This article is intended for domain name professionals and Internet Marketing professionals. If you wonder what a domain name is, please read one of my previous post. Please read this post till end.
- In January 1985, domain name system was implemented.At that time extension (TLD) were .com,.net,.org,.edu, .gov, .mil and .int.As internet grew .com, .net and .org were mostly adopted.
- Initially .com was used as abbreviation of company, .net was being used as abbreviation of network and .org was being used as abbreviation of organization.
- With time .com became most used TLD and it is the king of all TLDs.
- From 1985 ccTLD started, first was .us. ccTLD is 2 letter Top Level Domain abbreviation, given to every country (and territory) in world. What is ccTLD? Like .de for Germany, .uk for UK, .au for Australia.
- As of now there are 255 country code TLD in Latin alphabet.
- Different countries have have implemented their country code TLD differently. Some countries allowed subdomains directly under TLD (like .to, .io etc) others implemented third level domain where 2nd level domain was used an extension (like .co.in or .com.pk). Some allowing both directly TLD as well as third level domain as 2nd level as extension (like .co.in and .in). - All the countries which implemented their own version of .com, their are two type of implementation.
- First type is using .com.under TLD like - com.au, com.br, com.cn, com.de, com.ec, com.ru, com.sc, com.mx, com.ua, com.pl, com.tw, com.co, com.vn, com.sg, com.es, com.pe, com.pk, com.uy, com.bd, com.mk, com.ba, com.kw, com.ge, com.ai, com.jo
- Second type is using abbreviation of .com as .co Second Level Domain extension like - co.za, co.de, co.uk, co.za, co.nz, co.jp, co.in, co.kr, co.il,.co.id, co.at, co.th, co.zw, co.ug
- I would say .com is natural adoption of ccTLD using .com extension as second level domain, .co Second Level Domain is abbreviated for .com.TLD. Which I would say as artificial extension.
- India did open registration for .in and .co.in (besides few more extension) open to anyone on 16th Feb 2005. Now .in and .co.in are established extension in India. It has taken almost 17 years for .in TLD for adoption.
- Second level extension under .in TLD at the time of opening on 16th Feb 2005 were - in, co.in, net.in,org.in,ind.in,gen.in and firm.in.
- On 29th October 2021, NIXI (the in registry) quietly started registration for 29 more extensions (second level extension, third level domain) under .in TLD. None of the registrar had system ready for registration.
- The most promising extension announced on 29th October 2021, available for registration was com.in.
- Some registrant manually registered many .com.in using registrar that have taken request manually. Within couple of day, couple of registrar started supporting real time registration using their system.
- Registry was criticized for not allowing trade mark holders to first register their names in Sunrise period. Many abuse of this had happened like google.com.in, amazon.com.in etc was registered by someone from Bulgaria.
- After complaints registry halted registration in new extension (29 of them) on 13th November 2021. Subsequently Sunrise rule was announced.
- As per new sunrise rules, These extension opened for all on 27th December 9:00 AM IST.
- But in evening of 27th December 2021(IST) registry sent communications to registrars against bulk domain registration by limiting new domains registration to 2 per individual and 100 new registrations by a registered company.Please Refer from registry, .
- At the same time, .IN Registry has announced Promo for Second Level .in registrations and third level .in (example co.in, com.in etc). Registration promo price will be 299 INR including GST. Please Refer
- I have talked with couple of registrars, the bulk .in and third level domains under .in will be exempted from bulk registration restrictions during above promo duration.
- Hope some day, registry will realize that there is no use of restricting bulk registration restrictions , but this is what we have right now. So, unless there is a communication from registry, you have a limited window to acquire more .com.in in particular and .in TLD in general.This opportunity ends at End Date: 23:59:59 (IST) 31 January 2022 i.e. 18:29:59 (UTC) 31 January 2022 . After that you would need approval from ceo(at)nixi.in for bulk registrations.
- What would be repercussions of .com.in extension? First thing is for sure, it took .in and .co.in 17 years to get traction, com.in may do that in couple of years, because .com and .in both are "known" extensions.
- There would be dilution of .co.in value because theoretically traffic may leak to .com.in. It will be both way, if a person have website at .com.in and doesn't own .co.in, there may be some traffic leak as well.
- In long run, .com.in may take over .co.in, because as I said earlier .com.in is natural extension and .co.in is abbreviated thus artificial extension.
- Value of .in extension(Second level .in domains) will increase because it will be kind of insurance that it would be not affected by traffic leak because of confusion between, .co.in and .com.in
- Disclaimer : All of my opinion in this post is my personal opinion, please use your judgment when you are looking to register names in .in ccTLD extension in general and .com.in extension in particular.
