They are not "abandoning" .com domains. They are just really hard to find available or cheap enough to buy, so they launch with something else instead!
It would shock me if that domain were actually allowed to be killed off by pure bureaucracy. I would like to believe that at some point bureaucracy must give way to concerns for the humans it serves, and if nothing else there is enough money involved with the industry that uses it that they'll probably be able to lobby effectively, one way or another.
it's not that they can't afford to buy one. it's that they're not available. and now a lot of other tlds have gained traction so it's now reasonable to consider others.
I would assume that for most foo.ai domains, foo-ai.com would also be available. So it’s more about naming preferences, and sometimes lack of imagination for coming up with an available name.
Which gTLDs are reliable besides the classics (com, net, org,...)? By that I mean that the TLD owner won't screw you over a few years from now, for example by raising prices?
I kind of like the idea to use .com for the marketing site, and .app for the actual web-app.
.st is cool because they allow US-legal content and it's pretty cheap. I don't think it will be popular with companies but I like it for personal sites.
While reading the essay, I could not stop thinking about the literal "X" company which was formerly known as Twitter :D. It's like X is no longer a variable but a constant.
Is non .com/.org, and hyphens still haram? I registered a new domain last week; I went with non-hyphenated .com. More verbose than ideal, but I chose based on my previous understanding.
I remember .ly was a thing for a while, then the tech companies would do *ly.com instead.
Exactly, and nothing will ever match the "prestige" of .com
.ai is also kind of cool right now but it will probably lose its appeal after some years when everything will become AI and the world will get tired of the term.
But .com is still at the top of the food chain. If you can survive for a few years, raise your series A/B, you will likely have enough money to acquire your sexy single-word .com name.
From personal experience .dev is a little weird. For one thing its on the HSTS preload list, enforcing https. You cannot make a http://... request to a .dev domain from most browsers. I found this out the hard way after trying to use .dev for... development.
I understand using http on localhost and in some cases local domains accessible within the LAN. But I don't see much point in using http for public domains, especially since browsers apply many restrictions to insecure origins (http://*.localhost is considered secure).
"A recent YC startup spent 250k on a domain. I was slightly shocked. But when I asked how much they raised after YC, the answer was 6.5m. So 1/26 of their round. This is the time we live in; one shocking number counterbalances the other."
.com — in RFC 920, it originally meant 'commercial.' But come to think of it, a lot of recent startups seem to be selling things that aren't really commercial at all. So maybe they're actually heading in the right direction.
I never thought domains are actually uper important for startups. .com was always cool, then ther was an .io madness, never liked it, still go with .com or .co
Nope: it surprised me too, but we did a small survey and unless you’re a nerd, anything not ending in either com or your own nation’s TLD structure is considered dodgy and/or hard to type (.co being a notorious case — people type .com instead).
This is mitigated slightly by the fact that people don’t use URIs much any more and even if they do they usually type something into a search bar or chat bot which DWIMs what they typed anyway.
They are not "abandoning" .com domains. They are just really hard to find available or cheap enough to buy, so they launch with something else instead!
.com will always be king
A while ago we had the .ly domains. Now .ai. Things change depending on "fashion" if you can call it that.
I kind of like the idea to use .com for the marketing site, and .app for the actual web-app.
I wouldn't call this 'abandoning .com' though
it's basically still .com dominated with a good chunk .ai
and I guess the ones with good .com are keeping the .com
I remember .ly was a thing for a while, then the tech companies would do *ly.com instead.
.ai is also kind of cool right now but it will probably lose its appeal after some years when everything will become AI and the world will get tired of the term.
But .com is still at the top of the food chain. If you can survive for a few years, raise your series A/B, you will likely have enough money to acquire your sexy single-word .com name.
I’m still annoyed that thanks to a missed payment, I lost quixote.com.
https://x.com/paulg/status/2083628660708561075
Was that a .xyz?
This is mitigated slightly by the fact that people don’t use URIs much any more and even if they do they usually type something into a search bar or chat bot which DWIMs what they typed anyway.