I have said it before and I will say it again, the new gTLDs are just a money grab by ICANN. Not only that, but they are basically SEO black holes, no thanks!

Not a money grab. All $$ paid by the winner of the gTLD are divvied up to the losers of the auction. ICANN isn't just printing money here or pocketing the price.

I dont know where you heard that, because that is not what the ICANN wiki says: https://icannwiki.com/GTLD_Auctions

"ICANN condones private auctions, as it has encouraged applicants to resolve contention themselves, presumably through buy-outs, partnerships, and auctions. ICANN offers its own auction model as a last resort. All proceeds from gTLDs auctioned off under ICANN's auction model will go to ICANN as "excess funds" that will be redistributed at a later date, in ways that are yet to be determined.[2] "

"The first ICANN auction of last resort was concluded on 4 June 2014 for the string .信息 which had two applicants. The winning price was $600,000 US Dollars. ICANN used their authorized auction services provider Power Auctions, LLC to carry out the auctions."

So looks like you are incorrect.

Not really. The citation you mentioned above itself says, under "Private Auctions" --

> The winner will pay the amount of the second-highest bid, split either equally or proportionally between the losing applicants

And if you look at the news articles from the time that .blog was auctioned -- like http://domainincite.com/17991-blog-won-in-eight-figure-aucti... -- Minds + Machines, one of the losing bidders, revealed that they had received 3.4 million dollars after pulling out of the bidding for both `.blog` and `.store`

Also, apart from all the above which is public knowledge and there for you to find on your own, I work for Automattic, and when I checked with those who were involved with the .blog purchase, he confirmed that the winning bid was dispersed to the losing bidders. All in all, not a bad consolation prize.

No, I think they are needed. The .com namespace is crowded, it's really hard to find a nice, short domain name, as pretty much everything under 6 characters has been bought up.

If we can get older blogs and new blogs onto the .blog namespace, then this will free up .com for what it was intended for; companies.

Oh, so consumers make a difference between name.co, name.com, name.website, name.online, name.click, name.link? Gimme a break! This is a legalized scam and ICANN is a mafia!

It's a non-profit organization, hardly the kind of organization I would call a mafia. And yes, consumers can tell the difference between the different domain names. We already have hundreds for different countries, like .ca, .us, .uk, etc.

You're really looking for a problem where there is none.

As an organization - it's a non-profit one, true, but it is its bribable members who make it a mafia. I've been in the domain business since 2000 and I know a thing or two. ICANN is a mafia, period! And nobody in the domain business has any doubt about it!

What's your solution? Because you just sound like a tin-foil hat conspiracist at this point. There has to be an organization that manages domain names, how else would they be managed?

This sounds more like a troll than a tin-foil hat conspiracist. Ignore it.

You're a troll - a newly created account with virtually no karma! I own thousands of domain names, and I have dealt with hundreds of domain registrars over the course of 20 years. When I say ICANN is a mafia, I know it first hand! I've reported a bunch of fraudulent registrars that stole some of my domains, and they didn't care due to that being a "customer support" issue and ignore all evidence I provided.

Haha keep trying.

I don't care, really. I profit from idiots who buy domains. So, keep buying, please!

What's wrong with blog.domain.com or domain.com/blog? Why have a gazillion different domains - this is fragmenting identity especially if you can't secure the same name. The new extensions are a legalized extortion!

Theres nothing wrong with blog.domain.com or domain.com/blog. This new TLD is probably going to be more useful than the other TLDs that were released previously.

Also, I don't know that I'd call this extortion, no one is forcing people to buy up these new TLDs.

A cash grab, however...

It surely is! If you have name.com/blog, now you have to buy yet another domain - name.blog. Many brands are forced to "secure" a bunch of overpriced domains! And this is what extortion is! And I said "legalized" extortion as on paper, as you say, nobody is forcing anybody, but in fact they are!

"now you have to buy" I fail to see why. Do they also have to "secure" a handle in every social media/service/website/platform that allows registration? An email account in every provider? Register their company in every country in the world?

Well, maybe applicable to the predominantly narcissistic demographic, but brands definitely are extorted - no doubt about it!

This guy is trolling the whole thread btw.

Not really. You should read more carefully and try harder to comprehend before name-calling and rushing into wrong conclusions. Multiple gTLDs do fragment and confuse and .com will continue to rule as it's short, unambiguous (meaning "a website address" unlike .google, which doesn't mean anything) and people are used to it. Learn from the past! The porn industry that didn't adopt .xxx. Also .info, .biz, .mobi, .tel, .us, .la, and many others in the past didn't pick any adoption - you think longer extensions would? Not to mention the SEO issues with spreading links over a multitude of domains! No to mention that domain names become less and less important - people click links, scan QR codes - don't type URLs in!

Finally a useful one among a plethora of questionable TLDs (ninja, rocks, guru, etc).

I'd say it's worse because I personally dislike tying a TLD to the function and purpose of the website. Having said that, in this case, it may not be a problem because this TLD is controlled by a blog-hosting company.

Well put. I'm not attached to my current domain and might actually pick one of these up, depending on pricing.

Can't wait to setup blog.blog.blog

Someone register law.blog as Bob Loblaw

I can't tell if these will be just for Wordpress blogs or will be allowed to be bought by anyone and used for anything.

> We’ll be offering them to all websites — you won’t need to have a WordPress or WordPress.com site to purchase one.

The only want money.

That this TLD is called ".blog" is a nice marketing stunt from them --a very clever one!

I'd imagine they would want money. Registering a gTLD isn't cheap (yet)

I'm surprised there's no www.trump yet.

The most luxurious TLD, only available from The Sharper Image

As a guy who helps other guys manage mail servers, I regularly see colleagues block these new tlds outright due to being spam domain hell holes.

Like .xxx the real value will be in easier filtering.

Tell me a single popular .xxx website, please!