back to article Capital gets trendy address: .London on its way

London could soon get its very own top-level internet address, .london. Official city promoter London & Partners is set to announce later today that it is looking for companies to help submit a bid for .london to global domain name overseer ICANN. Several companies, including .uk manager Nominet, are expected to respond to a …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Is it just me...

    Or does anyone else feel dirty is when they see .uk.com?

    Nominet should sort out .london.uk that would make more sense as I'm sure there must be at least 12 other Londons on the US East coast who will try to claim they should have it.

    1. BoldMan

      and all those little places can fuck off as they were named after the original Luhndin innit?

      1. Steve Evans

        I think Athens Georgia could be in with a punt though, Greece hasn't got any money left to pay the lawyers with so a US East Coast state should easily be able to out-gun them in the courtroom.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          great, just what we need

          Don't give them any ideas, besides, they'd probably rather have .bulldogs or .dawgs (because, well, just because)

  2. Ian Stephenson
    Mushroom

    Put me down for...

    not.london

    forget.london

    fuck.london

    destroy.london

    etc, etc

    1. Code Monkey
      Thumb Up

      beerstooexpenivein.london

      lotsofobnoxiouswankersin.london

      The list goes on

    2. Steve Evans

      I'd remove the last one if I were you, that's more than enough grounds for an early a.m. anti-terror front door removal.

      1. Ian Stephenson
        Flame

        @Steve Evans

        I'm pretty sure I have been on a/the watch list and been removed from it out of boredom.

        After all, I went to Uni before the wall fell, I've been PV'd for a job I had, certain other family members have been PV'd for their careers too.

        Oh and I bought the materials to make thermite through eBay for the sheer hell of it after staggering in from the pub one night just to see if there would be a knock.... nah.

        I will not give up my free speech just because someone may overreact to my (obviously tongue in cheek (or shitstirring depending on view point)) postings.

        Flame icon for the thermite

        Boy this thread will have Echelon in a tizzy!

        1. Steve Evans

          Here here!

          Well said that man!

          I think you need a few more words to get Echelon beeping... I believe assassinate semtex and Allah akbar usually help.

          Now I've got to pop out for a bit and take some photographs in .london

          Oh gawd, that's done it!

    3. The Fuzzy Wotnot
      Megaphone

      Hmmm, they obviously won't bother with Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool, Newcastle or Glasgow as no one north of Watford could afford to buy domains!

  3. Stuart 22
    Unhappy

    Of course it is a brilliant idea.

    I got surveyed on this by YouGov with some nicely positioned questions apparently designed to elect a positive response. Only us in the domain business and old recalcitrants who dished ICANN's dot anybody.with.wads.of.cash realise the true horrible and costly implications.

    You know there is trouble when you are on the same side as the Direct Marketing Association.

    Please, please go away ....

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Gonna really upset all those other Londons, perhaps we should have a .lunden domain

    1. TeeCee Gold badge
      Paris Hilton

      Or just ".innit"

      Then we can have things like ".london.innit", ".watford.innit", ".chingford.innit" and of course ".sarfend.innit".

  5. AF
    Meh

    Another shakedown on the way?

    This is getting daft. If it's only going to be available to businesses whose sole operational location is London - i.e. not country- or world-wide brands, then fair enough - but I doubt that will happen. In which case, how much will businesses be forced to stump up this time to stop someone registering brand.london? Or are we now expected to register brand.london, brand.manchester, brand.paris, brand.littlehamptononthewye...?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    no - London can lump it with the rest of us

    I wouldn't go to a company just because they had a .london domain.

    There are more companies and organisations outside London than in it.

  7. Fishy
    WTF?

    The point being?

    And the point of this is?

    1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

      It's all in the article:

      "London & Partners is responsible for promoting tourism in the city. It was set up by Mayor Boris Johnson in a cost-cutting reshuffle of London's PR departments in April."

      The point, then, is to spend the budget Boris has given them and the point of Boris's budget is to be seen to be doing something.

      1. Elmer Phud
        Meh

        A pretty barmy idea -- oh, Boris is involved

    2. Robert E A Harvey
      Thumb Up

      As far as I can see it is a superb method of filtering. By avoiding anyone with a .london name I can stripout all the self-important, opinionated, tosspots at a stroke.

  8. Lockwood

    So, we can have transport companies with non .gov.uk addresses?

    transport.london, tube.london, rather that www.tfl.gov.uk/tube etc? Awesome!

    Outer London will have problems. wimbledontennis.london? IIRC, Wimbledon is technically Surrey, not London.

    heathrow.london or heathrow.middx?

    These gTLDs are going to be a typing nightmare.

    Though, I'd like to see a .cmo and .coom gTLD

    1. Armando 123

      I'd like to see .om for a spiritualist network.

    2. Code Monkey

      Can Luton use it, too. After all their airport is London Luton (I'm also expecting the rebranding of London Birmingham and London Bristol airports before long).

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I am a Nominet member

    .... and as with most things Nominet-related, Lesley Cowley does *not* speak for me.

    I can see a case for london.uk but definitely not .london or any TLD which ICANN wants to create on a whim; someone needs to educate Lesley as to what an SLD is and should ask the members for which she claims to work for whether it is worthwhile creating london.uk or using Nominet company resources for a purpose for which they are not meant for.

    Nominet is set up to run the .uk registry - nothing else - if they want to spin off a legal entity like they did for managing the 4.4.e164.arpa (ENUM) domain, they are welcome to do so but she should not be committing funds/resources to something which is actively going to *dilute* the .uk brand/TLD which she has been actively trying to promote for the last decade.

  10. b166er

    sa lundun fing

  11. alan buxey
    Flame

    london.uk

    ...is, I believe, acceptable.

    I do not like the .london concept (and all the other capital city/major town top levels it will sprout) at all

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: london.uk

      I totally agree. All the resulting top level domains will be a real mess.

      london.uk is ok - london.city.uk would be better. ho hum.

  12. MurderMostFowl
    Pint

    A Capital idea

    Unless I'm unaware of this particular difference between American and British English, shouldn't the headline be "Capitol" ?

    1. toansweryourquestion
      Headmaster

      The "Capitol" is a building. The "Capital" is the city.

  13. Cyclist
    Paris Hilton

    For us in out here in Bumpkinsville...

    Will there be a second level domain called thathere.london to help us along. Or maybe thathere.lunnon to make it really easy.

    Paris. She's capital, so I gather.

    1. Lamont Cranston

      .herebedragons

      for the dark lands of northern England?

      1. Code Monkey

        I believe the Welsh are already llobbying for .herebedragons

  14. BasevaInc
    Trollface

    beento.london !!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      gotrobbedin.london

      roitedin.london

      gotrippedoffin.london

      howmuchforafuckingpintin.london

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Much like Nominet, your understanding of Not For Profit, differs from mine.

    "not-for-profit basis, returning excess funds.."

    Surely if the company is trying not to make a profit, there should not be any excess funds. Nominet gives away millions, pays well, and still calls itself "not for profit". Meanwhile the pricing for .uk domains hasn't changed in years.

  16. Andrew Barratt

    I can see this all getting very

    .messy

    or

    .confusing

    for the average .joe

  17. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Happy

    I think it's a good idea. A simple filter and it will be so much easier to eliminate all the overpriced companies I don't want to deal with.

  18. growls

    shouldnt that be .excrementhole that should be flushed away by demolishing the thames barriers

  19. Wanda Lust

    Totally redundant

    How many .london URLs would end being traded as is.gd or bit.ly shortened URLs?

    About as useful as typing HTTP://WWW.blah.com into your browser - the www being totally redundant as yer already on t'web.

    What about ten.downing.street.london - wouldn't that be a memorable domain name?

    Boris is involved? Explains a lot, buffoon!

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Other capital cities...

    paris.hilton@hilton.paris

    1. TeeCee Gold badge
      Thumb Up

      Oh well spotted sir!

      Are there any others that work like that?

      1. Armando 123

        Not sure, let me ask my friend, Sydney(*) Buda-Pest. I think his friend, Roma Washington, might know of some, too.

        (*) - Yes, I know it's Canberra, but it was too easy. Or should I have used Ray Kjevik?

  21. Graham Marsden
    Holmes

    "CentralNic...

    "...has been aggressively pursuing new opportunities to keep businesses paying and paying for more and more domains which they don't need and don't want, but are going to have to register simply to stop someone else from squatting on them..."

    There, fixed it for you!

  22. Microphage

    I don't see the .point

    > Next January, ICANN will start to allow any well-funded organisation to apply to run a so-called generic top-level domain (gTLD) .. 2013 Londoners could be able to register domain names such as bobstaxis.london or museums.london to promote their websites ..

    I don't see the point, unless `.london' is verified as being officially associated with the government, in this case the mayor of London's office, same with .FORD or .SONY. And what about people with the same names as a company such as Peter.Jones

  23. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Fire up the moneymaking machine...

    This is just a money making machine for ICANN - plain and simple.

    All the marketers and SEO dickwads will be jumping on the bandwagon, convincing companies they *must* have their own top level domain to compete.

    It's all total BS.

    Most people just guess or search to get around on the web these days - a lot of that is to do with the way Google search works and as the dominant player, that's what most people use.

    I want to find companyx ?

    I just type companyx into the address bar and google finds it for me.

    People are also used to just putting in a company name and slapping a .com, .net or their country domain on the end of it - 9 times out of 10, it works.

    Once you start adding a slew of custom top level domains, your heading for trouble.

    Firstly, there's company firewalls which tend to block out any domain suffix that aren't on the 'allowed' list, then there's the mess this will cause to the DNS system itself.

    But hey, ICANN don't care, they've got $$$ signs for eyes.

  24. Evil Auditor Silver badge
    Paris Hilton

    Yes, but...

    who will own .paris?!

  25. Purlieu

    Huh

    surely it should be .landahn

  26. J.G.Harston Silver badge
    FAIL

    And so the destruction of the hierarchial domain naming system continues.

  27. lurker

    Too long anyway

    6-letter tld = fail

    .ldn maybe. Not that I see the point anyway, tbh.

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Great!

    Can I register "fraud.london", "con.london", "profiteering.london", "avoidance.london" (so I can have "tax@avoidance.london") and a few other domains that define some other essential services?

  29. Ru
    Facepalm

    6 letter TLD? Who will care?

    Its as bad as the bloody stupid '.museum' TLD. More stringent rules on .com usage would have fixed the issue nicely... the whole thing is absolutely riddled with domainers many of whom make so much from advertising that the domains will remain forever useless. What you need, when you need it indeed.

  30. John 62
    Trollface

    AOL keywords are back!

    And what if London, Ontrario, gets in first?

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