I bought the following two domains last week:
projectwebsite.info
kaijuhost.info
All for the only Php147.00 (USD 3.31) EACH!
I had wanted to put up a clients test website online instead of my localhost but I couldn’t use their domain. So instead I started to shop around for the cheapest possible domain name extension I could find and after some searching I found .info.
I’m pretty pumped up about this one. At only P147.00 for a domain it is an absolute steal! Though there might be other cheaper extension out there unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be a way to find it as several intense Google searches proved futile.
So why do I think .info needs to replace .com as the go – to domain for everyone? Here’s my list:
Reason #1: IT IS CHEAP.
I do not understand why some domains are made expensive. Making something expensive is essentially saying to the buyer two things: a.) do not buy this, and b.) look for other options.
Take for example our own .ph. Looking for other options is EXACTLY what Filipinos do when considering buying our own Philippine country domains .ph, and .com.ph. As of today, a .ph domain costs P2,199.00 (discounted from P3,219.99 from Godaddy, screenshot below):
So tell me, if you were to choose between a .info domain name (P134.00) and a .ph domain name (P2,199.99), and it is not essential to establish if it is in the Philippines or not, which would you choose?
What’s that? Oh, you’ll choose the one that gives you a P2,065.00 savings? Why am I not surprised!
Heck forget .info, just choose between .com (P597.00) and .ph (P2,199.99), a savings of P1,602.00 right there!
But what if it IS essential to you to establish your website has to do with the Philippines, then why not just do what UNIONBANKPH.com did (a major Philippine bank), and attach a ‘ph’ prefix to your domain and still save cash by using a .com. That way visitors to the site realize you are a bank (check!), and you are in the Philippines (check!), without having to buy a ridiculously overpriced domain.
Or why not try using a subdomain instead, similar to what Godaddy does, like this:
or what Paypal does, like this:
Again, you can realize savings while at the same time establishing a relationship with the Philippines.
Or heck, why not just do what inquirer.net did and disregard any association with country altogether? You still save P1740.00 (P2,199 – P459.00). Of course you may ask ‘So what if the Inquirer chose not to use a .ph domain as their main url?’ Well they’re only the country’s MOST READ Newspaper with hundreds of thousands of daily readers all over the world, that’s all!
Reason #2: IT QUICKLY ESTABLISHES THAT IT IS A REPOSITORY OF INFORMATION.
.Info is obviously a shortening of ‘information’, so if you are trying to show that your website has information as most websites do, then this is pretty much what you want to use.
This as opposed to .com, which was originally intended as for domains registered by commercial organizations. This is great if you are a commercial organization, but clearly there are many websites using a .com domain that are NOT, but likely chose it only because it is the most popular.
Reason #3: IT IS AN UNRESTRICTED GENERIC TOP LEVEL DOMAIN.
A Generic Top Level Domain (gTLD), is a domain name that carries no restrictions, meaning there isn’t anything that keeps anyone from using it. Unlike for example, the .coop domain which requires you to submit proof you are a cooperative, anyone is pretty much allowed to do whatever they wish with .info.
While that can be said of others (.com, .net, etc.), .info was not designed to do anything but indicate it has information, it is probably the most generic of all generic TLDs.
I recognize this appears to have turned out to be a rant against .ph at the middle section of this article. Unfortunately that is what happens every time I talk about .ph. The fact it is one of the most expensive domains out there baffles the mind.
Unfortunately the .ph registrar is a private enterprise and as such is free to price the domain any which way they want, and they have been doing so for more than a decade now. Guys like me can rant all they want and it won’t change a thing. They want it that way and that’s it.
What we can do however is use other options, and with the advent of newer CHEAPER more reasonably priced domain extensions out there, we are spoiled for choice.
Which is how the internet should be, imho. We should have choice. The choice not to have to spend an idiotic sum of cash for what is essentially the same thing. A choice that I think, will eventually make unreasonable domain registrars who don’t understand that making their product cheaper so more people (and themselves) can benefit from it, suffer in the long run.
