I'll never cease to be amazed at what large companies will throw hundreds of thousands of dollars at just to _apply_ for a new gTLD. I mean what's the demand for whatever.superintelligence? Nobody is going to type that or notice it in a URL bar and think anything but "damn, that's a long TLD" while the dozens of other shorter AI focused TLDs sit there too.
Non-tech companies are getting sucked in, too - see, for example, the applications for .airliquide, .capitalgroup, .dinebrands, .massimodutti, .newbalance, .stubhub, .warhammer, .zarahome, and so on.
From what I've seen thus far, most brand TLDs never get used. (The only significant exception that comes to mind is .google, and even they never really committed to using it.) Who's been going around convincing these companies to apply for this round?
I remember when I worked for a registry (not a registrar) before the first launch of gTLD's. Bizarrely one of the products they were excited to promote was not to register domains under a TLD, but rather, to _block_ them. The idea being that if you wanted to make sure someone else didn't register <company_name>.[sucks, stupid, whatever] you had to pay them (Donuts) to make sure it didn't happen. It felt extortionate.
I worked on the .name application, and it was a key thing we were basically required to demonstrate we could do even back in 2000. ICANN was obsessed with protecting trademark holders.
Anthropic applied for `.claude` and `.anthropic`. OpenAI applied for: agent, agi, asi, chatgpt, codex, daybreak, deploy, evals, gpt, mcp, model, oai, openai, skill, & voice.
Meta Registry Holdings LLC applied for: agent, aiglasses, facebook, frommeta, insta, instagram, llama, loc, messenger, meta, metaai, metaglasses, metaverse, muse, reels, superintelligence, threads, vrs, wearables, whatsapp
Charleston Road Registry Inc. (doing business as Google Registry): agent, alphabet, api, ask, beam, browser, cast, chromebook, chromium, classroom, deepmind, find, fitbit, gem, gemini, gemma, genie, gke, intelligence, keep, lens, lesson, lyria, maps, mcp, nest, pixel, share, sheets, shorts, slides, teach, ultra, veo, vids, waymo, waze, wear, workspace
So Meta, Google and OpenAI all applied for .agent
Some of these keywords are so valuable that I see them all forming a consortium of sorts to share access amongst themselves.
I'll never cease to be amazed at what large companies will throw hundreds of thousands of dollars at just to _apply_ for a new gTLD. I mean what's the demand for whatever.superintelligence? Nobody is going to type that or notice it in a URL bar and think anything but "damn, that's a long TLD" while the dozens of other shorter AI focused TLDs sit there too.
Non-tech companies are getting sucked in, too - see, for example, the applications for .airliquide, .capitalgroup, .dinebrands, .massimodutti, .newbalance, .stubhub, .warhammer, .zarahome, and so on.
From what I've seen thus far, most brand TLDs never get used. (The only significant exception that comes to mind is .google, and even they never really committed to using it.) Who's been going around convincing these companies to apply for this round?
Checked all primary strings for length, the 3 longest (excluding punycode notations):
.superintelligence (17)
.registeredagent (15)
.meditativemind (14)
.intelligence (12) is also in the top 10 longest primary strings.
I remember when I worked for a registry (not a registrar) before the first launch of gTLD's. Bizarrely one of the products they were excited to promote was not to register domains under a TLD, but rather, to _block_ them. The idea being that if you wanted to make sure someone else didn't register <company_name>.[sucks, stupid, whatever] you had to pay them (Donuts) to make sure it didn't happen. It felt extortionate.
Apparently it's still a thing. https://kb.centralnicreseller.com/services/brand-protection/...
http://caltechrejects.com/ takes you to https://mit.edu/: you don't need a .sucks TLD to be funny.
> It felt extortionate.
Because it is.
gTLDs include .com, .org, .info etc, so they have been around pretty much since the beginning of public dns
I worked on the .name application, and it was a key thing we were basically required to demonstrate we could do even back in 2000. ICANN was obsessed with protecting trademark holders.
the domain industry is completely insane
In fairness, the problem they're trying to solve is insanely complex. Not surprising that the solution went off the rails.
Here is a direct link to the applied TLDs: https://newgtldprogram-aps.icann.org/applications
If my counting is correct (the results wrap across multiple pages), 13 companies applied for the .agent TLD.
The CSV download button gives the full table.
Amusingly, .scam is being applied for.
A real scam would never use that TLD, it would be too obvious. Therefore, you know any .scam website must be legit
...or that's just what they want you to think.
"ICANN's mission is to help ensure a stable, secure, and unified global Internet."
No, ICANN mission is to make more money and maintain strong monopoly. Maybe they can be honest about it.
Someone applied for .slop, I hope they make it.
Please, no more... don't we already have enough junk tlds?
Also see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49997249 for the 1372 unique strings:
abion, acc, account, accounting, ace, acg, act, action, active, ada, add, adeka, adidas, adk, admin, admiral, adobe, adventhealth, adventure, advice, advisor, advisors, advisory, aeon, agc, age, agent, agentic, agentid, agentur, agi, agile, agnt, agt, aiagent, aid, aiglasses, aio, aiq, air, airbnb, airliquide, airo, ais, akamai, album, alexa, algo, alicloud, all, alliance, allianz, allin, aloha, alpha, alphabet, alsac, alsok, alum, alumni, ami, amor, amp, analog, anime, anon, ans, ansid, antel, anthropic, any, ape, apex, api, apparel, applebees, arabbank, arc, archive, arena, argenx, article, artisan, artisanal, artist, arzt, asap, asdf, asi, ask, ass, asset, association, astro, asus, ate, atelier, athletics, atkinsrealis, atl, atlas, atom, atos, att, attbusiness, atto, audit, aura, auth, automation, avax, ave, avocat, axis, axon, backup, bad, bag, bakery, bali, ball, bang, bankofamerica, bao, base, bau, bay, bazaar, bbq, bca, bci, bdo, beach, beam, beijing, ber, bershka, beta, betr, bewell, bff, big, bili, bilibili, bill, bin, biontech, biotech, bistro, bit, bitcoin, bland, bldg, blend, bln, block, blvd, bmo, bnb, board, body, bold, bolt, boom, boost, borg, borrow, boss, bpce, brain, branch, brand, bremen, brew, bro, browse, browser, bsky, btc, btgpactual, btr, btw, bud, budapest, buddy, bug, bun, butterfly, cake, campania, cams, cancel, cannabis, canuck, canva, canvas, cap, capcut, capitalgroup, cardano, carecredit, cart, cartoon, cas, cashpro, cast, catalog, cater, cause, ccc, cdn, cell, cencora, central, century, cert, certified, chain, change, charge, chatgpt, check, chef, chess, chevron, chi, chic, chip, christian, chromebook, chromium, ciao, cibc, civic, class, classroom, claude, claw, clean, cleaners, clear, cli, cloak, clone, cloudflare, cmo, cms, cna, cnp, cnpassurances, coaching, codex, coin, collection, collective, come, comedy, comics, commerce, commercial, compute, con, concierge, conex, conf, config, connect, consult, consultants, contest, control, converse, copilot, core, corp, corporation, cos, cosmetics, cosplay, cot, counseling, couture, craft, craps, create, creations, creative, creator, crew, crm, crypto, csc, cscglobal, csr, ctrl, culture, cupshe, cyb, cyber, cygames, daihatsu, daily, daiwa, dao, dapp, dash, datadog, daybreak, ddd, decor, deep, deepmind, deeptech, defense, defi, demo, den, dentistry, deploy, depot, develop, developer, development, device, dia, dian, did, dine, dinebrands, dmgmori, dna, dns, docomo, dola, donate, donor, door, doubao, douyin, dpp, dragon, dream, drink, droid, drone, drop, dub, dunlop, duo, dyna, earn, easy, ebay, echo, echostar, edge, edible, edit, eero, ego, elect, electric, elite, engine, english, ens, ent, enter, entity, epic, eqt, equs, era, erica, esg, esports, etc, ether, ethereum, ethers, etsy, euro, evals, exfy, exness, exp, expedia, explore, expo, ext, extra, extravaganza, eye, fab, facebook, fact, factory, fafo, fair, fam, fanatics, fandom, fantasy, fanuc, faq, fart, fastly, fav, feed, fest, festival, fight, file, files, find, finder, fintech, firm, fitbit, fix, flagscape, flipkart, flow, flux, focus, folder, folio, follow, for, force, forge, form, format, forms, founder, foundry, frame, frankfurt, frax, freedom, freelance, fresh, frhc, frommeta, ftw, fuel, fujitv, fundraise, funny, furry, fusion, future, gamecocks, gamer, gaming, gas, gate, gateway, gear, geek, gehealthcare, gem, gemini, gemma, gen, general, generalinc, genesys, genie, get, getaway, ghost, gig, gilead, girl, gis, git, gke, glam, glasses, gleif, glitch, globe, glow, gmi, goat, god, goldmansachs, good, goods, gossip, goto, gpt, gram, graph, great, grid, grit, grow, growth, gtld, guard, guild, gym, hack, haier, haierbros, hakuhodo, halara, hall, ham, han, hao, happy, hard, hash, hat, haute, heart, hello, her, hero, hers, hey, hid, hike, hill, hilton, hims, hip, hire, hisense, hit, hive, hodl, hola, homecare, honey, hongguo, hop, hope, hospitality, howto, huawei, hub, hubid, hug, huge, human, humanity, hund, hunt, huo, hvac, hype, iam, icon, icp, ics, idea, identity, idk, ify, ihop, iii, image, immersive, impact, indeed, index, indie, indigenous, inditex, industrial, industry, inf, infinite, inn, ins, insights, insta, instagram, intel, intelligence, inter, interiors, internet, inv, invest, invite, ion, ipr, ish, ishere, island, item, itis, itiswhatitis, ity, ivf, jackpot, jackson, jazz, jbs, jelly, jera, jet, jia, jin, jjj, join, joinus, journal, journey, jtg, jtgroup, jti, juliusmeinl, kai, kaneka, kao, kart, kawaii, kawasaki, keep, kek, kernel, key, kgs, kick, king, kit, know, koala, konicaminolta, kord, krafton, kuiper, lab, label, labs, laden, lake, lan, landcros, lane, larus, leads, league, learn, learning, ledger, lefties, legacy, legami, lei, lend, lens, leo, lesson, let, level, lfg, liebherr, lifetime, lift, light, line, links, linz, lipovitan, list, listing, lit, livescore, lkab, llama, llm, lmao, lmax, lmk, lms, loc, lock, lodge, log, logic, login, logistics, look, loop, lore, lot, lounge, lovable, lowes, luck, luckin, luckincoffee, lugano, lvs, lyria, machine, mad, mag, maga, magavip, mai, mail, make, maker, mall, manga, maps, mark, mars, mart, mask, massage, massimodutti, master, mate, math, matrix, matt, max, mazda, mbda, mcp, mech, meditative, meditativemind, medley, meeting, mei, meinl, meli, mem, member, memo, memory, mempool, mentor, meow, merch, merlin, merrill, mesh, messenger, met, meta, metaai, metaglasses, metaverse, michelin, min, mind, mine, mission, mitsui, mix, mizuho, mkt, mmm, mod, mode, model, module, mono, montecarlo, mood, moon, more, motion, motors, move, msft, msig, muenchen, mufg, muse, mvp, mychart, myntra, nas, nation, national, nav, near, need, neko, neo, nerd, nest, neumann, neural, newbalance, nft, nhl, nice, nightlife, nil, nissin, nlp, node, noe, nomura, nonprofit, north, not, note, notes, notion, nova, novartis, novo, novocare, npc, nrs, nsfw, ntv, null, nusa, nut, nutrition, oai, official, oid, oil, okay, okta, okx, ola, ole, olympic, omg, only, onn, opc, openai, opensource, operator, opinion, oppo, ops, orb, order, organization, organize, original, oss, otaku, oto, out, outlet, owl, own, oysho, pack, pai, painting, pal, palantir, panda, park, pass, passion, passkey, passport, path, paws, pax, pch, pdf, peach, pec, peptides, person, personal, pflege, pharma, phi, php, pia, pickleball, pico, pill, pinet, pit, pix, pixel, pki, plan, planet, planner, platform, playlist, plaza, plc, plex, pltr, pod, podcast, point, pool, pop, port, portal, portfolio, pos, pot, pov, pow, power, ppp, praxis, predict, premium, present, presto, pride, print, private, product, products, profile, program, project, prompt, proto, protocol, proton, prototype, proxy, pubg, public, publishing, puff, pullandbear, pump, punk, purpose, push, qai, qqq, quant, quantum, queen, query, quince, quiz, quote, qwe, qwen, qwer, race, radar, railway, ralphlauren, ramp, ranch, rank, rankings, rap, rare, rating, raw, rblx, real, realm, records, recovery, rednote, reels, registeredagent, rem, remax, renewable, reno, rep, reply, repo, res, research, reservation, resona, resort, resources, resume, retail, rev, rewards, ring, ripple, risk, ritres, road, roblox, robot, robotaxi, robotics, roku, roland, roma, roof, roofing, round, rrr, saas, sabre, safari, sage, saison, salesforce, salzburg, san, sands, sat, say, scale, scam, scan, scania, sci, screen, sdk, sea, sec, secom, securitas, see, seiko, seite, self, sell, send, seniors, sennheiser, sense, seo, server, set, share, sheets, shield, shift, shimano, shinoken, shionogi, ship, shiro, shopify, shorts, sicredi, sign, sim, simplii, sito, skill, skills, slack, slay, sleep, slides, sloan, slop, slot, smb, smbc, smith, smtb, snow, snowflake, sns, soc, socialmedia, society, sodexo, soft, sokagakkai, sol, solana, solo, sompo, soon, sos, sou, soul, sound, source, sov, spark, special, speed, spice, spirit, spring, squad, src, sss, stack, stake, start, stats, status, stay, steel, stem, stiftung, stjude, stock, stone, story, stradivarius, strategy, street, stripe, stubhub, stupid, substrate, sugar, sui, summit, super, superintelligence, sure, survey, sus, sushi, sushiro, sview, swap, swedbank, swi, swift, sync, synchrony, syndicate, synth, sys, tableau, taco, tada, tag, taisho, takamiya, tanaka, tap, taser, task, taylorswift, tbd, tbs, tea, teach, telegram, telus, temple, ten, tether, tex, text, the, therapist, therapy, thing, this, threads, tiger, tiktok, time, tiny, tisi, tkns, tldr, tnl, token, tokiomarine, tom, tone, toppan, toy, track, trademark, traffic, trail, train, trainer, transcend, transit, translate, transport, tree, trek, trending, trends, trimble, trip, triumph, tron, tropic, truck, true, trump, truth, trx, try, ttt, tumblr, tutorial, tvasahi, twente, twin, twitch, twosigma, twt, uber, ufo, uid, ulm, ultra, ultraview, uni, union, unit, united, universe, unlimited, update, upload, upsa, url, usc, usdt, use, user, uvw, uwu, valid, valley, value, van, vault, vegan, vend, venue, veo, ver, vercel, verein, verified, versant, vert, via, vibe, vid, vids, vienna, view, village, vintage, viral, virtual, visit, viv, voice, volunteer, vpn, vps, vrbo, vrs, vvv, wager, wallet, wan, want, war, warhammer, water, wave, waw, way, waymo, waze, wealth, wear, wearables, weed, weird, welcome, well, wellness, west, wew, what, whatsapp, whatsnew, why, wifi, wild, will, wire, wise, wit, wix, wiz, wizard, wonder, woo, wood, wordpress, workflow, workshop, workspace, wynn, xbt, xiaomi, xio, xmr, xn--04q76x2mcuuv / 海尔兄弟, xn--3ds443g / 在线, xn--3et971b / 海尔, xn--6oqv20b1zgzxr / 株式会社, xn--bur6r91txtx / 瑞幸咖啡, xn--ces6a / 地址, xn--czr694b / 商标, xn--eqr661e / 名片, xn--fiq228c5hs / 中文网, xn--fpy230a / 番茄, xn--g2xx48c / 购物, xn--gmq502atzh / 数字人, xn--gmqr38alogxt2a / 人工智能, xn--gmqz0qc7o / 机器人, xn--gtv852c / 红果, xn--hxt324i / 酒店, xn--imr513n / 餐厅, xn--io0a7i / 网络, xn--jvr800e / 品牌, xn--kbt444f / 官网, xn--lwt700c / 瑞幸, xn--npqq54o / 防伪, xn--pruv10j / 抖音, xn--qubec-csa / québec, xn--tqq477c0xs / 智能体, xn--uir314m / 钱包, xn--vuq143e / 海信, xoxo, xpi, xserver, xxl, yam, yay, yea, yeah, yes, ygeia, yoyo, yuasa, yueyang, yum, yyy, zan, zap, zarahome, zec, zen, zia, zillow, zoho, zoo, zoom, zzz
I hope whoever registers index.php uses that power for good.