Liberalisation of the Internet
Gandi Special Report on Domain Space Liberalisation- Evolving landscape
- Business impact
- Consumer impact
- ICANN process
- About the report
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- Full report
- Business guide
- Summary fact sheet
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Thursday 2 July 2009
By Ryan on Thursday 2 July 2009, 18:08 - Hosting
Thursday 25 June 2009
By Ryan on Thursday 25 June 2009, 17:23 - Hosting
Friday 19 June 2009
By Leland Vandervort on Friday 19 June 2009, 16:37 - Gandi
Tuesday 16 June 2009
By Joe on Tuesday 16 June 2009, 12:37 - Internet
Looks like our ICANN report has generated quite a bit of buzz. We've been covered in hundreds of online publications in 10+ different languages all over the world (summary will follow towards the end of the week).
But it seems we've hit a rich vein of SEO implications and generated a bit of buzz in that community. I've just come across this blog summarising the view of many of the SEO big boys. http://www.cornwallseo.com/search/2009/06/16/what-is-internet-liberalisation-and-why-should-you-care/
Interesting stuff and some good issues raised.
Jeff Behrendt says "The only clear winner of the proposed new TLDs is ICANN - at $185K per application, that’s a gravy train they are going to want to ride for many years."
That may be a little unfair. The fee is partly in place to make sure that ICANN can provide a good oversight to new extensions being created and protect trademark holders and general internet users from people setting up dodgy extensions or without the technical competency to run them. They've said this may come down (or up) as they get into the process. The fee should be high to ensure a higher quality of registry. This could be the beginning of the internet name space clear up, with higher standards leading to fewer squatted, speculative or advertising domains.
Michael Gray says - "In most cases opening the web up with more TLD’s is just going to create confusion for consumers". A point also made by Patrick Altoft about consumer confusion.
Well that seems to be what our consumers have said in our survey, so they agree. Though this liberalisation does open up the opportunity for specific TLDs and therefore potentially more simplicity and order. Michael's example of .movie is precisely along these lines, why have spiderman3themoive.com when you can have spiderman3.movie. The film industry could create this extension and protect its use solely for films. I think consumers could get used to that, and it will make more logical sense. More literal meaning to the name space. Roll on the sematic web. Tim Berners-Lee would be so proud 
Hugo Guzman talks about the importance to big business - "The liberalization of domain extensions is already grabbing the attention of Fortune 500 companies".
This was supported by our research too. Still 2/3 were unaware this was happening, but those that did know were both excited and afraid of it, depending on which department you spoke to (e.g. excited = marketing, afraid = legal). Owning .brand could allow you to more effectively manage your brand as you create the association with customers that only sites on .brand are really yours. Though Steve Russell is right, this will cost a lot more than the $185k setup fee.
Anyway, food for thought, and thanks guys for your views.
Tuesday 9 June 2009
By Wendy on Tuesday 9 June 2009, 00:01 - Gandi
In 2010, the geography of the Internet is set to expand significantly, as ICANN will liberalise the market for domain name extensions. Gandi have commissioned a report from The FutureLab to see how consumers and businesses view this change.
More about the liberalisation process
Is this a squatting opportunity or a branding opportunity?
2/3 of businesses don't realise domain extensions are being liberalised next year. But those businesses that do know about this (like Deloitte) are excited about the opportunities in the areas of global branding. However corporates are also concerned that brand protection mechanisms need to be in place at the new registries, a view that has been raised by Microsoft.
More about the impact on businesses. Inc video interview with COO Gandi.net
Will the net become full of pointless domains?
Many consumers are confused about what liberalisation means and are concerned by the rise of squatting, phishing and advertising clogging up the domain space. However they do feel a real connection with localised domain names, e.g. .london, .paris. nyc, etc., and communities they are interested in, e.g. .music, .movie, .sport. There is also a growing Generation Y group interested in self publishing and being associated with certain brand names like .facebook, .myspace, .moonfruit.
More about the impact on consumers. Inc video interview with Marketing Director Gandi.net
Will this mean the end of 'Dot Com'?
Will 'Dot Com' decline with the advent of new geographical, brand and interest group based extensions. Or will this give Dot Com a chance to clean up its act and reclaim its prime real estate from pay per click ads, squatters and unresolved web addresses.
More about the evolving landscape

The evolving landscape of the internet following liberalisation
Why did Gandi commission this independent report
At Gandi we feel strongly about the future of the internet. We commissioned this report because we want to keep the domain space free for consumer and commercial use. We think this is an important enough issue that people need to understand the impact on them as consumers and businesses. How do you want these new domain territories to be governed? and are there lessons to be learned from how we've used our existing domain space?
More about the report
Download the report in full
Friday 5 June 2009
By Ryan on Friday 5 June 2009, 14:49 - General
Wednesday 3 June 2009
By Ryan on Wednesday 3 June 2009, 14:30 - General
By Ryan on Wednesday 3 June 2009, 12:15 - Gandi
It is true that the summer vacation - lounging about, and getting a nice tan - is on its way, though we have chosen to do the opposite! By staying in doors and slapping on the sun cream we will be making our website lighter and brighter!

3 years after the big makeover (Gandi V1 to Gandi V2), we felt that it was time to brighten up our website. So that's what we did!
This version is not yet Gandi V3, it is more of a transitional stage, which has incorporated only subtle changes here and there - lightening up the graphics and making everything easier to read. Let’s call it Gandi V2.5!
As always, we welcome your comments, criticisms, reactions, large random shipments of candy…
Tuesday 2 June 2009
By Ryan on Tuesday 2 June 2009, 14:53 - Hosting
By Ryan on Tuesday 2 June 2009, 12:43 - Gandi
Thursday 28 May 2009
By Joe on Thursday 28 May 2009, 14:22 - Internet
Would you trust a 'for profit' company to represent your best interests? Perhaps. But when your interests diverge, will they represent you or themselves?
Following the overwhelming success of our first article on the domain name industry (1 comment ;-), we naturally thought you were begging for more! I know, I know registrars and registries can be a bit dull, but it is important. Believe me when something goes wrong with your domain name, understanding this can be quite important. So if we look at how and where issues can be dealt with, and who has influence in the industry it sheds a bit more light on the subject.
Thursday 7 May 2009
By Ryan on Thursday 7 May 2009, 16:38 - Hosting
Friday 24 April 2009
By Joe on Friday 24 April 2009, 12:40 - Gandi
Registry, Registrar, Registrant, (Registratum, Registrata, Registrunt). Ok, so the last 3 are made up words, and the domain name industry wasn't really founded in ancient Rome nor part of your everyday Latin dialect, but what do the first three words actually mean and how does the domain name industry work? We've been working in the industry for years, so we have a pretty good idea. But we can also understand why all this really can just sound like ancient Greek to many people and not mean a thing. So in the spirit of lifting the lid and keeping things honest (as Gandi likes to do), we thought we'd give you a quick overview of what it all means.
Wednesday 8 April 2009
By Ryan on Wednesday 8 April 2009, 14:20 - Gandi
We are pleased to release 3 new improvements this week, .DE domains for
everyone, launch of .RU and live service status directly from Gandi's
homepage:
.DE domains for everyone
We are now able to offer the German extension to everyone! This is done
by setting a local German contact (trustee) as one of your domain
contacts when you purchase a .DE domain. The local contact (a German
lawyer) will automatically become the administrative contact at the
registry on your behalf, though you will of course still own the domain
name, and have administrative rights through Gandi.
Tuesday 7 April 2009
By Wendy on Tuesday 7 April 2009, 18:04 - Gandi
A pulling back of the domain business curtain to reveal a few shady practices undertaken by unnamed sources…
1) Transfer Out Fee. It is essential to read the small print when signing up to a domain registrar. There are all kinds of pitfalls waiting for those who couldn’t be bothered to go through the terms and conditions with sufficient care and attention. For instance, hidden deep in there might be an agreement for a charge to be made to your account as a ‘transfer out’ fee if you want to switch your domain to a different registrar. What’s worse is this fee might be several times the price of your original registration.[|/post/2008/12/04/Dodgy-domain-practices-the-story-contines#comments|en]
Thursday 2 April 2009
By Ryan on Thursday 2 April 2009, 17:09 - Gandi
We are pleased to announce the release of a new feature that you've
been eagerly anticipating for some time now : the ability to increase
the size of your disks!
You will need to perform two steps to do this:
By Joe on Thursday 2 April 2009, 15:12 - Gandi
Wednesday 25 March 2009
By Joe on Wednesday 25 March 2009, 09:45 - Gandi UK
You may remember we recently told you about www.demotix.com, a citizen journalism website and photo agency, which is one of the companies supported by Gandi.
Well they've just won the Guardian newspaper Independent Media Award!! This is a fantastic recognition for demotix who are starting to make inroads to the heavily dominated media industry. More and more of their photos and stories, provided by real people all over the world, are starting to find their way into the traditional press, and this accolade from one of the most respected UK newspapers will do a lot to support this progress.
Well done Demotix!
http://www.demotix.com/news/demotix-wins-media-guardian-award-2009
Thursday 19 March 2009
By Arti on Thursday 19 March 2009, 09:48 - Gandi
After the Sunrise and Landrush phases (underway until March 23rd), .TEL domains will finally be available to everyone as of March 24th.
Online pre-reservation for this final phase is available at Gandi. Registration will be made on a first-come, first-served basis. Registration requests that failed will be fully refunded. The price for a .TEL domain has been set at 14 euros per year excl. VAT under A rates.
Friday 13 March 2009
By Ryan on Friday 13 March 2009, 09:29 - Gandi
At Gandi, our customers are our best advocates.
We do not put out any advertisements, contrary to our competitors, to sell our services. We rely on satisfied customers to be our sales force. Our objective is to concentrate on your satisfaction, not to pay for television ads or armies of sales representatives to recruit new customers.
This policy keeps us focused on quality. This is why we monitor your level of satisfaction carefully and do everything possible to treat you as we would like to be treated ourselves. Put simply, your satisfaction is an essential part of our success and our future. So how do we calculate this index?
Monday 9 March 2009
By Joe on Monday 9 March 2009, 11:18 - Gandi UK
As many of you may know Gandi likes to put its money where its mouth is (not literally, as most coins are actually quite unhygienic, but that's another story). But it does mean that we provide support to other companies that are doing exciting work to provide credible alternatives for customers often in industries with well established monopolies.
So we are very proud to be able to extend this support to Demotix.com who describe themselves as a citizen-journalism website and photo agency. Demotix takes user-generated content and photos from freelance journalists and amateurs and markets them to the mainstream media.
And why are they doing this? Mainly for us. The shocking reduction in generation of 'news' that is currently underway puts us, the readers, in a situation where we know less and less about what is really going on. Today there are only 4 US newspapers with a foreign desk. Even AP and Reuters fail to cover 40% of the world with a single staff member. Publishers are cutting journalism costs to fight the fall in ad revenue, and rely more on newswires for content. This means the available sources of news are being reduced, and ultimately it is us who will suffer.
Demotix believes it can change this. They believe that together we can build news communities and source stories and news from every corner of the globe. We can change the way news is gathered, and we can change what's on the front pages of every newspaper and broadcast worldwide.
The quality of the photos and honesty behind the stories is extraordinary. Have a look for yourself at www.demotix.com and learn a bit more about their vision and philosophy at www.demotix.com/page/about-us.
And if you want to know more about the Gandi Supports projects, then take a look at our site www.gandi.net/supports/ and see what else we're up to. Maybe we can help you too! (though do look at our 'search criteria' we're not a VC fund 
Tuesday 3 March 2009
By Ryan on Tuesday 3 March 2009, 08:54 - SSL
) that means, "go ahead, you are on a secure website".Monday 23 February 2009
By Joe on Monday 23 February 2009, 18:00 - Gandi
So here we are, proud parents of the Gandi hosting infrastructure. Our little baby has now been live (or alive) for 4 months now since the full launch on 1st Oct. Like any new parent everything is possible for our hosting baby, and the future is really exciting. But also like any new parent, there is lots to learn and always things to be done.
Sunday 15 February 2009
By Joe on Sunday 15 February 2009, 21:19 - Internet
We all put a lot of effort into securing the domain names we purchase. It may be creative energy finding the perfect name for your blog in an increasingly crowded landscape; or waiting patiently for your company name to be released back into the wild by someone who's owned it for 5 years but never used it.
Regardless, your domains can be stolen or sniped from right under your nose. We thought we'd take a light hearted look at how to keep your domains safe from potential domain thieves:
Thursday 5 February 2009
By Ryan on Thursday 5 February 2009, 17:04 - Gandi
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