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

Morning Folks!!

With hundreds of new extensions coming out the noise will be very loud. Too loud for me to even respond as we soon will be overwhelmed with hype, ads, press releases and a host of things that will make your head spin. Some will be very good and creative, many will be pretty lame as evidenced HERE!

And this is the stuff I am talking about as one gTLD stumble can hurt more than just that particular extension. This video is so lame it has the POWER to hurt more than just them. The message I got, if you want to be a faker or a wannabee then .CEO will make you a make-believe big shot. Sorry, that hurt the extension. It marginalized the seriousness and effectiveness. It was a disaster. But I am sure they are all high-fiving each other over there while the rest of us shake our heads.

So I guess I just inadvertently reviewed .CEO. Won't make friends there. But I am never going to sellout what I believe from what folks want to hear. They all get to prove me wrong. That is what selling is about. 100 people come into a room and think just like me. THEIR JOB IS To PERSUADE! The problem is many will get angry instead of using the art of persuasion and they automatically LOSE!

The 100 are not their enemy. They need to be convinced. But you must convince with FACT. The minute you use BULLSHIT or make things up to convince, game over. Better load another 100 in the room and try again because that room has been tainted. So if you do the same thing, you get the same result. Do you think that makes it harder or easier for the next guy? Want to be the last guy to pitch the audience? They may have your head on a stake by then.

This illustrates how each new extension OWNS the bullshit and the lies of the others gtld folks. Sorry, may not be fair, but it is what it is. If you have not factored that into your equation. OH WELL!!

700-1000 extensions each must sell. But it is not our job to buy what each sells. Even if they are our friends. This is not Girl Scout Cookie buying. This is deciding where to put our investment dollars to be safe and to grow. My job is to focus on the winners. But even winners are runner-ups. Not to .com but to a category called "Other". They will ALL reside in "Other" and will share it with HUNDREDS of "Others" for what could be decades before the FIRST one breaks out other than .web which will probably be the FIRST to break out and our job s to pick winners.

I don't have any .web interest. I have no reservations on .web domains. I have never spoken to anyone at .web. I have no plans to register any .web domains. I am simply handicapping the race. And if folks get pissed at my handicapping, so be it. I only want to focus on the winners. The top 3. The top 10. The top DOG!

Of course I could become a 6 or 7 figure whore for one of them. lol. But at least I would come here and say so. I would not hide it.

My job/your job as an investor is to figure out the 1, 2 or 3 that MIGHT break through and break out of "Other".

It IS about picking the winners. The THREE extensions out of 1000 that will lead the pack. Why would anyone GAMBLE with the other 997? The return keeps getting exponentially SMALLER, not larger. The top 3 might already be gambles. Why would anyone want to make the odds of success smaller and smaller and smaller? Value is proportionate to size of audience among several other factors. No audience, no value, no nothing.

I look at the price disparity between a .com domain and .whatever domain as it is today and with the exact same keyword. It's a 100-1 ratio in case after case. Same work. Sometimes the same level of investment when you learn to focus on FIRST.

Sometimes I really don't think folks understand numbers because they have to lie about them so often. They have to inflate them to have credibility. Make them up as they go along. That's blowing smoke up people's ass. Everyone reading this should get their bullshit meter inspected before the noise makes it impossible to calibrate.

So hundreds hawking these extensions will be of no interest. They can hawk. Some will buy. All will learn.

I ONLY want to focus on the top 3. Then we can debate if they will ever be meaningful. But the 997 that don't finish, first, second or third, may or may not have registry level success and that does not translate to investor success. Far from it.

It translates into great risk. Who wants to buy my .xxx today at 50% of what I paid? I already dropped most of them. Each year I have more information and I drop more. That is on EVERY extension.

So, clearly as a domain handicapper at this point .web has the best chance to win the race. There is not even a close second. I see this as the ONLY viable extension that MAY breakout of "Other".

There may be room for a .club in the eco-system. But that may not qualify it for investment level. So .club may enjoy a "Registry success" but that does not automatically translate to an investor success. There will be some. But limited. VERY limited.

.App has a place and since .App is commercial and social I see that as possibly a better investment than .web. But it is still early in the race. And the chance of it getting out of "other" is remote.

.Blog again may have a place in the eco-system. Investment wise, not as good as .App the way I see the world. But of wider interest than .app.

If I see another extension come out of the gates I will come and state it. But as they are each announced, I don't have the time to focus on anything else other than perhaps the top 3 or the top 10. So far, I am just at 3.

First they all need to catch up to .mobi.

Second, I think they have some obstacles in the form of .Me, .Co, .TV, .Info and even .US because each will get a second look. I see these competing for those top 10 slots besides the other top 7 new gTLD's.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

I can't even describe the high as I began to read the Forbes.com article last night. Then without notice I got sucker punched when I was referred to as a "Domain Squatter".  I was more than outraged. I was body slammed but I was not knocked out.

I thought we had passed that point of jealousy. But I got thrown back right into 1996 and that forum about mobile home and real estate flipping. They removed my comments as fast as I could write them. My crime? Showing a new type of real estate that would provide them with more money and a quicker way to do business.

But the biggest surprise of all is that this was coming from Forbes.com. The leading Capitaistic publication in the world. Outragreous!  I am reading this and wondering whose agenda is this? What would motivate this? The contradictions make no sense. They did not just present 2 sides, they presented something that did not add up.

So while we have not come as far as I would have thought, hoped, dreamed, it is still 2 years 1 month and 3 days until that 20 year mark. The time I believed it would take to change how this medium is viewed and why the .com address would increase in value faster than any other asset class in the history of mankind. A bold premise! A crazy timeline. But it would take all those years to change the thinking. And as you see with that article, we still have work to do. And while we are on the threshold of 20 years, we are not there yet. The landing gear is not down. But we are in contact with the control tower. We are in the gravitational pull of where this is all heading.

The gTLD "Booster Rocket" is just that. A Booster Rocket. What that means is that it propels the main ship (.com) to the destination while the booster rocket part falls back to earth as we have seen over the past 50 years on TV with every launch.

Comment #1

Excuse me,
But I invested many millions of dollars into an uproven medium called the Internet and I am NOT a “Domain Squatter”! I may be a homesteader, a risk taker, a gambler, but not a squatter and you should update your article accordingly.

Is Donald Trump a land squatter?
Bet you call him that and you would hear from his people pretty fast.

It is called CAPITALISM and that is something that Forbes is supposed to champion!

When I bought Porno.com for $42,000 people thought I was insane. That is not squatting. That is pure capitalism.

Comment #2

Squatter: a person who unlawfully occupies an uninhabited building or unused land.

So PLEASE update your story as you are implying I have done something unlawful and that is damaging to my reputation. And it is not accurate!

Occupy Wall Street, THAT is what a squatter is. I am a capitalist. An opportunist. Something that I should not have to defend on FORBES.COM of all places!!

Comment #3

And when Steve Forbes himself came to talk to the DOMAIN INDUSTRY at the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. domain conference I co-produce in 2007, he thought those that thought we were squatters were ignorant of what being an entrepreneur is all about.

btw, when I sold candy.com you failed to mention I still retain 10% of the company and get a 1.5% royalty for every item that goes out the door. That might be important information for your readers to know.

And yes I am a college dropout. That does not make me stupid. Last time I looked, I was in pretty good company. I even know what a squatter is and what a squatter isn’t.

I paid $750,000 for Property.com, how does that make me a squatter? That is outrageous coming from Forbes.com

I paid MANY millions for the domains I OWN! I outbid others just like some did last night. You just called them all squatters!

If I had domains with infringing trademarks that I was profiting from, then you would be on the right track. Generic domains like Candy.com, property.com and the 5998 others I own do not infringe on anyone.

Comment#4

I just saw the author is a a lawyer and journalist. And you would think she would know better than to refer to me in this disparaging and negative manner in an international publication like Forbes.com: “Domain name squatters like Schwartz”

NONSENSE!!

I bought domains LEGALLY, open to anyone and no other person on the planet wanted them out of 7 BILLION and it paid off. And will pay off for the rest of my life. Or I was the highest bidder. Neither of which would in any way, shape or form make me any more of a squatter than Donald Trump or any other property owner in the USA.

Ms. Jacobs, I am no squatter! I think you must correct and update the story and set the record straight.

Comment #5

And lastly,
Your entire article is based on false information you are giving your readers that the value of domain names are going down. Sorry, they are more like Manhattan Real Estate. Up, up, up.

Why don’t you tell them that the aftermarket on domains in 2013 broke ALL previous years sales records and we still have what may be the #1 month of the year to go?

Tell them that while the housing market was crashing that generic dotcom domain names were going up or fairly stable. That everyday many people are making loads of money by buying and selling domains like they flip real estate and are not squatters nor are they squatting. They are doing what has been done for HUNDREDS of years.

Tell them how all the hotel chains missed Hotels.com and how they have to pay millions a year to get reservations that they could have had first and FREE had they or anyone in their employment had the foresight to figure it out. They failed!

Comment #6

Morning Folks!!

So let's look at the coming time line for the gTLD's and what is likely to happen.

While sunrise periods are starting nothing counts until things open to the public and the cash registers are open for full business. So that is likely next summer and fall by the time things are in full swing. Not sure exactly when things will climax as the roll out takes 2 years.

The slip by one can hurt many and that could replay many times. A stumble by one. A scandal by another.  Who knows. But what I do know is that is will affect them all whether they like it or not.

No matter which way things shake out, the drop game is going to be the big winners. DomainShane and DomainPicks will have to have several daily editions  to even try to keep up. That calamity starts summer or fall 2015 and then continues for as far as the eye can see.  The drops will be dropping like flies and there will still be registries opening their doors in success or failure and those headwinds WILL have an effect.

Don't trip over the drops on the way to shangri-la.

You don't have to be some so-called visionary to see the obvious and plan for it and take advantage of it. This is a GUARANTEED EVENT regardless of the success or failure of any gtld.  GUARANTEED!

See if you see things the way I see things you can see events that are definite far out in the future and from those events you can be at an outcome before there is an outcome. Be at the beach before anyone arrives or even thinks of going.

You can also fill in the blanks in between the outcomes. That provides a roadmap and a timeline and you never break a sweat doing it.

There will be clues and evidence and successes and failures along the way. It is from those events you get to predict other events. But to do this you must discount the propaganda, the noise and the bogus and inflated sales sure to come. That which provides the BAIT for others to get sucked in.

And it will be those folks that will be trying to desperately get rid of their domains before the drop of 2015. The 80/20 rule in full swing and that number has the potential to be bent much, much higher. There are more and more domainers invested in the success of gtld's. There are thousands of jobs at stake. Tools to be sold. Things to write about.

The question is how will the consumer and business respond and participate. Without them, it has all the makings for a tulip festival and that would not be good for anyone reading this. Expansion is a great thing. Anyone bring any stop signs, traffic lights or exits?

Whichever side you come down on, follow your heart and beliefs. Bet on yourself. Don't listen to me or Monte or Frank or any blogger. Do your own due diligence. Be skeptical. Ask hard questions. Follow the numbers. Target without exempting the entire planet. You have a right when it comes to investing your hard-earned dollars because our futures are all at stake. The futures of our family. Our main job is to resist propaganda and insist on facts.

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!!

Grab a cup of coffee and get ready to enjoy Part 2 of a 2-part video that was shot live at T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Some say it was one of the best panels we have had.

Whichever side of gTLD's you come down on, you will love it! About 1400 folks have watched part 1 and there are plenty of comments here and around.

I think you will see it continues to be candid, passionate, respectful and displays the best of our industry debating a true unknown. I hope you enjoy watching it as much as I enjoyed participating in it and I want to thank Frank for agreeing to do it to begin with. It is great theatre and it was sorely needed to give some clarity to what is coming.

Team Schilling was made up of Frank Schilling, Monte Cahn, Jeff Saas, and Tim Johnson. Team Schwartz had Lonnie Borck and yours truly.

Gentlemen, thank you for agreeing to participate in this panel. I am hopeful we will do it again in May. Below is part 2 and HERE is Part 1.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!

Yep, hide the kids. No asterisk today.  Today I get to ask a real question.

So what does a Clusterfuck Really Look like? Seems clusterfucks are the new normal. Got insurance?

But I'm not going to get political.

So what does a Clusterfuck Really Look like?

"In the event a Fortune 500 company network infrastructure fails to work because of collision, the damages that just one company  could suffer could easily exceed all of ICANN assets."

First of all that might be a breath of fresh air.

But what happens if this untested .whatever results in collisions and crashes?

"Paul Rosenzweig, Esq from the law firm of Chertoff Group & David Fagan, Covington was on hand to tell everyone the consequences and potential liability that ICANN, new gTLD’s registries,  backend providers and even registrars might face if all new gTLD’s are allowed to go to delegation without any attempted mitigation for collisions and collisions actually occur resulting in large corporate networks to go down or existing domains to stop resolving.

To summarize Mr.Rosenzweig comments now that the collision report is out ICANN and everyone else in the food chain of likely defendants are on notice that this issue may cause damage to companies, ICANN cannot sit by without taking some action."

Now I have said Berkens is like having your own research staff.

The motivation came from this post he did yesterday.

So in case you want to know what a clusterfuck looks like, we may still be on the verge of seeing one. Chances are not high, but then again, this is a TEST!! If it goes south, it's a clusterfuck.

And guess what. This may only be one of many possible clustrfucks coming to an Internet near you.

Y2K? Maybe. then again, maybe not.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

Below is Part 1 of a 2 part video that was shot live at T.R.A.F.F.I.C. just exactly one week ago today. Almost to the hour. Whichever side of gTLD's you come down on, you will love it! At least I think you will.

I think you will see it is candid, passionate, respectful and displays the best of our industry debating a true unknown. I hope you enjoy watching it as much as I enjoyed participating in it and I want to thank Frank for agreeing to do it to begin with. It is great theatre and it was sorely needed to give some clarity to what is coming.

Team Schilling was made up of Frank Schilling, Monte Cahn, Jeff Saas, and Tim Johnson. Team Schwartz had Lonnie Borck and yours truly.

Gentlemen, thank you for agreeing to participate in this panel. It is helpful to all. The proof will be when you see the comments and overall reaction throughout the industry and beyond. I hope you will join me again in Las Vegas in May so we can do it again because we are a long way from knowing what is to come and in May we will be closer to finding out.

Now I am going to sit back and watch it for the first time myself. History in the making. We will look back at this in a few years and we will see. Enjoy!!!!

Part 2 will be out next Monday if all goes smooth or sooner if we can. If you can't load on your mobile device, try

Rick Schwartz

Good Afternoon Folks!!

As I have stated previously, our sessions were among the best attended ever. The content was real and it was unvarnished and it was stuff you can use right now. But that would not happen without the speakers. The speakers are golden and they are all willing to share. They don't agree on a lot of things and that is why we can hear both vistas of opinion and come to your own conclusions.

So these speakers come to TRAFFIC for a few days and I rope them in to appearing on stage and helping me out. I literally could not do it without them. They give of their time, energy and thought process and I don't thank them enough for what they do to make TRAFFIC such a great event. YOU are TRAFFIC.

So thanks to each and every one of you. Your testimony in the future will be even more important than it is now.

And of course a special thanks to Frank Schilling and Adam Dicker for each holding great dinners. Memorable dinners. Vivid experiences. Plus appearing on panels and Frank participating in a fantastic debate over gTLD's. A debate that I expect to post right here this Friday that was so much fun and was just so cool. So thank you guys so very much. Adam's seminar was worth the price of admission. Schwartz/Schilling was worth the price of admission. Berkens says Meeting of the Chiefs was worth the price of admission .

Thank you to all speakers. Lonnie, thanks for being on Team Schwartz. Ron Jackson, thanks for chronicling the event that is so well done you feel like you are there.

Andee Hill who enlightened us and played a key role in the auction with the help of Escrow.com.

Ammar with his spiffy wardrobe and fantastic taste in robes and the "Toga Party" that followed at Gregg McNair's suite. No details available.

Finally the Michaels. Michael Berkens for all he does throughout the year. The Domains.com keeps me posted on the things I need to know. The guy is like having a research staff on payroll. Michel Cyger, just doing a great job for the industry and a tip of the hat!

Now if I keep going I will never finish this post. I just can't thank the speakers enough. The most knowledgeable people on the planet when it comes to domaining.

To everyone else, my deep gratitude and if I were not so exhausted I would go on and on and on. I will have more posts about what I saw as a result of this show. Clarity for one thing. But I have to save that for another day and another post. We are a special business fraternity of forward thinkers that are happy to welcome new folks and have deep regard for each other and their accomplishments. Salute!

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

I am certain that in the days ahead you will read many accounts of the seminar that folks might talk about for a very long time. It was as good as billed and perhaps better!

There was passion from each and every person on the panel and the debate was respectful but intense. I think the result was more clarity on each side.

.Club had a point of view and .Kiwi had a point of view.

One of my favorite points of the debate is when Monte and Frank disagreed and they were on the same team. That was priceless.

My partner was Lonnie Borck and for those of you that know Lonnie, he is sharp and smart and was able to boil it all down to simple things. Like .whatevers MUST sell to survive while with .com there is no concept to sell.

The basic disagreement I have with Frank is that he believes .whatever will devalue .com and I believe it will do just the opposite. Increase the value of .com Nothing I have not said right here on this blog before. Many times. I look to history for my answers.

I compared the prices of .com domain names today with the historical salaries of baseball players. I believe that domains are on a par with what Babe Ruth made or maybe as fas as Mickey Mantle. But these guys never earned the tens of millions stars earn today.

And even as Football replaced Baseball as the National Pastime and Nascar has become bigger than both, salaries in baseball continue to go up.

So I put that question to the attendees and the vote was overwhelming that .com prices would go up as a result of all this.

Photo Lifted from: http://www.dnjournal.com/archive/lowdown/2013/dailyposts/20131021.htm

Howard and Danny did "Man on the street" and the interviews were more than surprising.

One young guy in his late 20's said Facebook is where his company website is. The crowd laughed.  He said is website was under construction. More laughter. Two said they did not have websites and don't want one. That surprised many. None knew of the new gTLD's. So the point is while we know this and that because we do this fo a living, Main Street is far behind and I think the audience was stunned by how far! These were just random small businesses that were picked.

We touched on many subjects and as I said, there will be a number of stories about what took place and it was all good!

I want to thank Frank for doing this with me as well as Monte Cahn from Rightofthedot.com,  Jeffrey Sass of .club and Tim Johnson of .kiwi and Lonnie Borck.

We did record the session and we plan to put it online for all to see. I am certain you will enjoy it and find great value with it. It's just a sample of what we do at TRAFFIC. Should be online within the week. YOU be the judge.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

There are myths in business that have been busted wide open over the years. I have empirical evidence. Not theory. I can point to things I have pointed to for decades because they are solid in the results they have proved over that time. I can calibrate the future for 40 years by the 2 simple myths below.

Myth #1. If I deliver food or pizza to people fewer people will come to my restaurant to eat.

So that is a myth and the thinking behind it is flawed. Here is the fact:

If you deliver you increase your pool of customers. You increase sales, profits and you expand. Your dining room gets fuller and you fulfill a NEED when they don't feel like leaving the comfort of their home. Now you can argue, but it won't make you right. I have 40 years of challenges and that baby still stands and your dog won't hunt. But some dinosaurs still think that way.

Where did those new folks come from? Some would want you to believe they came from your own dining room. That you split your customer base. Sorry, wrong answer. It increases people who are interested in your restaurant overall and maybe from a larger area and your customer base grows from the outside with new business. A rising tide.

Myth # 2. If I have a restaurant and a guy opens up a restaurant across the street he will take half my business.

Wrong! He might DOUBLE your business.

So let me point to real world example in Dallas Texas and Restaurant Row that was created in the mid 1970's. At the time there was one restaurant named "Old San Francisco" and it was one of my favorites.  There was a bowling alley across the street. They were busy. They did fine. But then they opened up some 20-30 other large  restaurants all right next to each other on the same street. Some thought they would go out of business because of the competition. In fact, you had to call Old San Francisco 1-2 weeks in advance to get in the door. See 30 restaurants and 30 restaurants advertising the same basic address and same basic product.

They were all good restaurants and they added VALUE by bringing all those people together looking for the same things and they all did well. They do that with auto malls. More PROOF! Not emotion. Facts. Proof. Historical evidence. Empirical evidence. How about malls themselves? How about "World Trade Centers"? They bring competitors together to do MORE BUSINESS in a faster amount of time!

That is why I can be certain that whatever happens in .whateverville, it can ONLY HELP .com. PERIOD!!! NO QUESTION!! NONE!! NONE!!!

Now if you have shit domains you are screwed but you were screwed with or without the new gtld's because you have crap.

Here is what the debate should look like if you want to have legitimacy with gTLD. Talk about specific .whatevers only.

There could be a market for .app or .blog or .web or a FEW others. I talk about dying on the vine. Look how many have died before it even germinates let alone making it to the vine. Many abandoning what they were going after and doing it early on in the process.

No emotions, just facts. Hundreds of horses at the gate and while you may want to talk about the race track itself or even the other horses, none of that matters. What matters is your horse and your stable. So if you tell me how bad the other guys stable is, most folks get turned off and walk away whether they say something or not. We all need to hear benefits of your horse. Why your horse can win. It has little to do with the others losing. It has to do with you winning.

So my horse is better because yours is an old nag won't hunt. That ain't selling

My horse does the quarter in 3 seconds faster than any other horse in the race will hunt. That IS selling.

One emotional one factual. Facts make points. Emotions don't. Unless you are gullible.

Everyone reading this is open to make millions. Everyone reading this is open to the next opportunity. Most are open to .whatever including me. But together there are 1400 "Franchises" coming out that will likely be grouped together in one way or another and a stumble by one can bring down many. I write about those pitfalls to alert and help those on that trail. I simply believe many are unprepared and unrealistic about what is to come, the headwinds they face and the surprises they face.

Sales is easy when you have a product everyone needs. When you are in a crowded field of products most don't need, its gonna be ugly for 1390 or 1400 of them.

The future holds ever single answer. But so does the past!

Rick Schwartz