CircleID

What will happen to dotcom once a thousand generic Top-Level Domain (gTLD) applications were approved and start to skate around on global cyber platforms? Nothing, firstly, there are over 200,000,000 dotcoms while these 1000 exotic high profile gTLD will not even make a scratch to the dotcom market. Secondly, a dotcom is about $10 plus while gTLD is $500,000 plus, therefore the global population out of practicality will continue enlarging the size of dotcom base at greater speed. After all gTLD are never supposed to be for everyone, as they can only be fitted to right and very special combinations. On the other hand the introduction of gTLD with fanfare will further infuse new interests in global cyber expansion enticing all kind of new cyber ventures via very hassle free and instant dotcom space.

The other prime fear of dotcom losing its power is partially based on the structural difference between the two and how Sony.com a fix suffix based name will work out against a suffix-less dotSony name. No need to worry as the market will learn very quickly as it did in differentiating the @ symbol of email and the .com suffix. Once the right logic with explanation on gTLD gets underway from ICANN the public will catch up fast.

However, the next new messages to be introduced form ICANN should differentiate why gTLD is a suffix-less super domain name for super players while current suffix based dotcom is the king of all the suffixes, something the global public already knows pretty well. The art of crafting the right themes and special messages are hidden in the deeper understanding of finer shades of nomenclature and actual usability of names on global cyber branding.

By Naseem Javed, Corporate Image & Global Naming Expert. He is the founder of ABC Namebank, author of 'Domination: The GTLD Name Game', syndicated columnist, keynote speaker and specialist on global naming complexities.

Related topics: Domain Names, ICANN, Top-Level Domains