Google

Google is the operator of the .New domain name registry (Nic.new). Yesterday morning, the company’s Google Docs Twitter account shared how the company will be using a handful of its .New domain names:

Introducing a ✨ .new ✨ time-saving trick for users. Type any of these .new domains to instantly create Docs, Sheets, Slides, Sites or Forms ↓ pic.twitter.com/erMTHOsdyH

— Google Docs (@googledocs) October 25, 2018

If you visit Docs.new, Sheets.new, Slides.new, Sites.new, or Forms.new, you can see a live example of how these domain names are being used.

Any time a company like Google promotes its new gTLD domain names, I think it’s a pretty big deal. Awareness is one of the most important factors in the life of the new gTLD domain names.

This is a neat shortcut, and it is neat to see Google using and promoting one of its off-brand new domain name extensions. It should also be beneficial to companies with a vested interest in the new domain extensions because more people will see and experience the new extensions.

That being said,

Google has repeatedly stated that new gTLD domain names do not receive any type of boost over .com domain names or domain names with other extensions. In a 2016 Google Hangout that Barry Schwartz hosted with Google’s John Mueller, it was stated that the keywords in the new domain extensions do not count for ranking purposes (Google supposedly ignores them).

Despite Google’s repeated reminders of this, people still seem to speculate that the opposite could be true, and that the new gTLD extensions could have a positive impact in search.

Google recently launched the .App domain name extension to much fanfare. As of yesterday, the company has sold over 210,000 .App domain names, as reported by Google engineer Ben McIlwain on Twitter last night. Without a doubt, this is one of the most successful launches for a new domain name extension.

Since the launch, I have seen

The .App extension is off to a fast start, booking over 100,000 registrations in just a few days. I tried to pre-register a few domain names for the standard fee at GoDaddy, and I ended up with none. It looks like all of the names I was interested in buying were bought by others prior to them becoming available in the General Availability phase.

I don’t think I will be attempting to register any other .App domain names. Based on some experiences negotiating with people who operate apps, I don’t think there is going to be a big appetite to buy domain names at a premium price,. Of course, I could be wrong, but I am not going to spend the time to try and find available .App domain names when I see limited upside.

I am sure there will be some people who

Yesterday, I mentioned the Google I/O session about .App domain names. Google is the operator of the .App registry, and the company is holding a session at its developer conference to discuss its newly released .App domain names. The session takes place today at 4pm PDT (7pm EDT).

Heres a livestream of stage 6:

Google will host its annual developer conference, I/O, from May 8th – 10th in Mountain View, California. Domain names do not generally play any role in the I/O developer conference, but Google is going to be giving some attention to a new extension in one of the sessions.

On May 8th (tomorrow) from 4pm – 5pm, Google will be hosting a session called Introducing .app domain names, and how to secure them. The event will be hosted by Google employees Ben McIlwain and Adrienne Porter Felt. Here’s how the session is described:

“.app, the web’s first secure-only open top-level domain (TLD) for mobile apps and developers, is launching on May 8. This in-depth technical talk covers use cases for .app domain names, HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS), best practices for secure website development, and the unique security benefits of .app domains thanks to TLD-wide HSTS.”

As you may know,