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Thursday, June 22, 2000
Q: I recently heard of a new Internet address ending in TV. I thought that Web sites are limited to .com, .org, .net, and .edu. What gives?
A: Traditionally, domains in the United States have ended in standard top-level domains (TLD). By far the most popular is .com -- and typically indicates that the owner of the domain is a commercial enterprise -- but not always. The nonprofit Pittsburgh Technology Council owns pghtech.com. Most nonprofits use .org domains. Network Solutions (the company that manages the master database) reserves the .edu domains for four-year institutions of higher education.
You may register multiple domains for your company, and the domains do not need to be in the same TLD. In fact, Network Solutions, in its role as a domain registrar, suggests you register your domain as .com, .net and .org -- a type of risk reduction against competitors who might try to register a similar name in a different TLD.
The U.S. government controls two domains for its own use. Used for most government departments is .gov, such as irs.treasury.gov, although the Postal Service Office uses usps.com. Various U.S. military departments, including all the major branches of the armed forces, use .mil. Most countries have their own TLDs -- .us for the United States; .ca for Canada; .fr for France. The idea is that you can identify the country in which you do business by the domain name you use. For instance, while Sony uses sony.com in the United States, it uses sony.ca in Canada. But acceptable use differs from country to country.
In the United States, each state has its own subdomain, and there are usually subdomains for communities within those subdomains. In Pennsylvania, the state government uses state.pa.us as its primary domain.
Some countries restrict how their domains can be used. A U.S. company doing business in Canada can use a Canadian TLD; but unless a company is based in Germany, it cannot use the German TLD, because the German government doesn't let outsiders use its TLD. This creates obvious challenges for companies that want to show a local presence in foreign markets.
Have a question for David Radin? Contact him at his Web site
Some entrepreneurs and executives have taken advantage of the TLDs of countries that don't restrict use of their TLDs. If you're a doctor, don't be surprised if you receive a mailer from a company that wants to sell you a domain or even a full Web site ending in .md. So you could be smithassociates.md to clearly identify your profession. This is done by using the TLD of Moldova.
Executives at Clear Channel Communications, a large broadcasting entity, are reserving .cc extensions. So don't be surprised if one day you start hearing about wdve.cc. CC is the country code for Cocos (Keeling) Islands. The .tv TLD that you've seen was registered for the country of Tuvalu.
The .com domains are getting very crowded. So a standards group called ICANN is looking at increasing the available top-level domains. In the meantime, a few companies have started offering their own TLDs. Until ICANN has "blessed" new TLDs: however, these new TLDs are not considered standard.
In the interim, expect small countries to take advantage of the opportunity to make a few dollars on gold-digging entrepreneurs who want to have a unique domain name -- or who want to sell unique domain names to others.
If you're thinking of creating an e-business or putting your company on the Web, you're still better off registering your domain with a .com TLD. The .com immediately identifies your company as being on the Web -- even to those who know little about the Internet. Any other TLD is value added to your .com.
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