NetNames and .eu domains

[lloyd]

Firstly will .eu domains take off. IMO I'm not sure. I can only see people taking them up if you have missed out on the .com or .co.uk domains.

Secondly will the Googles of this world treat them like .co.uk on Google UK or more like .com?

[jmccormac]

Google and the other large non-European search engines will probably apply the same braindead website IP>country sifting that they use on .com and .net gTLDS.

The .eu may well take off in countries where there is a heavily regulated and or highly priced cctld (.ie in Ireland and .es in Spain etc). Though I think that .uk might be somewhat spoilt for choice and .eu may not make much of an dent in the market in the first year of operation. Remember that .uk is still a very strong brand. And it is cheap enough to compete with .com for the bulk of the advertising business. However since both .co.uk and .com are effectively unregulated, the utilisation (domains active and in use) for both is probably in the region of 60 to 70%.

Regards...jmcc