A Rush on Internet Real Estate

Oklahoma Land Rush

Did you know there’s a land rush going on the Internet? If not, you’ll soon notice when you see domain names with extentions like .vegas or .sports. That’s right – we may soon see the ‘.com’ turn passé when we can get a domain name with a .insurance or a .ins.

How soon could we see this? ICANN, the organization that oversees the growth of the web, is now ready to offer these to the public to buy-up, and like any ‘land grab’ it’s best to get in early. It’s a little pricey though, at $185,000 just to register, but once you do you can sell the domain names – such as www.hotels.vegas or www.golf.sports – for a good profit.

Personally, I’m looking forward to the new extensions as many new businesses find it difficult to find their business name in a .com. With the new extensions we may also find a whole new way to brand business’ website’s. It will also be interesting to see how Google regards all these new extensions and how it plays out in search engine optmization.

Branding .JOBS is a great example of how a good extension can get you some PR while the public get’s used to all the non-dotcoms. Listen below to see how .JOBS is using thier extension.

What do you think? Is a new dot-something good for business, or confusing for the consumers?