May. 06, 2002 PT


Last autumn, when registrars introduced the first new top-level domains in 15 years, no one expected suffixes like dot-biz and dot-info to prove any real match for the all-pervasive dot-com. 

Dot-com, after all, has long been the chosen suffix of nearly all the most-visited sites on the Internet. Heck, it even had a stock market bubble named after it, not to mention an entire subspecies of human, the dot-commer. Add in the fact that many folks got burned speculating on dot-com domains, and it seemed logical that new suffixes would be poised for a slow takeoff. 

Seven months after the debut of the first new domains, such predictions have largely proven correct. 

Although registrants have claimed more than 1 million dot-biz and dot-info addresses in the last several months, only a small portion of registered sites in those top-level domains actually contain content. Of those, few have drawn heavy traffic. 

"We do see the new domains out there, but the heavy driver is still the dot-com name," said Carolyn Clark, media analyst at the measurement firm NetRatings. 

As for sites in the new domains, NetRatings says the most visited address –- Indiansex.biz -– ranked just 2,134 among all URLs for home surfers in the month of March. A visit to the site indicated that it was probably the barrage of pop-up porn banner ads, rather than compelling content, that boosted traffic numbers. 

More at: http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,52274,00.html