ICANN suffix application deadline

Companies only have today to apply to have their name as an Internet domain. The ICANN’s global top level domain (gTLD) applications close today and have already seen BIG names like Google and Coke rushing to grab one. This would mean companies can incorporate their own brands into their online addresses.

For example, drinks giant Pepsi can apply for .pepsi, .gatorade or .tropicana as an alternative to existing suffixes such as .org or .com. It costs a massive $185,000 (£116k) to apply for a gTLD.

Could we see gaming companies follow suit? Will there be .bwinparty, .paddypower, .bet365, or .pokerstars? All sound like good suffixes, imagine www.poker.pokerstars. All of the major companies are keeping quiet about their strategies towards the new offer of suffixes.

However some of the local governments of Scotland and London have reportedly applied for domains.  The UK’s registrar, Nominet, has also taken the opportunity to apply for new national domains including .wales and .cymru.

In the run-up to the application, it was feared a gTLD landgrab might include cybersquatters, who contest domains or register them fraudulently, but this was dismissed as “hype” by Forrester Research analyst Jeff Ernst, who wrote in a blog: “Don’t get so stuck in the hype about the risk of cybers-squatters or of someone else getting your dot-brand,” Ernst wrote.

Whatever happens after the Thursday deadline, certainly there will be some of the large gaming companies taking up the opportunity, who will be first to use it, only time will tell.