back to article Google U-turns on exclusive snatch of .app AND .search addys

Google has been forced to abandon its bid to grab exclusive use of the web address extensions .app, .blog, .search and .cloud - after it was warned the move was anti-competitive. Late last year, the advertising giant applied for the four generic top-level domains (gTLDs) to internet overseer ICANN, which is charging companies …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    Google's not the only one who can play this game

    I've applied to ICANN for the .millionaire, .billionaire, and .trillionaire extensions.

    By this time next year, I'll control 98% of the wealth on the planet.

    Fortunately for you, I'm a benevolent dictator.

  2. Bernard

    Are there any good reasons for adding more TLDs?

    The only people I see benefitting are Icann themselves, for whom the revenue boost is likely to be enormous, and the myriad scammers who foul up the internet by tricking people into visiting them at goggle.com, ficebook.com and (now) anything.anythingatall.

    I don't see a single redeeming feature here.

    1. Steve Knox
      Meh

      Re: Are there any good reasons for adding more TLDs?

      The only potential benefit I see is if the rules for the new gTLDs can be and are tailored to the domain. The common example is .bank -- this could allow such things as requiring registrants to actually prove that they are XXX Bank, requiring secure communications, etc.

      Sadly, I doubt that's how it will end up working...

    2. Tom 35

      Re: Are there any good reasons for adding more TLDs?

      Well someone has to pay for their junket to Beijing for "Public" meetings.

    3. Eddy Ito
      Coat

      Re: Are there any good reasons for adding more TLDs?

      But it's going to be grand, think of all the new email addresses ellipsis@dot.dot or kay@dash.dash

      The one with the straight key in the pocket.

    4. Tikimon
      Coat

      Re: Are there any good reasons for adding more TLDs?

      Porn at .cum

      Pirated media at .yar

      Technically, .net would already be spoken as "dot nyet" due to Russian pronunciation. Pretty obscure though.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Are there any good reasons for adding more TLDs?

      They have to keep investors happy somehow.

  3. Pirate Dave Silver badge
    Pirate

    .app for developers?

    Eh, didn't anybody in Mountain View ever think that maybe .app would be a good TLD for, oh, I don't know, maybe marketplaces selling apps? And instead Google wants to lock it down to nothing more than domains hosting flamewars about how much better vi is than emacs?

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    I advocate a TLD specifically for Russian web sites: .nyet

    I'll be here all week.

  5. the spectacularly refined chap

    Ban Google from gTLDs

    They want to run http://search? That's invalid - their must be one dot in there. Ignoring that breaks the existing hostname resolution mechanism that we were all assured that would be unaffected.

    If Google are going it alone and breaking that then that indicates that their branding and commercial interests are more important than maintaining interoperability. Throw all of their applications out without a second thought.

    1. Steve Knox
      Boffin

      Re: Ban Google from gTLDs

      Well, not quite right. There actually does not need to be a period in there. http://search is valid. However, it does not necessarily point to search. (i.e, the search gTLD under the root domain.)

      According to the DNS RFC (see page 7), any character string which does not end in a period should be treated as a relative name, which should be resolved against a predetermined origin or list of origins -- but the exact list and methodology is not prescribed.

      In practice, clients generally test single-word (i.e, no periods) strings against the local domain (e.g, search may be resolved as search.thiscomputersdomain.com.), and multiple-word strings against the root domain, with a possible fallback to the local domain if no root match is found (e.g, search.com is resolved as search.com. and failing that search.com.thiscomputersdomain.com.)

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    .shit for social websites

    That's my proposal and the reason for proposing it because it has quite a ring to it, facebook.shit twitter.shit and it's honest about what to expect. Anyone wants to put +100k for an application?

  7. Mike Moyle

    Not that anyone at ICANN asked me...

    ...but it seems obvious that anyone who is a participant in a given field should NOT be allowed to own the TLD for that field -- allowing this makes them, effectively, a gatekeeper for their competitors. It may not matter at this moment, with the amount of scrutiny that the new gold rush is garnering, but further on down the road I could see a gradual shift to "setting the fox to guard the henhouse"-mode happening.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    This is obviously a cynical money grab by ICANN

    We all know it and the applicants know it, but they are terrified that they will be at a commercial disadvantage if a competitor gets in first. The whole thing is immoral, and should be illegal. Sometimes this planet really sucks.

  9. Old Handle

    New TLDs

    The only new TLD that struck me as a genuinely good idea was .xxx and the company that actually bought that one STILL used it in a completely cynical and horrible way.

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like