.XXX - simply a bad idea
The concept of a .XXX TLD is simply a bad idea. The only thing that can be seen as a positive about it is the fact that the company managing the TLD will make money. As that is not a public good, it's not really a positive note for the creation of a new TLD. It has been said by some that more TLDs are needed to even the playing field when it comes to domain names, that all the good ones are taken. If this was truly the case, then there would not be TLDs that have been created and gone virtually unused. The ability to get a 'good domain name' in something other than a .COM or .NET will become a non-issue when browsers work differently. In the end, a 'good domain name' really does not mean much. Amazon, GoDaddy, Google and how many other companies came up with domain names that seemed to have nothing to do with anything. If the domain name was what made a domain a success, then likely there would be more use of other TLDs that have largely failed like .NAME and .INFO to name only two. Marketing makes the domain name successful. Marketing is what makes each domain name useful by establishing a brand. It's the concept of a brand that is the only thing that might make a .XXX TLD actually sell any domain names. Many companies in the adult realm will want to protect their brand by registering a .XXX version of their domain name. They won't do this necessarily because they want to, they will do so because they feel the have to in an effort to protect their established brand. If this happens, bring in the lawyers as there will be many legal battles. Let's not forget the argument that .XXX will pool all the adult sites so it will be easy for parents to 'protect the kids'. Wrong again. Use of a specific TLD is a voluntary item. Nobody can be forced to use a specific TLD. Now, there are TLDs that can only be used by specific organizations such as .EDU, .GOV and a few others, but when it comes to the concept of a public TLD, the intent has always been to use the one that makes the most sense for the intent of the domain being created. Even this has had it's problems as cities and state agencies around the USA have used .COM and .NET just because they could, causing at least some amount of confusion. I would wager that this same type of confusion exists in other countries using country specific TLDs Being both a parent and a webmaster, I see no good coming from the concept of a .XXX TLD. It has been proven time and again that there are plenty of current filtering products available to protect children from adult content. Even if filtering solutions were inadequate, this is still not the way to accomplish a goal of protecting children. There are thousands of sites out there that are not considered ‘adult’ that as a parent, I don’t want my kids to have access to. If a .XXX TLD is to be created, then it had better be followed by a .KKK, .NEONAZI or simply a .CONTROVERSIAL… but then… again, how would it be determined what types of sites should use these and who would willing self select to use them? For that matter, collegehumor.com has a great deal of content that I don’t want my kids exposed to, yet it’s unlikely to be classified as an ‘adult site’. This is why I use filters on my children’s computers. The other true problem with the concept of a .XXX TLD is that non-technical parents could be given a false sense of security that their children are suddenly safe if it were created. Nothing could be further from the truth. Since it’s completely voluntary by nature, no website would actually have to use it. Even if it were somehow made compulsory at some future date, again, there is a whole lot more on the Internet than ‘adult content’ that parents would prefer their children not come in contact with. If the intent is truly to ‘protect the children’, then the single new TLD concept that could have an impact is a .KID TLD. This would also create a fresh start for companies that have a strong interest in serving the massive population of children in the world rather than companies that would begrudgingly register their companies in another TLD. Somehow, this seems to be of no interest as it’s unlikely that anybody would be able to charge ten times the amount for a domain registration as is the case with the proposed .XXX. Because of the limited amount of revenue potential from domain registrations, and the added overhead that may be incurred from actually having to control what domains would be eligible for a .KID site, it could be that this solution might not be the right business model to actually ‘protect the children’. If it’s not obvious by now, I feel that a .XXX TLD should be voted down for a final time. A single companies profits should have no bearing on the future of a global resource. Yours truly, Student4ever Aka: Brent |