Just today Elliot is reporting the sale of Chicago.com now confirmed by Crain. I think it safe to say it was well into the 7 figures if not more.

Stop selling yourselves short. If you have premium domains you are set for life. If you don't, and the $$$ are not rolling in, scrap what you are doing and go get some before it is too late.

Morning Folks!!

Let's take a few minutes maybe even a few posts to untangle this clusterf*ck of what is coming and what the Myths and Facts really are. And if I don't know, I will make it up. I will come to an assumption. I will use what facts are available and at the minimum use that as the starting point because you need somewhere to start and assumptions are perfect until you can plug-in the actual facts when they unfold. And if you have been paying attention they have been unfolding every day. And if you have some parallels set up, you can already see what is coming and the stages they are coming in. Let's just say "Consolidation" will be the keyword for the first 5-10 years or more and we have already seen that happen. Or die on the vine.

Myth #1 "gTLD's are bad for the Industry."

Well it may be a mess and it may be a clusterf*ck of historical proportions, it will also bring awareness and tens of billions of dollars into our space. Normally I would say sales. But in this case, the #1 expenditure will likely be advertising and other means to bring awareness but does not necessarily result in sales that are strong enough to support. Not to mention employees, customer service, unexpected glitches. A rocky road. It costs money to pave the way and get to a smooth time. Many won't survive that journey and some already gave u before the trip even begins.

Myth #2 "gTLD's will devalue my .com's."

Well nothing could be further from the truth. It will do quite the opposite. Those that are saying that are likely buyers trying to get you to sell beneath market. How gullible. Are you paying attention to the after market? It is exploding! There is a reason for that but I won't argue the point, I will just state what happens before it happens and be on record so we can look back.

Myth #3  I am not sure what to quote here. But just an interesting observation. The gTLD's were open to everyone in the world. All the different languages. But extensions are dominated by English Words. Why?

Myth #4 "Somebody that owns a .com will want the other .whatevers."

As Page Howe articulated on DomainSherpa.com last week and I agree with 100%, he never goes downstream. In other words, if you own something other than .com then you want to grab every other extension and keep going after better and higher level domains until you get to the prize which is .com. But if you have the .com you are really not motivated to get the lower level extensions. Matter of fact, you can't wait for one of them to have a giant success.

Myth #5. "My .whatever extension does not leak traffic to the .com"

Sorry, fact beyond dispute. The evidence is overwhelming.  So overwhelming in fact that it has the potential to sink the ship. Any ship. That's a captain of a ship that believes the ocean has no shallow spots and a few leaks won't hurt anything.

Myth #6 "Google and Amazon and the big boys are in charge"

Not true. The consumer is always in charge. Everyone chases the consumer. There are some that do it really well (Apple) and have a harness on it and there are others that fail like JCPenny and are wobbling out of control. The consumer demands certain things. And when you don't give it to them, they won't give their dollars to them.

Myth #7 "The buyer sets the price and is in control of a transaction."

Come on. The seller is the only one that can press the Red Button and make a decision. The seller has only one thing he controls, his wallet and perhaps lack of funds.

Myth #8 "Reverse Domain Name Hijacking is no big deal"

REALLY?

Myth #9 "Rick and his Need, Want, Desire" does not get it.

Sorry, few have challenged Need, Want, Desire" and "Value" becomes a knockout blow. Down goes Frazier! I am just saying that many of those that are doing this are unprepared for the reality of what they are going to find out. So their only play is selling the extension. And while everyone thinks they make 5X their money with a $1 million sale of a $185k asset,  there are also many other fees and expenses and time and energy that the very people I talk about, don't count. Sorry,  It all counts!! Ignore enough important things, minimize them like a shrinking machine and eventually collapse may be the result.

Myth #10 "We will have hundreds of thousands of registrations"

That's like the Internet guy saying that getting traffic is no problem. Until he finds out it is the 2000lb gorilla in the room and there are 699 other gorillas and some are much bigger.

Myth #11 "The success or failure of those extensions that are released first will have no affect good or bad on any other extension.

I beg to differ and did an entire post on it. It the first 10 are dogs, it won't help #11. If the first 10 are winners, then  it will help #11. If it does not move the needle, it is even worse. That means nobody cares.

Like I said, it would take more than one post to go down the list. So #11 was just a replay bonus. ;-)

There will be many ways for the savvy to make money regardless of the fact that most people will lose their asses.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

The new gTLD's have a very tough road to cross. The sharp ones have already thought of this. Then many have not. So let me pose the question and see what the answers are. What happens to a new gTLD when all the domains that are registered are only to domainers and there is not an end-user in sight? What happens?? Tulip Festival?

The reason .com is a success is from the approximately 120 million registrations, probably 80-100 million of them are registered by individual end users worldwide. Tens of Millions of end users. Matter of fact, my prediction is .com will have more end-user registrations in one day than 700 new gtld's combined have in a day, week.......

My point is these gTLD owners must walk a very fine line or they risk collapse. Another risk of collapse I should say because I have shown pitfall after pitfall after pitfall. Huge pitfalls and  a dynamic difference from what happened with .com. The pitfall is much deeper and more damaging if you have not thought of it.

I think some will get in trouble pretty fast when they don't see registrations flying in and when they do, it will be domainers. Which devil do you want to deal with first because they are both likely scenarios that many will have to deal with? How does an extension survive in the long run if 100% of your base is domainers? And on the other hand. How does an extension survive in the long run if  your base is not domainers?

Worse than all this is many of these gTLD operators are not financially prepared to make a difference. They could not even afford to hire professional domainers to consult with. They have virtually no advertising budget to advertise with. It is stunning to watch.

So we know once this race starts some 20 new extensions will come out each week. That is 4 per business day. Really? I don't recall a "spectacle" like this ever to have happened before. Maybe they can create a frenzy. Maybe they can't. Chaos for sure.

Are they anticipating the elbows flying in this crowded field? I could come and make a list of so many pitfalls that have never been discussed internally by some of these companies. So when they go into battle the marketplace, they could get whooped! I see it less with the domainer based outfits because they have a knowledge base the others just don't have but the carcusses of the others has the potential to impeded and derail everyone. Like a train wreck. Like a multi car pileup and you just happen to be caught in the middle due to no fault of your own.

We'll see. But it's tough to win the battles you don't see and come sneaking up behind you. The battles some are not armed to fight. The battles and battles and battles before we even get to the main battle of Need, Want, Desire.

Rick Schwartz

Mornng Folks!!

Just a couple of weeks ago I made a post stating that a blog post was not complete without comments. I think my blog post yesterday about a possible collapse of the gTLD's illustrates exactly what I meant. The post and conversation grabbed the attention of Frank Schilling and others and I think we are having a very healthy conversation and debate in the comment section.

It is unfiltered and real and I think you will find it most interesting. I invite other gTLD folks to join the discussion. Believe me, we all want to know what you see and why. We want to get our heads around it in light of the history we have already seen and been part of and our wallets sometimes lighter because of it.

That's what this is all about folks. Respectful debate. A sale can not be made until ALL objections are addressed. So a tip of the hat to Frank for understanding that and not fearing it like so many others will make the mistake of doing.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

Talk about a SCATHING article about the new gTLD's. this baby is a blockbuster!!! How many of these "Weddings" are going to end up in death as they die on the vine? Or, maybe open up shop and be served with 100 or 1000 different lawsuits claiming this or that and as a corporation you are compelled to answer each and every one of them? How do you spell "Can of worms"? Well here is a batch jumping out of a can just as we are getting to the altar.

Mike Berkens uncovered a WHALE of a story by the NY Times yesterday and I am compelled to post about it here as well. It is stunning. It is a rebuke of what is to come. The Clusterf*ck as I have been describing it since day one. But Clusterf*ck sounds mild when Ester Dyson says it is "contributing nothing" and others use the keyword CONFUSION! Gee where have I heard that word before. Confusion. Let me think. Maybe 100 posts of mine!

"The proliferation of these suffixes seems fraught for both consumers and companies. It has the potential to confuse online searchers: .car or .cars? baby.toys or toys.baby? It could also prompt companies, at great expense, to register bunches of new brand sites defensively as a way to pre-empt cybersquatters, spoofers and fraudsters."

Some technology veterans and trademark experts view the domain expansion as largely unnecessary.

“You are creating a business, like derivatives on Wall Street, that has no value,” says Esther Dyson, a technology investor who served as the founding chairwoman of Icann. “You can charge people for it, but you are contributing nothing to the happiness of humanity.”

She went on to say,  “You are creating a business, like derivatives on Wall Street, that has no value,”.

THESE ARE VERY STRONG WORDS COMING OUT. Taking a stand like this in public is not an easy thing to do. She is courageous for saying them and it would be even more courageous to heed them.

And perhaps the biggest warning comes from  professor, Jacqueline Lipton, from University of Houston Law Center.

“The Internet address oversight body may not have considered deeply enough the larger linguistic and societal ramifications of setting off a land grab for new virtual real estate like .love or .home “It’s a private body, that is dabbling in this very delicate balance of commerce and expression online that is fraught with pitfalls.”

The entire article is here