Web 2.0.11562 beta

Here’s my experiment. I believe there’s an intrinsic value in .pro extension, when it’s used with a generic domain that makes sense. I plan to try foisting a few on the world and see if they take. Whether or not google will someday come to love them I don’t know. But I think they’re memorable and deserving. My first site to be released into the wild is Sushi.Pro. Check it out and we’ll see if it goes anywhere.

Remember my post here about title insurance for domain names? Well it’s not crazy at all to some folks. In fact this article over at DomainNameWire discusses it as if expecting it as a neccessary part of “doing business” in the business environment we currently operate in. How might they operate? Take a read a DNW and think about it for a while. Guess my “webtitle.org” name might come in handy someday after all.

A great and informative followup report by Kevin Murphy: http://texturbation.com/blog/2006/11/05/july-domain-kiting-hall-of-shame/ Same clowns in Miami doing the same old thing under the same corporate names. But the interesting thing is the legwork done to find all the names Enom may be doing business as, in an apparent attempt to fly under the radar. Good solid reporting!

The widely anticipated IE7 browser was released today. First sighting I could find was at Yahoo!, where the Yahoo! branded and bundled browser package could be had for those early adopters. When the official, unbundled Microsoft version appeared the link still said that it was RC1. When downloaded it disappointed those waiting for support of some languages… I mean that it appears the early release supports only Japanese and Arabic. Roughly 50 other languages should be supported by the time the browser is”pushed” to folks around the world as a security update.

There seems to be plenty of religious wars going on due to the imminent release of Microsoft’s IE7 browser. The unwashed masses use this browser well in excess of 90-95% depending on the country. So the argument goes, folks in countries where English is not near-ubiquitous will gradually realize that they can type directly into the browser in their own language. I just don’t understand why people don’t think this is the inevitable result?

Sure, Mac users will say, they take for grated that they can use whatever language they want when navigating the web. And sure lots of programmers use Firefox (yours truly) which has long supported IDNs. And so on and so forth, say the devotees of Opera and Safari and Konqueror, etc. But the vast majority of web users have never realized they could, and soon they will make this discovery. Like I said I just can’t understand the naysayers…. if most of the web were in Chinese and suddenly I realized I could type English into my browser — guess what, I would!

OK you mention footwear companies and I think of giant marketing machines with sweatshops. But Adidas has gone and made such a cool product. Not content with lame old-fashioned advertising, they created a counterpart to a real product that is tailor made for second life. Their a3 Microride shoe actually gives you lots of bouncing ability in SL. Now that’s smart. If beer companies offered the same kinds of products the girls around you would actually start to look better as you consumed virtual beer in SL.

Great example of a smart registry in action! Many sequences of digts were reserved by Neustar (the .US registry), including 5-digit domains, 5-digits-dash-4-digits (zip + 4) and all possible US 10-digit phone numbers. To see the complete list of reserved domains see this zipped doc.
They are in a stronger position than Marchex with their incomplete collection of zipcode .coms and .nets. But Marchex has a head start with myzip.com which they plan to use as their portal.
Are these guys smart or what? The next competitor - .TEL extension, who aim to bring a souped-up version of the same basic funtionality to a worldwide userbase.

Here is my letter sent to my local congressmen and senators earlier today, in reaction to ICANN moving up their next meeting date when this issue will presumably be discussed. Not that I think the US congress should seek legislative solutions to force saneness on the part of ICANN, but the mere threat of action to pressure the commerce Dept. should help to compel ICANN to include language that people are more comfortable with. The main goal should be to find reasonable ways to allow registries to profit without putting the users if the system at such a high level of risk.

Read on to see the text of the letters. More to the point, if you agree please write to your congresspersons. You can do so at http://www.congress.org/congressorg/issues/alert/?alertid=9002726&content_dir=ua_congressorg

Read the rest of this entry »

Say what you will about the shortcomings of ICANN, and the United States’ continued oversight function, but let me be the first to say that there is not a viable alternative. The United Nations is demonstrably incompetent when it comes to any sort of governance, technical or not. I think that’s the main obstacle to a transition to another governance model - the distinct lack of any credible choices.

ICANN has launched its new Registry Request Service stocked with industry insiders who seem poised to deal with new and sometimes innovative requests from all comers. Registries in particular will find exciting ways to drive increased registration, so one easy prediction influenced by a recent Verisign report: the number of registered domains will never again be reported to be less than 100 million!