Hair Of The Dot. Dog

Dot.BMW, Dot.dog and Dot.Singapore may soon become three of many new domains now that the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) the nonprofit Internet coordinating body has approved the development.

The only catch is that a  person, company or government wanting to secure such a domain-name suffix will need to fork out the princely sum of $185,000 to make their application and this will put such an initiative beyond the budgets of many SME's.

This however is not the end of the cost.  For having secured the domain, there is then an annual fee to Icann of about $25,000, among other costs such as hosting and domain management

Registering a new extension for your company is an excellent branding idea but the cost of doing so and maintaining it will be prohibitive for most.

So the Dot.Com party is finally a thing of the past and we have entered (to quote the WSJ) the age of Dot. Anything.

Will this development make it easier for the consumer, or more difficult as they search through an ever expanding array of domains for the company or service that they seek?

Going to the Dot.Doctor will never be easier.

Read All About It

While a plethora of new domains might make finding relevant information more of a challenge, a new service from the Newseum allows a reader to feel the pulse of the world through an interactive map of newspaper front pages.

Front pages of the World - Flash version

Through a special agreement with more than 800 newspapers worldwide, the Newseum displays these front pages each day on its website. The front pages are in their original and unedited form and are viewable in either the Flash or Bing Beta versions.  Personally I prefer the latter (see below) as the pop-up windows are easier to navigate.

Bing Beta version

Related articles

• Brand name Top Level Domains coming (zdnet.com)
• ICANN Approves Generic Top-Level Domains: New Era of Innovation or A Flood of Spam? (readwriteweb.com)

Should be Sceptical?

News International is claiming 105,000 paying customers for The Times and Sunday Times. 

This is five months after the introduction of their paywall, touted at the time as being the way things would be for all online publications moving forward.

According to a UK journalism site, "the sites charge £1 for a day's access and £2 for a week's subscription, though an introductory offer allows 30 days of access to both sites for £1. Access to the sites is also bundled with a seven-day print subscription to either title."

However there is much debate as to what the figures really mean and how successful the paywall model actually is?

Average traffic for May has actually halved compared to the previous year according to Hitwise and the BBC goes further claims there has been an 87% drop off in site visitation.

They also question how many of that 105,000 paying cystomers are currently in the introductory £1 for thirty day trial period?

Colin Greenslade, the Guardian's media commentator says the figures simply don't stack up as a new business model.

As he puts it:

"Most importantly, there is no clear breakdown of the 105,000 total figure to show how many people have subscribed monthly, weekly or daily. "
 
If you compare the reach of The Times with that of a more traditional online model, the Guardian, the decline is very noticeable.
 

Rob Brown of PRMedia Blog believs that the paywalll could well tumble.  He makes the point that where this really doesn’t add up is when you look at ad revenue.
 
"The Guardian is pulling in £40 million a year in online revenues more than double that of the Times and bear in mind that doesn’t account for the fact we are not looking at a full year position for The Times.
 
It looks like online ads at the Guardian represent serious value in comparison. From their pre-paywall high point the audience for the TimesOnline has dropped almost 90%."

"These figures very clearly show that large numbers of people are willing to pay for quality journalism in digital formats." says Rebekah Brooks, chief executive of Rupert Murdoch's News International. 
 
This to us looks like an attempt to put a postive spin on a less than positive result, albeit after just five months of moving to the paywall model.
 
While we love an optimist, Rebekah Brooks's conclusion could well be premature.  There is not yet conclusive evidence that such a business model is viable in the medium or long term.

Related articles

• Why the Times paywall numbers are meaningless. (malcolmcoles.co.uk)
• Times's paywall figures don't add up to a new business model (guardian.co.uk)
• The successes and failures of the Times's paywall (newstatesman.com)
• Is The Times Paywall Ready to Tumble? (pr-media-blog.co.uk)