
Is having a '.name' email address a good idea? - arxanas
http://waleedkhan.name/blog/dot-name-email-address/
======
folz
I used to run a minecraft server for my friends on $NAME.com and still own the
domain. There's apparently a construction company also called $NAME, and they
own $NAME.net. $NAME.net is on all their branding, emails, contact info. As
far as I know, they've never used $NAME.com.

I routinely get email meant for them sent to to $NAME.com, sometimes including
personal information, and sometimes from employees at the company. I guess
their clients assume that businesses always own the dot-com for their name and
don't think to verify the actual address (I'm not sure why the employees don't
know their own email addresses).

Because of that experience, I try to own the dot-com for any project I start.

~~~
Spooky23
I have a common first initial last name gmail address and similar lastname.com
domain addresses.

The mail I get is astounding. I've received:

\- A word document containing most of somebody's online passwords, including
work passwords and the vpn client for the persons work.

\- multi-angle Video of an accident investigation involving a bus flipping
over a highway medium

\- a series of swimsuit modeling and sexy emails from some lady to her
boyfriend, followed by angry emails about his lack of attention

\- football and soccer pools

\- emails from some guy who test drives various luxury cars every 3-4 months

\- legal papers from various people

\- fan mail to a niche celebrity

~~~
PakG1
I have a first.last@gmail.com email address. At first, I was super annoyed
that I kept getting emails meant for firstlast@gmail.com and was upset that
Google kept sending those emails to me. But as I later understood that Gmail
is simply trying to avoid creation of multiple email accounts that are too
similar, I realized something else. People are just ignorant and stupid. It's
not Google's fault if those people don't know the correct email address of the
person that they're trying to contact.

So people will continue to email the wrong person, and I will continue to
receive those emails. Although I don't know why nobody ever emails
first.last@gmail.com as the wrong email. It's always firstlast@gmail.com. But
whatever.

Because of people's ignorance and stupidity, I am changing my email address to
a custom domain hosted by fastmail.com. It's just worth it in the end. Besides
that, I'm currently living in China, and Fastmail is accessible here without
VPN, while Gmail isn't. So two birds with one stone.

But it was not wanting to deal with ignorant and stupid people that was the
driver for this move. The number of such wrongly directed emails seem to be
increasing. Grr.

~~~
tga
FYI, Gmail ignores dots before @.

first.last@gmail.com, firstlast@gmail.com, and f.i.r.s.t.l.a.s.t@gmail.com are
all the same address.

~~~
PakG1
Yes, I know. :)

------
shabbyrobe
I used to have all kinds of trouble communicating my personal email. My
solution was to get the shortest unpronounceable domain name I could manage,
paying as much attention as I could to visually unambiguous characters (though
this was frustrated considerably by availability), and hooking it up to a
catch-all domain mailbox. If I'm going to have to spell it anyway, why not
make it as easy as possible? It makes it less cumbersome to use the NATO
alphabet too, which I establish by starting with "b for bravo". Yes, this was
a reaction to getting a few emails to "bravo@..."!

I had to go with the .net TLD, but .net is WAY less confusing to people than
my old .org. This process has not needed refinement for years.

------
legohead
I was following the .family domain, set up a calendar date for the public
release, etc.

Ended up learning a lot about these new private TLDs. They are controlled by a
company, essentially, who can sell them for whatever they want and even raise
prices on specific domains. ie. you can buy randomblah.family for the default
$30, but for smith.family you're going to have to pay $5000 or whatever they
set it at. My family name was set at $1300/year.

I emailed the holders of the TLD and complained to them, seeing as it's not my
fault I was born with a semi-common last name. Eventually, after the domain
didn't sell, they emailed me offering to sell it at a one-time $1300 price but
the renewal would be $30/year, forever. Not bad, but I'm still not paying
$1300. So I'm sticking with the crappy domain I currently have.

------
petercooper
I find even having a _.org_ email address to be a pain when stores/customer
service/similar ask for it. They're expecting a .com or .co.uk on the end, I
find, and I have to clarify what I said was right. Tempted to get a separate
"easier" address to forward on :-)

~~~
justinlardinois
Hell, even using an email address that's not a popular webmail host tends to
throw people off. Mine is me@justinlardinois.com; I can't tell you how many
times I've confused call center operators with it. I even had one think I
meant justinlardinois@me.com.

~~~
Normal_gaussian
I run with the pattern 'iam@<my domain>'

This works well for everything except my personal domain. My first name is
Eoin, pronounced like Ian. Several people have tried to correct the words I
just explicitly spelled out to them. I've resorted to having people spell that
one back.

~~~
notatoad
Using iam@domain when your name sounds like Ian seems like it's just asking
for confusion.

~~~
Normal_gaussian
Absolutely.

It was a naming scheme I adopted on other domains first and, being used to ian
spelled my way, didn't notice as quickly as I should have.

It's relatively low traffic and has a catch all however, so more just trivia
at this point.

------
edent
Ha! You think that's bad, you should try having a Chinese domain name.

None of the major webmail platforms would even acknowledge that it was a valid
email address [https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/01/poor-idn-support-from-
major...](https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/01/poor-idn-support-from-major-
webmail-providers/)

That was 2 years ago, time for an update!

------
cstrat
After reading this thread on HN
([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12247401](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12247401))
I made the move away from gmail to fastmail with my own TLD.

I used a `.me` TLD. I love it. Works great and haven't been confused yet.
Still trying to work out what to host on the domain other than my mail...
maybe a resume or something.

~~~
arxanas
I host a résumé (and most recently, a blog). I used to be pretty discoverable
on Google by linking my StackOverflow, LinkedIn, Github, and website together,
which seemed to have worked well. I think it was something like three of my
links in the top five results, although I don't remember.

(Then another Waleed Khan made the news and I'm still struggling to regain my
search result spots.)

------
richard_todd
I gave up my .name domain a few years ago, primarily because people didn't
understand it. I was wondering if the recent explosion of TLDs might help
everyone collectively realize that there's more than '.com', but it doesn't
seem to be happening yet.

------
flashman
I owned internets.computer for a year, then the novelty wore off. It was a
tongue-in-cheek parody of branding and new TLDs, and great for catching
certain tech-savvy people's attention, but ultimately not worth the several-
times multiplier of a regular domain name.

------
akkartik
I use a .name domain, but redirect .com to it. I also ended up using the .com
for my MX record after experiences similar to those outlined in OP. This
approach seems like the best of both worlds.

------
hundchenkatze
I have $lastname.co and used $first@$lastname.co for a while... I should have
known better. Obviously people would end up sending it to $lastname.com,
because they thought it was a typo or I've even seen people just add the 'm'
from muscle memory. Then I bought $lastname.xyz, and people just think I'm
giving them a completely fake email.

~~~
omginternets
Have you tried $lastname.sexy?

------
valine
I tried using $NAME.co, but everyone seemed to think it was a typo. I Recently
switched over to $NAME.io and haven't had any issues. It's short, looks nice,
and I've had generally positive reactions to it.

------
ilikejam
I've had a .name email address since the TLD was released. Never had any
problems with validators.

'Name' is a surprisingly easy word to mis-hear over the phone if it's not
expected, though.

~~~
vidarh
We definitively had problems with validators early on (I co-founded the
company that pivoted into the .name registry; not been involved in it for over
a decade - and it was sold to Verisign years ago), but we spent a lot of time
harassing site owners with stupid validation, so most of the high profile ones
were fixed very quickly. It helped that there were a number of other longer
TLD's launched at the same time, like .info (there were a few that used lists
of valid TLDs, as well, but mostly people just assumed the TLD couldn't be
longer than three characters).

".name" was a pivot from offering an e-mail service (Nameplanet) were we let
people register <something>@<lastname>.<various tlds> \- we negotiated bulk
deals with a range of TLD operators and so had 50k-60k domains or something
like that.

Problem with giving people a ".name", I think, is that people often don't get
right away that you mean it literally. Especially if you have an unusual
firstname/lastname that they know, and you try to avoid spelling out the
e-mail address by going "my firstname at my lastname dot name".

I've since gone back to just using my .com - discussing our respective
<lastname>.<tld> and how there must be more people who'd like that was
actually how it started.

------
CaliforniaKarl
A .name email was what I went with after I graduated University, but I made
the mistake of going for a first@last.name email address, instead of just
buying the last.name domain directly.

Even at the time, it was hard to find a provider, and I can't imagine how many
there are now, but it must be a real small number.

So, I've still got my first@last.name, but now I also own last.us, so
first@last.us is my primary.

------
calgoo
I currently have a <lastname>.so domain for private email etc. Its working
good, just a few people ask to clarify in the last 4 years of usage. However,
I do worry that I could loose it as its a country TLD? For example, if someone
from the country of origin would start a company for example, could they claim
it? Does it depend on the country in question?

~~~
AlecSchueler
Yes, each TLD is operated uniquely so it would depend on the country you're
dealing with.

------
thoughtsimple
I use a .name address for all of my personal email. There are occasional
problems but mostly it works just fine.

------
kardashian007
I used to do .name about 10 years but too many sites didn't allow
"unconventional" TLDs and are/were hopelessly pathetic. Given that there are
many more gTLDs and still sites can't manage a proper email "validation"
regex, it's too hipster to bother with.

------
RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u
Perhaps I've just been lucky, but I've used a few novelty TLDs for e-mail, and
never ran into any issues. My current go-to addresses are
myfirstname@mylastname.email, for more professional settings, and <one
letter>@<two letters>.<two letters> for quick throw-aways.

------
justinlardinois
A rare occasion where Betteridge's law[0] apples in a non-cynical way.

.com was part of the zeitgeist of the late 90s and its cultural ties to the
web and technology in general haven't faded since.

Even using a .net domain makes you look a little off; I don't see much utility
in attempting to use any of the countless TLDs that have proliferated since
then.

I get the impression that ICANN is _trying_ to undermine the ubiquity of .com.
I think it's a noble goal, but it hasn't been successful so far and I don't
see any reason to believe things will change.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines)

~~~
vidarh
I was part of setting up .name - I'm named in the ICANN application - and I
kinda agree with you. I've gone back to using my .com, because I had my
<lastname>.com for years before we started .name and it's just simpler to get
people to understand.

But I think .com is being undermined quite effectively simply by it being
"impossible" to find good names. I get .com's when I can find something
reasonable, but otherwise look at other alternatives. It will just take a lot
of time. I also think this is more apparent outside of the US, where we're
used to using ccTLDs a lot more often, and where ".com" in many cases implies
"foreign, like US" which may or may not be what a company would like.

What's interesting to me is what "works" and doesn't as alternatives to .com.

E.g. I hardly ever seem to visit ".info" or ".biz" (who launched at the same
time as .name) sites, even though at the time (I have _no_ idea what the
relative counts are like today) they were vastly more successful than .name. I
don't see that many ".name"'s either, but still far more than many of the
other early new TLDs. While many of the ccTLDs have managed to build some
level of popularity (e.g. ".io") and others seems to have faded into obscurity
(".cx" used to be quite popular in tech circles, but I rarely see it any
more).

~~~
justinlardinois
I think one of my favorite things about Hacker News is that you can comment on
a technology and have a nonzero chance of someone who actually had a hand in
it piping in.

Also, I realize now I forgot to mention domain hacks, which I think do give
non-.com TLDs a lot more value than they'd otherwise have.

> But I think .com is being undermined quite effectively simply by it being
> "impossible" to find good names.

In my opinion, a "just okay" .com is better than a good domain with some other
TLD. I suspect this is a pretty common opinion.

> I also think this is more apparent outside of the US, where we're used to
> using ccTLDs a lot more often

I thought about this when I wrote my comment, but as an American it's not
something I'm especially familiar with. Our own ccTLD .us isn't commonly used.

> I hardly ever seem to visit ".info" or ".biz" (who launched at the same time
> as .name) sites, even though at the time (I have no idea what the relative
> counts are like today) they were vastly more successful than .name.

I think the only reason these were ever popular is because they were priced so
cheaply. It seems like .info is/was mostly used for throwaway domains, and
.biz is just a terrible name. It's supposed to be for businesses, but it
sounds like it'd only be used by shady used car dealerships. Nevermind that
.com is officially for commercial entities anyways.

> While many of the ccTLDs have managed to build some level of popularity
> (e.g. ".io") and others seems to have faded into obscurity (".cx" used to be
> quite popular in tech circles, but I rarely see it any more).

I think .io is a fad that's going to die along with infinite scrolling
websites. The fantasy notion of a "startup" is trendy and sexy right now even
outside the industry, just like a "dotcom" was two decades ago. It'll fade
away just like .tv did after the novelty of TV services on the web went away.

Side note: would .tv still be big if Netflix used netflix.tv instead of
netflix.com?

~~~
vidarh
> In my opinion, a "just okay" .com is better than a good domain with some
> other TLD. I suspect this is a pretty common opinion.

I agree with that, but finding even a "just okay" .com is getting pretty damn
hard. I use .com for most of my projects, but I've also got some .io's and was
looking at .ai (which looks like a massively missed opportunity right now -
you need to pay $100 just to register to be able to buy the domain, and then
$100 per domain; if they made it a bit easier/cheapr, it'd seem the perfect
time to profit from lots of deep learning / AI tech projects...)

> I thought about this when I wrote my comment, but as an American it's not
> something I'm especially familiar with. Our own ccTLD .us isn't commonly
> used.

Yeah, .us had a very brief period of limited popularity, but was effectively
stifled by the silly policy of geographic subdivision.

> I think the only reason these were ever popular is because they were priced
> so cheaply. It seems like .info is/was mostly used for throwaway domains,
> and .biz is just a terrible name. It's supposed to be for businesses, but it
> sounds like it'd only be used by shady used car dealerships. Nevermind that
> .com is officially for commercial entities anyways.

Yeah, it really got off on a bad start by effectively feeling like cheap
knockoffs of .com, to the extent that at some point it was a clear signal that
you were probably a small two-bit operation or a scammer if you had the
.info/.biz and someone else had the corresponding .com. And if you had a name
that somebody didn't have on .com you'd be an idiot not to buy the .com
anyway. This is very different from e.g. the ccTLDs, where someone might very
well choose to have the ".co.uk" (you can get ".uk" too now, but they're not
common) and not bother with the ".com" if they're genuinely geographically
limited to the UK (personally I'd snap up the .com anyway, and redirect it,
just in case, but a lot of businesses don't).

> I think .io is a fad that's going to die along with infinite scrolling
> websites.

Maybe, maybe not. I think .io makes a lot of sense as a "easy way to get a
decent name" for projects that are not necessarily intended to be directed at
the general public. If you're aiming for a tech savvy audience, the .com isn't
so important. So <some random project on github>.io might very well persist. I
agree that most who use .io for public-facing projects will probably end up
moving to .com's as/when they find/can afford to buy suitable alternatives,
though.

> Side note: would .tv still be big if Netflix used netflix.tv instead of
> netflix.com?

That's an interesting question. I think a lot of these domains come and go
largely based on how good the registry's are at marketing them. Part of the
challenge is that the individual TLDs for the most part are not huge money-
spinners, so don't have the budgets to try to turn it into valuable brands.

For .name one of the challenges we faced was exactly that: We were contracted
to sell at a relatively low price (the market wouldn't have been prepared to
bear a higher price anyway for .name at that point, but for others, possibly),
and we were dependent on registrars that in most cases had no clue, and the
ones that had a clue had little incentive to invest hugely in it because to
them we were just one of a bunch of other TLDs, and we couldn't give them
anything extra of value (like exclusivity) compared to the other registries.

So unless you make it big, or can show projections that you will, the revenue
potential drastically limits the amounts you can spend building a brand around
the TLD. Which again limits the growth. And around in circles we go.

The painful irony is that we'd probably have done far better if we stuck to
our original business (vanity hosted e-mail) - the e-mail service was bought
by a company backed by Marc Cuban; I don't know if I can mention the sales
price but it wasn't huge (we had ~2 million registered accounts; the sale
happened after the .com crash) but as far I know they made the purchase sum
back in 6 months by converting the accounts to paid accounts and ditching any
user that wouldn't pay (a shame, but it was that or closing the service down
entirely).

Our original business plan was actually to stick with paid accounts like they
did, and we identified them early on as our only realistic competitor, but
then we got seduced by the potential of building up a huge free user base and
sell, with the enthusiastic agreement of the VC's we spoke to (this was at a
time where there had been crazily ludicrous transactions selling free users
for amounts accounting to decades of actual revenue per user, in the
expectation that you'd be able to sell to someone else who would find magical
ways of monetising them better).

Based on the .name registrations in early years I think it's safe to say that
it took many years to get to the same revenue numbers as they did basically
over-night. But we gambled on registration numbers for .name several
magnitudes higher than that, and that's the price you pay sometimes.

~~~
justinlardinois
Thanks for this writeup. You've given a lot of interesting thoughts and
insights.

------
ajdlinux
I have a .name domain which I don't use - I think ".name" just sounds... ugly.
I use .id.au now, which I personally find much more aesthetically pleasing.

------
bstamour
I used to own $lastname.email, but I ran into issues with other people's
accounts flagging me as spam.

~~~
flyinghamster
I'm not surprised. I tend to rate most of these new gold-rush TLDs as spam
havens; I've certainly never anything but spam from a .club, .work, .rocks,
.download, .stream, or other such address.

