Only a matter of opinion - Can't decide on domain format

[Asia_Expat]

For ages, I've been considering a blog about the city in which I live. I decided to go ahead and will name it after the major English language newspaper here, only addin 'notthe' at the beginning.
However, I can't decide whether to use the full name of an abbreviation of some kind. For example...

www.nottherangoonrag.com

or

www.ntrgr.com

Which would you choose?

(N.B. I do not live in Rangoon... I just randomly chose a city name so I do not self promote).

[jbinbpt]

To me the full name is too long for people to remember, so there is no advantage to it. The advantage of the abbreviation is that it's easier to type and remember.

Buy them both. Redirect. Use the full name at the top of the pages, exaggerating the letters in the abbreviation.

Best of both worlds.

[draggar]

How about something simpler, like

TheCityBlog
TheCityBlogs
CityBlog
CityBlogs
City-Blogs
City-Blog
NamesCityBlog
NamesCityBlogs
MyCityBlog
myCityBlogs

And so on. IMOHO - Domains should be relevant to the site.

[Asia_Expat]

I agree... but there is also valuable branding in a concept. I'm not the first person to think of naming a politically incorrect blog after the city's major newspaper (adding 'notthe' at the start) but it really works IMO. If you can remember the name of the newspaper and it's domain name, you can remember to put 'notthe' at the start.

I wonder if that would actually be easier to remember than the abbreviation, even though the abbreviation is shorter?

[edited by: Asia_Expat at 3:46 pm (utc) on Dec. 24, 2007]

[pageoneresults]

I wonder if that would actually be easier to remember than the abbreviation, even though the abbreviation is shorter?

As stated earlier, definitely get both. You're going to have left side and right side brain people and some will prefer one over the other.

Some abbreviations roll off the tongue just right and are very easy to remember. Others are not. The more characters in the abbreviation, the more difficult to remember. Unless of course it becomes an ACRONYM.

I'd work under the premise of launching under the full domain for many reasons and also take into consideration those who prefer the shorter version and make it so. ;)

The full name is going to give you keyword phrase advantage over the abbreviated version. Think about inbound anchor text.

[buckworks]

valuable branding

By riding on the coattails of someone else's trademarked name? Not recommended.

In addition to legal concerns, it's a better business decision to establish your own unique identity that doesn't depend on anyone else.

If you insist on using the "Not the" concept, consider keeping it in your tagline rather than in the domain itself. That would let you make changes later without losing your own primary branding.

ExampleCityBlog.com

"Not the Example City Rag"

[Asia_Expat]

Well, as I understand it, we're not really allowed to have discussions on the legality of this kind of thing but I have seen others do this without problems. I know that is no guarantee but the fact that you are specifically stating that it is 'not' the Rangoon Rag and that the website is for entertainment purposes only IMO is protection enough (famous last words?)
To my dismay, I discovered that someone is already doing this with the other major daily in my city but their format is not the same as the direction I will take for the daily I have chosen to satirise.