the dot pro landscape
Posted in Uncategorized on September 12th, 2008 by mdwThe agreement between ICANN and the registry for .PRO, RegistryPro was recently modified. The original expiration date had passed and it was an opportunity for the parties involved to reconsider the extension and the rules imposed on registrants and registrars. I wouldn’t characterize this as an opportunity lost per se, but rather an opportunity not firmly seized by those who stood to benefit the most from it.
The improvements in this arena are apparent; several registrars are now competing to offer .pro registrations, including Network Solutions. That’s important because this extension will now be on the radars of corporate registrants, who often use registrars like NetSol. They will quickly realize the inherent “rememberability” of this brand. It’s also important because price competition is crucial to the mass adoption of this TLD, and it only happens when more registrars join the fray.
The downside is that they left restrictions in place, but made them vague and unworkable. There will surely be legal challenges if they ever decide to revoke registrations (as they claim) based upon invalid certification data from the registrant. This is an absurd approach, and will retard the adoption of this TLD by scaring off a portion of the potential registrant pool. Hopefully the upside will outweigh this negative vestige from the TLD’s origins of yesteryear.
