
Google Announces .new Domain Availability - paulbaumgart
https://whats.new/
======
Cogito
So the stated use case is for 'performing new actions online: any act that
leads to creation can have a quick and memorable .new shortcut associated with
it.'

So it's expecting users to go to a different website to perform one specific
action, and then return to the original website?

If I'm on github.com, click the new repo button, and get redirected to
'repo.new' I'm assuming the website has been hacked.

If I want to create a new repo on github the last thing I'm going to think is
'oh yeah, I'll just type repo.new and that will be super easy' \- I'll go to
github.com and click the new repo button.

I just have no idea why anyone would use a whole .new domain to achieve the
stated purpose!

~~~
reaperducer
_I just have no idea why anyone would use a whole .new domain to achieve the
stated purpose!_

Domain squatting is _so_ last decade. The 20's are going to be all about
corporate TLD squatting.

~~~
keeganpoppen
google's already got a pretty good head start, too...

------
laurent123456
> That means that all .new domains registrations must: ...

I don't get why anyone would want this over a regular domain with which they
can do whatever they want with no restrictions.

It's just another way for Google to control and have a say over other people's
businesses. For sure we'll see again posts about people having had their
product destroyed because Google cut them off with no way to appeal.

~~~
Already__Taken
This is pretty normal, all registras have usage restrictions. Most are poorly
enforced but googles reqs seem pretty reasonable, The problem with all
registers is you have very little recourse.

I quite like gsuite but if your only domain is bought as a google TLD on
google domains with your gsuite account via google pay with google voice
contact details and gmail contacts. God help you.

~~~
tobltobs
> all registras have usage restrictions.

Sure, but I never saw anything as ambiguous as:

* Be used for action generation or online content creation;

* Take the user directly into the action generation or content creation flow;

* Allow Google Registry to verify compliance at no cost.

That some AI script with a failure quote of ~2% will verify your compliance
wont help also.

And the only way to get some human support in those cases is when you manage
to get on page 1 of HN with your "crying for help" tweet.

~~~
Double_a_92
That still seems pretty reasonable. They want ".new" to be seen and used as an
interaction element, not as a random TLD. E.g. if twitter would get one,
twitter.new would bring you somewhere where you could directly start typing a
new tweet.

~~~
eloisant
Well, good luck when your app gets flag by their bot, broken because the .new
no longer works, and you can't get a hold of Google to remove you from their
blacklist.

Just read all the horror stories about apps on Google Play.

~~~
Double_a_92
Well that would be a different issue... But their requirements / vision for
the .new domain are not unreasonable or ill-intentioned.

~~~
tobltobs
Well intention doesn't help you if the execution sucks.

------
appleshore
The only super useful version of this idea is a privacy law that requires
services that collect data to offer a “facebook.delete” link to temporarily
and permanently remove personal data.

~~~
profmonocle
I'm not keen on legally mandating the use of a particular domain extension,
unless that extension is managed by a non-profit. Some of the newly-added TLDs
have exorbitant annual fees, and if businesses were legally required to use
them they could charge whatever they pleased.

Plus, you'd have a collision problem. What if one company has foobar.com and
another has foobar.net, and they both collect data? (Imagine they're in
completely different industries and the term itself is fairly generic, so
there's no possibility of a trademark dispute.) They can't both get the
".delete" version of their second-level label.

(I realize I'm probably overthinking this.)

~~~
CydeWeys
You'd have to create the real TLDs as SLDs on .delete, and then the way to
make a .delete domain would simply be to append .delete to the existing FQDN.

So you'd thus have foobar.com.delete and foobar.net.delete, no collisions.

Not saying it's great, but it'd work.

~~~
DrKabab
Instead you could just have delete.foobar.com and delete.foobar.net instead,
wouldn't need buying a new pricy domain name...

------
tristanperry
So Google are doing their best to 'kill off' URLs in Chrome and Search, but
are simultaneously launching a new gTLD with rules that dictate exactly what
URLs under .new should use?

This seems like a case of 'the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is
doing'.

------
waiseristy
I'm still of the opinion that tld's are a complete scam. There should be a
flat rate across all of them. Google and Donuts are a drain on the internet
infrastructure.

------
joelennon
I like the concept behind this but I think the implementation is flawed as it
binds the actions to specific providers. For example - repo.new only creates
repos on GitHub, playlist.new only creates playlists on Spotify and the
music.new thing for OVO Sound is just odd, being specific to a custom cover
art generator thing.

For me, the better implementation would be where for each "action" there are
numerous providers and at a user level you could define which one you want to
use. So user A goes to repo.new and gets redirected to GitHub, user B goes to
GitLab, user C to Bitbucket and so on. The first time you go to the action
you're prompted to select which service you want to use by default and from
then on you go straight through.

~~~
Prawnz
I think you might have wires crossed, .new is a domain. So if github buy
repo.new then they can host on it. Good names are first come, first served

If Pizzahut bought pizza.new they could host a webservice on there provided
the webservice resulted in something new.

~~~
joelennon
Yeah I get that, but rather than Google opening it up for open registration
and having the usual domain land grab, they could have created domains for
each action and allow service providers to register intents in their services
for each action. It's going to make discovery of actions much harder if there
are different actions for different providers. It will also mean the
usefulness of the pattern will be limited based on the services I choose to
use.

In your example - if I prefer Domino's to Pizza Hut, what do I go to? I need
to go to pizza.new to discover that it's linked to Pizza Hut and then try to
figure out what Domino's action might be. In the end I'll just end up going to
the main site instead. I think the value of this concept is completely
nullified by binding the actions/domains to specific providers.

~~~
growt
They could have used subdomains:

dominos could register dominos.pizza.new and pizzahut could register
hut.pizza.new

pizza.new could then list and search through all the registered subdomains
(and would be hosted by google).

~~~
wolco
Typing: dominos.pizza.new / login and select last order / reorder

vs typing dominos / click the link / login and select last order / reorder.

------
kristiandupont
I use a .io domain and I get why .com isn't sufficient, but I really fail to
see the value that this, along with most of the other cute new tld's, bring to
the world.

More than anything, I fear that it will teach my parents that domains can look
like anything, so that link in the email is probably fine.

~~~
ownagefool
It's pretty much a fix for squatting.

You get a fair bit of defense for it around here, but ultimatly it's just rent
seeking. Keeping younger generations out from having decent name just because
you arrived earlier doesn't really promote a healthy web, nor provide real
economic value.

Of course, most squatters would respond "I was planning on using that domain",
so it's easier politically to just flood us with new ones.

My company name is squatted on several tlds ( by different people, obviously
no intention to use them ). The .com owner wanted to charge me $40,000 or
$1000 p/m. Fuck that. I used an alt tld.

------
grenoire
There's a requirements list, by the way:

"That means that all .new domains registrations must:

\- Be used for action generation or online content creation;

\- Take the user directly into the action generation or content creation flow;

\- Resolve to the action within 100 days of registration;* and

\- Allow Google Registry to verify compliance at no cost."

~~~
mustntmumble
I'm wondering how that would work for an online shop. Lets say I went to
amazon.new - what should I expect to see?

Maybe a new empty shopping cart?

Or a list of new products that have just been added to the store?

I think new products would be most intuitive for a shop.new domain...

~~~
wolco
The only limited use is sharing content. facebook/new would go to a share
page. Twitter. Reddit.

Pointless but I guess they are trying to justify the cost of .new

------
sdan
Been using [https://docs.new](https://docs.new) for the past 2-3 months.

It's absolutely game-changing as I'm writing a bunch of stories and need to
iterate fast and recompile my thoughts just by typing in 8 characters.

~~~
jiveturkey
huh. the sunrise period has only been 2 weeks so far. how did this exist for
2-3 months? that's unfair.

~~~
CydeWeys
"The Qualified Launch Program (QLP) Addendum is available for new gTLD
registry operators as of today. The QLP Addendum allows a registry operator to
register up to 100 domain names to third parties prior to the Sunrise Period
for purposes of promoting the TLD, under certain conditions."

[https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/announcements-and-
media/announ...](https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/announcements-and-
media/announcement-10apr14-en)

------
ocdtrekkie
It's so unfortunate that an idea like this is completely spoiled by who gets
what term going to the highest bidder instead of to the services you
personally use.

docs.new doesn't do me any good if I use a competing product to Google Docs.
Similarly, I might want to use playlist.new without Spotify.

Sure, these are just domains, but it really sours this weird use of this tld
as a "way to do things" that it's set to specific companies' services.

------
wdfx
The registration site had better be at Https://new.new

~~~
jedimastert
That domain appears to not be registered

------
hn_throwaway_99
So Google wants to get into the "AOL keywords" business. Just like bell-
bottoms, everything comes around again after 20ish years.

------
twodave
It's like they're trying to turn the address bar into a terminal. I really
don't get it.

~~~
shpx
The address bar is a thousand times cooler than my terminal because it
understands English and does package management automatically, often in under
a second.

I just wish it could convert files.

------
londons_explore
This certainly rings bells of AOL keywords...

[http://repo.new/](http://repo.new/) goes to github... sorry gitlab - you lose
this round.

------
JMTQp8lwXL
$452 per year on Gandi (I queried two-letter names up to a dozen; they were
all the same price). I get there is some cost to enforcing the intent of the
TLD, but that seems rather high to query a domain and check. It should take
all but a few minutes.

------
EGreg
Wouldn’t it be so much better if domains were specified the other way?

new.github.repo

It makes more sense and sounds better in most languages too

Although from the point of view of HTTP we already have verbs for that. It
should really be

POST github/repo

Or maybe in user friendly display:

new github/repo

I guess maybe usa.github and in.github can be different domains because
different organizations may have same name in diff countries

Treating a TLD as a verb is just silly. It comes at the end of the sentence...

Also it encourages stuff like repo.new to be owned by only one company -
github - but what about atlassian butbucket etc?

Better to just have decreasing specificity. Like you have after the slash!

~~~
CydeWeys
"Treating a TLD as a verb is just silly. It comes at the end of the
sentence..."

Yes, ending a sentence in English with a verb is definitely something that you
never do. Can you imagine how ridiculous that'd be?!

~~~
EGreg
You should read Mark Twain’s essay about the “terrible German language”.

Fine — it’s not a verb, it’s an adjective after a noun.

------
joshstrange
This seems rather... useless. I've bought a few tld's mainly in just a land-
grab/cover-my-bases fashion but by and large they are all useless. Every bit
of traffic is coming from HN/Twitter/FB/Google. The direct traffic is low
enough that it's probably coming from either me. It doesn't matter if I have
an .co/.io/.com/.dev they are all the same at the end of the day.

These new TLD's strike me as just a money grab before some people realize a
domain name matters FAR less than most people thing.

Maybe I'm just not the target audience but I don't ever see myself typing
"gist.new" into my address bar. Anyone who knows what a gist is is going to go
to github and if you don't know what a gist is then you aren't going to know
to type "gist.new" into the address bar.

~~~
ben509
The new TLDs are very much selling as a branding thing. How business owners
value marketing and branding is very hard to understand.

On a practical note, if you are gunning for a promotion, setting up
"widget.new" would make for a cool demo for management.

------
cyborgx7
Google is trying to be the central authority on what the central authority to
do a thing is. Probably a good business move but it creeps me out.

------
g105b
Since when is an arbitrary cross-origin domain name a valid user interface
choice?

From a security standpoint, using the _path_ of a trusted domain is still a
thousand times more secure and convenient, rather than navigating to another
arbitrary domain name with no validation of whether it is affiliated with the
domain where you've come from.

If Google push this sort of mechanism, it's opening up a whole load of fraud
capabilities! If I'm on gmail and receive a phishing attack email, tricking me
into navigating to "gmail.new" which asks for my google password, should I
type it into the box? There is a green padlock in the URL so it must be fine.

------
frumiousirc
On FF+uMatrix, a popup that won't go away shows this "exciting" message:

    
    
        [[domainSearchCtrl.getMessage('How exciting! {domain} is available.')]] 
    
    

I think I'll not whitelist anything.

------
fragmede
As mentioned on the linked page, [http://docs.new](http://docs.new),
[http://sheets.new](http://sheets.new), and
[http://slides.new](http://slides.new) exist as shortcuts to get to a new
google doc, but it doesn't play well with Chrome's address bar - using them
makes getting to existing docs and sheets take an extra step. Not the worst,
but still, kind of annoying.

~~~
tpmx
If you have a both a personal gmail account and a for-work "google for
business" account - the shortcut will take you to whatever account you signed
into _first_.

If you attempt to switch to a different account after accessing
[https://docs.new/](https://docs.new/), that will trigger an "ask for
permission to access document" dialog.

Not awesome.

(AFAIK, the only way to fix this is to sign out and then log back in, in the
"correct" order.)

(This is on a Windows desktop running Chrome.)

~~~
jianglai
You can try docs.new/1 and docs.new/2.

~~~
tpmx
Nice!

I do understand why you didn't advertise that on the web site.

This problem is a common theme amongst all of the Google properties. (I run
into it so much in the GCP console, too.) I would really like an explicit
option to select the "default" or "primary" account, in that top-right user
dropdown.

------
kanox
I'm looking forward to .old

~~~
yoloClin
I'm really sad that registering clin.sucks would cost me $250USD or whatever.
The intent of the TLD seller is to hold companies to ransom (buy
yourcompany.sucks, or someone that hates you will).

I'd kill clin.sucks as a mail domain.

~~~
JMTQp8lwXL
Even without the TLD, someone could register a multitude of other names, e.g.,
brandsucks.com. Or brandreallysucks.com. You couldn't buy all of them.

~~~
yoloClin
Yeah, but apple.sucks is far more iconic than applesucks.com. I'm sure
companies as large as Apple would have purchased both, and other variations as
a defensive move.

I can't think of any other justification for .sucks to charge as much as they
do for registration other than to ransom large companies.

TLDs are a complete wasteland any way you look at them.

com.au domains (owned by AUDA) at have a policy against squatting but it's
reactive, toothless, time consuming and painful. On releasing a squatted
domain, it's flagged as being a squatted domain (rather than expired) and AUDA
approved registrars such as drop.com.au host blind auction domains, with the
highest bin winning. Meaning you're either paying more than you need for a
resource that should cost $15AUD to fight off real or imaginary squatters who
will offer you the domain at a highly inflated cost. If you lose the auction
any money you bid ends up as non-refundable credit within Drop.com.au
ecosystem. I'm still unsure if it's good intentions gone bad, or just
blatantly corrupt.

/rant

------
tadasv
Why do we need this?

~~~
derefr
Why would TLDs need to be created based on need? What’s wrong with a company
making a TLD as a whimsical cute idea (and still expecting to be profitable
doing so, because whimsical people will go along with it)?

~~~
tadasv
I'm not necessarily talking about the TLD. This is more like a "service"
that's controlled by google and certain rules are enforced to those who hold
the domain.

This makes very little sense to me. I get that it's nice to have a short
domain that points to some action. But why do you need a completely separate
namespace for this?

------
anoncake
This is awful. Google Docs is _a_ place where you can create a new document,
not _the_ place. Same for Spotify etc.

Giving the .new domain to the dominant company just makes it harder for
everyone else to compete with them. Which is probably the point.

------
AdrienLemaire
I'm a bit confused. Are these domains only usable as web redirects? Or is it
just that the examples shown are used as such, but we can use the domain as
any other one? I wonder how having multiple entries to the same page will
affect page ranking.

Looking up gist.new, I wonder why there are 2 requests done:

307 Internal Redirect

301 Moved Permanently

Before getting the 200 request to
[https://gist.github.com/](https://gist.github.com/).

~~~
nullify88
Due to HSTS (It maybe preloaded in your browser), the browser internally
redirects [http://gist.new](http://gist.new) to
[https://gist.new](https://gist.new). And then receives a 301 from the web
server (which is cacheable) to redirect you to your final destination.

Edit: It is
([https://hstspreload.org/?domain=gist.new](https://hstspreload.org/?domain=gist.new))

~~~
philsnow
AFAIK google is doing this (HSTS preloading the entire gTLD) for many gTLDs
they own, including .app

~~~
edoceo
And .dev

------
zekrioca
How can they own and control the registration and dictate its policy for this
new domain (pun somehow intended)? Will it ever be available to other
providers to sell this domain with perhaps different rules?

~~~
tristanperry
Google bid for the gTLD
([https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/](https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/)) and won it
([https://icannwiki.org/.new](https://icannwiki.org/.new)), so they have full
control over it.

------
jiveturkey
searchengine.new

------
kennydude
I really hate how they want generic domains, like doc.new instead of
googledoc.new :(

Also the price seems a bit high for a TLD :G

------
iainmerrick
eBay gets “sell.new”? RunKit gets “api.new”?

This is awful.

------
gpas
Who decided that, for example, music.new goes to OVO and not itunes? Was there
an auction?

------
azr79
Ok what's the value in this?

~~~
techslave
diversifying google’s revenue

------
benawad
I'm sure Amazon's not happy they gave shop.new to eBay.

~~~
thekyle
I seriously doubt anyone at Amazon cares.

------
omarhaneef
Am I the only one who looks at new TLDs and immediately starts thinking of
puns you can use in the URL?

re.new k.new si.new

Not much there. I guess you can use phrases:

outwiththeoldinwiththe.new

There is just a lot more possibility with Google's "app" TLD.

------
brian_herman
I typed word.new and I got a cert error. Use at your own risk.

~~~
JMTQp8lwXL
That certificate is for *.oneroute.microsoft.com. It appears that Microsoft is
in control of the domain. It just isn't configured properly.

------
dannynice
tld.new

------
OrgNet
lets just go back to IP addresses at this point

~~~
journalctl
Nothing’s stopping you, perhaps besides certificate problems.

------
arthurcolle
This is unnecessary. .api would be more useful.

~~~
moondev
how about [https://api.new](https://api.new)

