A new Reuters article focused on a survey which concluded that most businesses don’t know about new gTLDs. The research, which only surveyed 100 business, and was sponsored by registrar Gandi.net doesn’t really lend itself to a whole lot of credibility.  The firm of Future Laboratory conducted the survey and comes to many conclusions based on the small bits of information they gathered.

We have no doubts about the conclusion that many small corporations have little knowledge of the possibility to own their domain name extension, we would venture to guess all except the global corporations really care about this prospect.  Most global brands have a team of IP lawyers and marketing directors who are likely aware of the issues and have made plans accordingly.  In fact some of these global brands are participating in changing domain name policy as part of the IRT team(pdf), are concerned with trademark issues with the new TLDs and have put up a stink about new TLD roll-outs.  If brands don’t know about the new TLDs why are they fighting them and trying to change the policies ?

Tom Savigar of Future Laboratory also concludes “(Owning their domain) could secure a higher level of credibility and recognition.”  Really a new domain is going to give global brands credibility and recognition that they don’t already have ?  A brand is a brand because it already has credibility and recognition. No domain name necessary.

Registrars obviously benefit from corporations who would want to protect their trademarks and would need to register multiple domains in all of the new extensions, so it is no big surprise to see some of these conclusions reached from “research” that does nothing to lead you to those conclusions. We would like to hear from a global corporation directly and see what they have to say about the new TLD prospects. . .of course after they review the expenses of running a new TLD and talk to their attorneys about the potential liablities.

ICANN was put on the ropes at the recent Congressional hearings and we’ve already seen ICANN consultants pushing forward the new TLD agenda. This article and “research” sure seems to wreak of a similar exercise of spin to push forward the idea that new TLDs are a good thing.

Filed under: Domain Name News