By Daniel L. Rogna
In a major corporate overhaul, Google has subordinated itself to a new parent company named Alphabet, which is using a new generic top-level domain (gTLD) name as its landing page: ABC.XYZ.
By adopting a .XYZ domain name, Google is creatively referencing the name Alphabet and simultaneously highlighting the new gTLD program. Although this approach may have been necessitated because www.alphabet.com is taken (it’s owned by BMW and has been down since the announcement Monday, likely due to a flood of traffic), Google had other options. Google has a stake in promoting the new gTLD program as a registry operator of several generic and branded new TLDs, but interestingly it is not the operator of the .XYZ domain.
Google’s registration of ABC.XYZ may help legitimize the .XYZ registry, which has been the subject of questionable registration practices and a number of URS complaints.
Furthermore, Google’s registration in a non-Google domain is a tacit approval of the new gTLD program as a whole, and could trigger the development of that space by other forward-thinking brands.
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To learn more about the new gTLDs, and see another example of the use of the .XYZ domain, read Daniel’s previous blog: “New gTLDs in Action (and Comedy).”
[This post originally appeared on the Partridge & Garcia Blog.]
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