The list, which may still change more over time, of generic country code TLDs is as follows: .ad, .as, .bz, .cc, .cd, .co, .dj, .fm, .gg, .io, .la, .me, .ms, .nu, .sc, .sr, .su, .tv, .tk and .ws.

Google’s Pierre Far shared the news in a Google+ post (via Search Engine Roundtable).

Pierre Far1 day ago

Expanded list of ccTLDs treated as Generic ccTLDs

Over the past few months, we've been updating our indexing systems to treat certain country country-code TLDs as generic TLDs; that is, even though the top-level domain has a country code, we would treat it, by default, as not targeting a specific country. Now that all the pieces are in place, we also updated our Help Center article listing the TLDs we treat as gTLDs:

http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1347922

The latest addition includes the quite-popular (and personal favorite ) .io.

---

Geotargetable domains – Webmaster Tools Help
Generic top-level domains (gTLDs) don’t target specific countries. If your site has a generic top-level domain, such as .com, .org, or any of the domains listed below, and targets users in a particula… 20    0 Powered by socialditto

Google’s Matt Cutts recently did a Webmaster Help video discussing location and ccTLDs. If you’re reading this article, you might find it helpful. You can get the gist of it in text if you click the link, in case you don’t feel like sitting through the two-and-a-half-minute video.

A spokesperson for Demand Media tells WebProNews that the company’s eNom registrar division has not had a significant retail presence, and that, “With this acquisition, we are directly reaching the end user; and expanding beyond our reseller community (of nearly 9K customers) to proactively target end users and offer a wide range of value-added services.”

Name.com has a substantial retail footprint, according to the company.

Demand Media CEO Richard Rosenblatt said, “Name.com will provide a direct channel for us to reach consumers and small businesses as they develop and manage their online identities. This becomes even more valuable as over one thousand new domain extensions are expected to become available for registration in the years ahead.”

Taryn Naidu, EVP of the company’s registrar services, added, “Our strategy is to provide an end-to-end solution for all things domains — whether you are looking to consume or distribute names and services. Name.com brings innovation, creativity and a deep commitment to their customers – factors which we believe are essential in the environment of new gTLDs.”

Demand Media applied for 26 gTLDs, in addition to partnering with Donuts for even more. ICANN announced in June that it had received a total of 1,930 applications.

Name.com was founded in 2003, and has registered about 1.5 million domains. This should be a nice addition to eNom division, which is the second largest registrar in the world, with over 13.5 million domain names on its platform, registered for nearly nine thousands resellers and partners.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Demand Media posted record revenue and profitability with its last earnings release. It will be interesting to see if that continues with the next one.

The Register reports that the US Department of Commerce has agreed to extend ICANN’s rule over the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority for the next three to seven years. The news was confirmed by the National Telecommunication and Information Administration last night. The most important part of the deal is that ICANN has retained the power to add and remove top-level domains as they see fit.

The retention of that power is essential as ICANN recently hosted the largest digital land grab in history with companies from all over the world paying to own various generic top-level domains, or gTLDs. Companies like Google and Amazon applied for scores of domains to either use for their own purproses or lease out for individuals to run Web sites with the .soy domain.

All of this doesn’t means that ICANN is free to as they wish with the entirety of the Internet like they used to. The NTIA published a press release that details the new regulations that ICANN must adhere as the overlord of the IANA.

Based on input from the global community, NTIA added new requirements. Those include a clear separation between the policy development associated with the IANA services, and implementation by the IANA functions contractor; a robust company-wide conflict of interest policy; a heightened respect for local national law; and a series of consultation and reporting requirements to increase transparency and accountability.

While some may not like ICANN’s approach to ruling the Internet, they are not alone. They have to work with multiple stakeholders from around the world to actually get anything done. It’s the kind of approach that has worked well for the Internet and maintains a level of equality for all who wish to surf the Web (local governments blocking access to sites notwithstanding).

Besides, if you don’t like ICANN, you can at least agree that it’s better than the UN controlling it. Here’s hoping ICANN can keep it that way when the UN meets later this year to discuss a possible take over of the Internet.

Demand Media’s story has been a pretty interesting one, having applied for 26 on a standalone basis, with the potential to acquire others from Donuts, thanks to a partnership between the two companies. The really interesting part about Demand Media’s applications, however, are the actual gTLDs they chose to apply for, particularly those related to the armed services and political parties. Such gTLDs include: .airforce, .army, .navy, .democrat and .republican. You can see the full list here.

It turns out that Demand Media’s choices were driven purely by data, much like other parts of the company’s business practices have been historically. Demand Media made a name for itself by producing content based on what data shows is in demand. Presumably, that’s where the company’s name comes from. Based on comments made by a spokesperson, Demand Media approached its gTLD application strategy in a very similar way.

Leyla Farah, speaking on behalf of Demand Media, talked to TheDomains.com, and explained the approach, when asked about the company’s choices to apply for gTLDs directly related to the armed services and political parties.

According to the site, Farah said: “Our entire portfolio of gTLD applications were all grounded in the same data-driven process. We analyzed all of the data we could find to determine which words people were consistently using to navigate through their digital world. Many of the most interesting words capture a universal sense of personal or professional identity, or are words that have come to define large and important ideas around the world. Ideas like ‘democrat’ and ‘army’ and ‘actor’ represent global, vibrant communities that naturally gravitate to one another using shared language and experiences. They are universal ideas that aren’t limited to any single entity like an armed service or political party in a single country — in fact they are often used generically (e.g., ‘Arnie’s Army’ etc.). Because of the universality and generic nature of of these words, there really aren’t grounds for objection by anyone.”

In other Demand Media news, the company’s President and CFO, Charles Hilliard is stepping down, while the company has reaffirmed its guidance for Q2.

You can see Google’s full list here, and Amazon’s below.

First, it’s worth pointing out that the two Internet giants applied for more than a few of the same domains. These include: .app, .book, .buy, .cloud, .dev, .drive, .game, .map, .movie, .music, .play, .search, .shop, .show, .store, and .talk.

Some of these would be obvious choices for either company, but some stand out for various reasons. Drive, for example, is actually the name of a Google product. Amazon does have Cloud Drive, however. Google has Google Play, formerly known as Android Market (and the Google eBookstore and Google Music). The closest thing Amazon has to that name, as far as I can tell, is Amazon Cloud Player. Google has a product called Google Talk. Amazon has no product with that name, to my knowledge.

The one that really stands out on this list, of course, is Search. While this is an obvious choice for Google, it is quite interesting that Amazon would apply for it. Amazon has its own search feature, of course, but what would Amazon do with a .search TLD? Also worth noting is the fact that neither Yahoo or Microsoft applied for it. There were a couple other applicants: dot Now Limited and Bitter McCook, which comes with a donuts.co email address. Donuts, Inc. applied for a bunch, and has a partnership with Demand Media, which could enable Demand Media to acquire the rights to some of them. You can view Demand’s own list of applied-for gTLDs here.

It’s a little surprising that Google didn’t apply for some of the others on Amazon’s list. That includes things like: .circle, .group, .mobile, .news, and .video.

It’s also interesting that Facebook apparently didn’t apply for any of the gTLDs, while Amazon did apply for .like, and is the only company that did so, according to the list.

Now, on to Amazon’s full list:

- .amazon
- .app
- .audible
- .author
- .aws
- .book
- .bot
- .box
- .buy
- .call
- .circle
- .cloud
- .coupon
- .deal
- .dev
- .drive
- .fast
- .fire
- .free
- .game
- .got
- .group
- .hot
- .imdb
- .jot
- .joy
- .kids
- .kindle
- .like
- .mail
- .map
- .mobile
- .moi
- .movie
- .music
- .news
- .now
- .pay
- .pin
- .play
- .prime
- .read
- .room
- .safe
- .save
- .search
- .secure
- .shop
- .show
- .silk
- .smile
- .song
- .spot
- .store
- .talk
- .tunes
- .tushu
- .video
- .wanggou
- .wow
- .yamaxun
- .you
- .yun
- .zappos
- .zero
- . アマゾン
- .クラウド
- .ストア
- .セール
- .ファッション
- .ポイント
- .亚马逊
- .家電
- .書籍
- .通販
- .食品

You can see ICANN’s full list of gTLDs applied for (and their applicants) here.

We knew Demand Media had applied for some, but now, we know which ones, and the choices are interesting.

The company applied for 26, and for 16 of them, they were the only applicant. Here are those 16:

.actor
.airforce
.army
.dance
.democrat
.engineer
.gives
.immobilien
.kaufen
.moda
.navy
.ninja
.pub
.rehab
.republican
.social

“We are very pleased with today’s results. We selected our TLDs based on data-driven algorithms that leveraged our leading registrar and content platforms to determine what domains small businesses and consumers were demanding,” said Demand Media EVP Taryn Naidu. “We are excited about the market potential for each of our TLDs and look forward to the innovative new product offerings that will result from making these available to consumers.”

The ones Demand Media applied for that have multiple applicants are:

.bar
.cam
.fishing
.gay
.green
.map
.mom
.moto
.rip
.wow

These 26 domains are just the ones the company applied for on a stand-alone basis. Additionally, the company has an agreement with Donuts, through which it may acquire rights in certain other gTLDs, once they’ve been awarded to Donuts.

These rights, Demand Media says, are shared equally with Donuts and are associated with 107 gTLDs for which Donuts is the applicant. I won’t list them all here, but they include things like: .golf, .home, .hosting, .hot, .insurance, .investments, .law, .living and .media.

More on the Demand Media/Donuts partnership here.

One Internet giant is noticeably missing from the list altogether: the newly public Facebook. No applications for .Facebook, .Face, .Book, .FB, .OpenGraph, .Graph, or anything of the sort from the company (though Google did apply for .Book).

United TLD Holdco Ltd. applied for .Social (update: apparently on behalf of Demand Media). Google and a number of others applied for .App.

It’s worth noting that Google applied for its domains using a third party, but we haven’t seen anything indicating that this was the case with Facebook. Even with Google’s applications, they came from @google email addresses.

I don’t know exactly what Facebook would use any gTLDs for anyway, considering that Facebook’s presence is already plastered across the web itself, and is all centered around Facebook.com to begin with, but it seems likely that many of the applicants don’t know exactly what they’re going to do with all gTLDs either. My guess is that many of the applications are simply just to secure things that these companies may want somewhere down the line, and are just a precautionary measure to keep others from getting them.

It’s interesting that Facebook is apparently not too interested in such precautions. There are certainly no hints at future Facebook products, and not much room for speculation about future moves from the company.

Perusing Google’s giant list, on the other hand, leaves a whole lot of room for speculation about what Google may be up to. Of course, it’s only that at this point. Speculation.

Image: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg with dog Beast

“We believe the new gTLD program represents a significant milestone in the evolution of the Internet,” said CEO Richard Rosenblatt. “In addition to delivering more choice for consumers and business owners, we expect the domain name expansion to spur innovation and new business opportunities.”

The company has applied for 26 names on a stand-alone basis. It has also partnered with Donuts Inc. so that it may acquire rights in certain gTLDs, after they’re awarded to Donuts by ICANN.

Demand Media tells WebProNews it will not comment further on specifics.

We did speak with Donuts Vice President of Communications and Industry Relations, Mason Cole, who told us, “If you look at the existing namespace, there are only 22 existing generic told level domains. There are hundreds of country coded TLDs, like .jp for Japan, and so on, but in the generic name space, it’s awfully constrained. It’s very hard to find a good Internet identity that a company, or a person, or a family, or a new product, or a cause of some kind can use to identify themselves and promote their interests on the web.”

Watch the video for the full interview:

Donuts CEO, Paul Stahura said, “As previously announced, Donuts has raised more than $100 million in funding to pursue the new gTLD opportunity. Donuts’ strategic arrangement with Demand Media takes us well beyond that $100 million funding and enables both companies to utilize additional resources, expertise and talent to generate the most value and benefits for customers from this historic opportunity.”

Last week, Donuts announced that it selected Demand Media Europe (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Demand Media), as its registry services provider.

For a bit of backstory, the ICANN application platform, called TLD application system (TAS), was taken down after a glitch was reported which allowed applicants to see each other’s user names and file names. ICANN set April 12th as the last day to submit applications before taking the system offline, after its board of directors approved an increase of the number of gTLDs from the current amount of 22 last June. ICANN, who moderates the address system of the internet, also began accepting non-traditional domain name endings this year, including ‘.sport,’ ‘,food,’ and ‘.bank,’ in hopes to prompt innovation in web commerce. Though, some critics have stated that the new extensions might only confuse consumers and force established online storefronts to spend millions on securing new versions of their brand web addresses.

Akram points out that submitted applications and payments are still being processed, and final numbers and a list for applied-for domains will be published on a target date of June 13. Akram adds, “We thank all applicants and the ICANN community for their support throughout the application process.”

For a bit of backstory, the ICANN application platform, called TLD application system (TAS), was taken down after a glitch was reported which allowed applicants to see each other’s user names and file names. ICANN set April 12th as the last day to submit applications before taking the system offline, after its board of directors approved an increase of the number of gTLDs from the current amount of 22 last June. ICANN, who moderates the address system of the internet, also began accepting non-traditional domain name endings this year, including ‘.sport,’ ‘,food,’ and ‘.bank,’ in hopes to prompt innovation in web commerce. Though, some critics have stated that the new extensions might only confuse consumers and force established online storefronts to spend millions on securing new versions of their brand web addresses.

According to ICANN, “acting solely in the best interests of global Internet users, the Independent Objector may lodge Limited Public Interest and Community objections in cases where no other objection is made to an application that the Independent Objector deems to be objectionable.” ICANN commenced looking for an Independent Objector last November, and interviewed numerous candidates. Pellet, who is widely published and represented governments as Counsel and Advocate in the International Court of Justice, was selected for the position.

In related news, some parties think that ICANN’s expanding of the variety of top-level domain addresses could become a bit of a disaster for certain brands, with cybersquatters stepping in and opportunistically buying up all sorts of brand names with new domain extensions. The post of the Independent Objector appears to be one of the last lines of defense against these sorts of nefarious domain registrations.