Food bloggers lining up to purchase the touted web domain myfavorite.pizza? Musicians, have you thought about the possibility of yourawesome.band? I imagine that the buzz being felt around the announced release of hundreds of new gTLDs (generic top-level domains) is similar to that of the people receiving the letters that gold had been discovered in California. Okay maybe as much buzz as the gold rush, but people are seeing some golden opportunities to find the perfect domain name that they missed in the .com registration era.
When will the new gTLDs become available?
New gTLDs are set to start slowly rolling out in late 2013 and trickle out over the next couple years, but there aren’t any specific release dates yet (at least from what I can tell).
Can I preregister for my new domain name?
Companies like 1and1 are offering pre-registration for new gTLDs while many more are gearing up to do so themselves. GoDaddy has set up a watchlist to track gTLDs you are interested in and to get information and release dates once they become available. The pre-registration works by letting users know that they can be added to a queue on a first come-first served basis for being offered new domains as they are released. Note: pre-registering doesn’t guarantee you the domain name you are trying to get. Also, our friends like the pizza blogger might end up paying a pretty penny for sought-after domains once they become available.
Should I preregister for my new domain name?
There is a lot of controversy and varying opinions around this topic and questions that don’t have clear answers. Which pre-registration list takes precedence if there are multiple sites preregistering people before release? Am I effectively raising the price on my own domain by showing that there is demand for it? What other factors precede preregistration and how legit is the actual process? There is a pretty damning summary of domain pre-registration on newgtldsite.org that recommends signing up for a watchlist instead of preregistering specific domains and giving away valuable information on your sought-after domains. Another article from the beginning of 2013 also advises to sign up for a watchlist as opposed to preregistering domains. It’s definitely tempting to preregister for a few domains that I want to pick up, but I’m a bit hesitant for some of the reasons above. I’m also not huge on the possibility of being locked into purchasing the domain from 1and1.com completely on their terms.
So…what next?
I’m in wait and see mode for the meantime. Hopefully more info will come out soon and we’ll get a better idea of what to expect and whether its a good idea to preregister.
Other helpful resources, articles, and news on new gTLDs:
Info site for new gTLDs
PCAdvisor: What you need to know
Are you going to preregister any domains? Comment below if you have strong feelings for or against pre-registration…would be interesting to hear more perspectives on the topic.
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