paulr

.Com seems the be the most sought after but the name i want is only availabe as a .name.Whats the difference between them and why are some more desirable than others?

Iain Young

Advertising basically. It's all about having the most marketable name. From a technology perspective, there's not really any difference.

Frosty The Snowman

If it's just a personal site for you then not a lot of difference. If it's a business site then to make it a little more memorable then it's either .com for a multinational or .co.uk for a uk only site. The .net site are usually used for technical type groups such as service providers and .name is meant for personal sites I think. The is also a .me.uk which is aimed at personal sites in the uk.

The .com and .uk parts are top level domains and you have all manner of different stuff under them such as .gov.uk nhs.uk etc...

What really annoys me is that the US still use the .gov top level domain as their own for some reason as they seem to think they own the interweb or something. They're not doing themselves any favours on not reverting to the more correct .gov.us format imho. They will soon find they are not the biggest internet user base and other countries will start setting the rules I hope, rant complete.

paulr

It seems there is a never ending supply of suffixes,will this continue?

stevencotton

As long as there is deemed a need.

bigsinky

heard that every combination of .com for up to 7 letters is taken. thats about 8 billion different combinations.

GaryK

yep theres .tv aimed at the crummy shopping channels or anyone who wants to tie in their tv channel to a website and I think .xxx has been passed as well for all those sites that net was invented for!

RussBoy

Not true. I register .com's every week for my clients and frequently register 6 and 7 digit domains. Don't forget also, that domains expire every day and become 'available' again...

.tv's aren't really used as a website address 'proper' but as a way of tracking and measuring marketing activity. For example, if acme.com did a tv campaign they'd sensibly use acme.tv on that ad so the marketing people can see what success (or not) the tv campaign had (as all traffic would be from the ad). They could also tailor particular page 'content' to a particular type of user dependent on where they came from (i.e. tv, press etc.)

It's like using different 0845 phone numbers for different advertising campaigns you're conducting (i.e. newspaper, web, yellow pages etc...) Again, this is a common practice we endulge in every week....

Next big one is in 3 weeks time; .eu (and there are still some great names not 'pre registered' so you heard it here first


Russ

paulr

Cheers Russ.

I'm not sure if i prefer a "leftover" .com or a first choice .name,.eu etc.

ie
paul97.com or paul.name.The .com suffix is so engrained now.

RussBoy

No worries

I'd advise against .name and .me.uk though - both give a pretty poor image unless it's a 'personal' (non commercial) type site. As a rule of thumb, I'd always go with .uk if you are targetting UK visitors (i.e. .co.uk). If it's a global target area then .com or .net as a 2nd choice. Years ago, .net was really for sites offering ISP type services and hosting etc. but this is pretty much not the case now.

The leftover names (or ones that come up for availability again) can be worthwhile as some *can* give your site a headstart on the search engines (if that is something you'd want).

The .eu option will give you a good chance of being able to register your first choice domain option....


Russ

paulr

There are loads of .eu domains available.

Its a personal website but i'd still like to get a domain and keep it for the long term.Still unsure as to go with .com/.co.uk and a number or the one i want (available) .eu.

Thanks anyway.

btw,who actually creates and controls the suffixes?