Does Scotland need the .scot domain?

[Scottish Business Owner]

OK I feel a little poll coming on

Came across the article below on the BBC website but it's also been doing the rounds on Twitter. Apparently Icann who govern most domain name extensions have decided to really open it up. So some people in Scotland have decided that we need the .scot domain. It will cost $185,000 to apply and I dont think it's actually guaranteed. So the poll is simple and it's the name of this thread

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-13903243

 

[Mike Lewis]

Yes. This would be very valuable. It deserves support.

And maybe there should be TLDs for Wales, N. Ireland and England as well.

But I don't understand what the $185,000 is for, or who will be expected to pay it.

Mike

 

[stugster]

The huge costs will be for (or showing) they have the technical ability and funding available to put in place the back-end to announce all the .scot domains.

Personally, I think it'd be cool. But from a professional standing I think clients and others would just get even more confused at the number of different TLDs. How many TLDs are there now that are just wasted? I can think of a few!

 

[Scottish Business Owner]

I've actually asked the people behind the .scot domain campaign how it gets funded and i'm currently awaiting a reply.

I did think initially that maybe it was something SBF could really get behind and support.

I dont think we really have enough votes to get a general feeling but i'll continue to promote the thread via Twitter etc to try and get more of an informed opinion

 

[kmbookkeeping]

I think it would be interesting. I'd probably get on for my business, but I wouldn't ditch the .co.uk. I feel if people are looking for a site they generally try .com or .co.uk. I agree that there are some obscure TLD's out there that most people would never think of.

Kris

 

[aviemorebusiness]

I personally feel that the world is going mad with all these extensions.... keep it simple is my moto and I agree with @stugster, how many of these have we already got that are not used. Don't get me wrong I am all for shouting out that we are Scottish business and all that but I think it just starts getting into the realms of confusion if you start opening things up this wide. We will be sticking.co.uk for definite, we are not even considering going down the .com route as we are not in America and nor do we wish to be. We are proud to be a UK company and that is what the .co.uk stands for.

Every time I write on here I feel like I have ranted!

(Katie)

 

[Mike Lewis]

I don't understand why some of you are saying that too many TLDs is confusing. Who does it confuse? The person visiting the site? But they simply type the address into their browser. It's just as easy or difficutl to do that with a .scot as a .co.uk or anything else. Or is the person setting up the website who will get confused? If so, I'd say that anyone who can't grasp the difference between one TLD and another should not be in the business of setting up wesbsites.

Also, Katie and Gavin, you say you don't use .com because you are not in America. In this context, .com stands for "commercial". It is not related to any specific country.

Mike

 

[kmbookkeeping]

Mike, you are right in what you say about .com meaning commercial but it is widely adopted as being an american commercial enterprise with those in the UK leaning more towards .co.uk

Obviously if you are using a search engine the TLD doesn't matter. But I know if I am looking for a UK company I generally try their name with .co.uk and then .com before trying a search engine. Very rarely do I try .info or .co or any of the other more obscure ones.

Kris

 

[aviemorebusiness]

Mike, I was going to say pretty much the same as Kris has said but would also add it's not a case of not being able to set them up from a web development point of view it is more the general fact that .co.uk and .com are in people's heads now - a bit like 0800 meaning a free number. I would much rather be advertising a domain name that I thought people would remember rather than having to look it up and by having .scot or .tv or .info.org.net etc etc this just adds confusion to the user's experience. When we ask our customers what the preferred extension is, it is a resounding 90% that want .co.uk

These are all going to be irrelevant come the QR code revolution anyway

Katie

 

[amestaper]

Scotland does need its own TLD but I hope this wont be as expensive as the .co sell off event a year ago which involved selling a kidney to buy up matches for .com's, .net's and .co.uk's to prevent cybersquatting. It turned into a greedy slugfest where the new domains were offered to the dotcom and dotnet holders by some registrars for first refusal in a pre-sale at a hugely inflated price. Dont quote me but I think they were in the low £££'s.

I'm sure all the good generic domains will be gone in minutes. I will buy, but only at a sensible price.

 

[Scottish Business Owner]

Alec,

You make a really good point actually. To a certain extent if people want to protect their brand then they may feel obliged to do so. We've been on the wrong end of people trying to piggy back on our domain a few times and I can tell you it ain't nice

I think the general consensus seems to be that people would welcome the association with their country and that provided it wasn't exorbitant they would grab the matching .scot domain. The only negative I have is that the people who are promoting this have actually failed to respond to a number of emails that I sent which in itself is pretty disappointing

 

[Inverkeithing.net]

I've voted yes! I dont know as much about this as other people on here but I still think it's a good idea and helps to preserve our Scottish identity and roots.

 

[aviemorebusiness]

I read with interest some of the above comments, however, I go back to my earlier point about customers associating domain names with things they remember. It is in our business interests for prospective customers to find us quickly and easily online and if they have to start scrolling through .com .co.uk .scot .tv .info etc etc they will soon lose interest and go elsewhere. There is the argument that you can purchase them all and forward them to your original domain name, however, from an SEO point of view this is not the best of ideas and could damage your existing rankings. Your domain name needs to be easily remembered if you want people to use it in the future. Whilst I totally agree that we need to preserve our Scottish identity and roots I would suggest that a domain name is not the way to go - there are far better ways for this money to be spent to assist Scottish businesses than setting up yet another TLD. Surely we are part of the UK and as people have been using .co.uk for years this is embedded into our 'language' and therefore is an automatic part of typing in a domain name.

I am sure there is not going to be a general concessus of opinion on here, but I would struggle to see the relevancy of spending nearly $185K on setting this up for only a handful of us to use, when as amestaper quite rightly says we will very quickly find that our .scot domains have already been snapped up by some unscrupulous company trying to make yet more money out of us all.