Not since the landrush and subsequent turmoil of .eu has there been a domain extension with as much buzz surrounding it. Sadly, much of this buzz is self-manufactured noise by those heavily invested in the domain extension. Outside of the domain investment crowd little if any actual consumers know anything about .mobi. And why should they?
The purveyors of the extension would like to have everyone believe it is the solution - the end all and be all of the entire mobile Internet. As if somehow a domain extension makes a market. The mobile Internet existed before .mobi, and it did so on every other domain extension available to consumers and domain investors. So what happened to make some believe that .mobi is the mobile Internet? Hype, marketing and a single sale made that happen.
The sale of flowers.mobi for $200,000 set off the feeding frenzy. The domain investment field is about making money - at all levels from the registrar on down to those flipping the domains for profit. They could not have wished for a better kick-off for the fledgling extension, especially being that the registrar held back the best domain names for their own future profit. Let's face it - good domain names are good domain names in any extension, but something was twisted along the way with .mobi.
Back to the idea that dotmobi is the mobile Internet. Here is where my contention that it is a useless extension comes in. The set of coding restrictions that imply that it is going to be viewable and accessible to mobile browsers seems like a great idea until you start to think it through. These restrictions which the people responsible for .mobi claim to watch and police are what makes this extension useless. These restrictions are for mobile devices of yesterday. This week saw the unveiling of a new breed of mobile device with the launch of the iPhone by Apple. It doesn't need to rely on restrictive underlying code to display Internet content - it displays a Webmaster's work as they intended it, well as close as a first generation piece of software can anyways. And that is the hitch - the iPhone is but the first in a long string of new devices coming our way.
Already the iPhone has been a hit with consumers. From the BBC, "More than 600 people were outside two Apple stores in New York and at one of them, customers cheered as the doors opened, Reuters news agency said." When you get lines 600 deep you know something is right about the product. But try telling that to the defenders of the status quo when it comes to .mobi. Flip on over to the large domain selling forums and you will see a hard-core group (all heavily invested in .mobi - many with domain names that wouldn't sell in .info, .net or cctld's for more than registration fees) shouting down the arrival of the new Apple product. They ignore that the iPhone will push other mobile makers to meet and exceed the capabilities of the iPhone - and quickly or they will lose market share. But this bit of business 101 common sense is lost on this crowd - on purpose or by…
The usual retort to the above contention is that some cell phone manufacturers invested some money in dotmobi and therefore they wouldn't abandon it. These people are delusional if they think these companies wouldn't ditch dotmobi in a split second if it meant either protecting profits or increasing them. They are in the business to make money, not to hold technology back, and most certainly not to protect an Internet domain name extension.
As a web developer I can tell you that designing for a shrinking market, which is the older mobile browsers, is a waste of time and money. Users of mobile devices count for low single digit percentages of Internet viewers each day. So why design a dot mobi domain for a device that is going extinct? What then happens to the 'mobile' extension and the restrictions placed upon it? If you no longer need restrictive coding to view a web page dot mobi will either have to stick to their original plan and see users drop, or drop the restrictions and become just another ordinary extension - an ugly unknown one at that. No, all of my development for the mobile Internet will be done using existing applications on active tlds like .com, .net and .info on top of various cctlds. You don't have to worry about the vast majority of users (those on traditional computer desktops) being dissuaded by your sparse website like those exemplified by dot mobi, and you can still direct the few mobile visitors to content crafted for the smaller viewing screens. You get the best of both worlds - and no such thing exists with a dotmobi website right now, nor can it in the future with the restrictions placed upon it.
As the new generation of mobile devices takes hold - which it most assuredly will, you can code as you always have without fear of losing visitors.
To those that bought in early on dotmobi and have reaped huge sales - well good for you and your ability to play the market. There is nothing wrong with turning a handsome profit. To those still buying mediocre to lousy .mobi domains because you are convinced that it is the future of the mobile Internet - you need to give your head a shake and stop listening to the ever-shrinking booster crowd. You may be about to lose a bundle of money on an ill thought-out domain extension. They continue to boost the domain extension for a reason - and that reason has nothing to do with you and your investment and everything to do with their own.
Smutty
Jul 01, 2007
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Well...
Some people make reams of cash from .mobi. But it's the late comers and newbies who will get left holding the bag. Some of them are so caught up in the idea that there is money to be made that they are registering 'brandable'(code for crap) and four and five character nonsense .mobi domains. You can still get the same in .net, .org, .info etc for a reason... iPhone sucks but the technology it brings will kill .mobi.
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mike
Jul 05, 2007
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what a joke
funny .. the article was posted by dotCOM ... someone feel threatened?
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dotcom
Jul 07, 2007
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Indeed - what a joke
Did you even READ what was written? What's to be threatened by? Nothing that's what! LOL .mobi is absolutely useless. I'm guessing I hurt your feelings as you own a bunch of mobis... If you are new to domain investing please take heed of the words I wrote, and see the best response to them. Flip on over to the other domain forums and you will see the same lame defenders of the useless extension. They'll scream about it being the mobile internet, such and such company spent money blah blah blah, but they will never address the main issue of it being useless to developers. Oh sure some really useless mobi sites exist - all contain next to no real information and/or are nothing but a series of links. So if you like viewing parking like pages at 1/100th scale then you might indeed like .mobi. Just don't complain when nobody wants anything to do with your domains this time next year when the phone companies all replicate the iPhone.
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Blue
Jul 09, 2007
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bye bye mobi
When you see things like: http://developer.apple.com/iphone/ you know .mobi doesn't stand a chance as being the sole extension for mobile devices. Half-baked or fully cooked? That's mobi vs developing on another .tld.
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Garrett
Jul 12, 2007
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.net useless too?
Hmmm, I guess I won't venture a guess what 'sex.net' or 'cars.net' would be worth. That's just anonther useless domain extension as well.
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blah-eh?
Jul 12, 2007
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To the above
I read the entire entry at it says nothing about .net being useless just .mobi because it requires you to develop for a browser/device that is not going to used much more. What's so hard to grasp there? The person who wrote this makes a good point - you can develop any extension and have it be properly viewable on both pc and mobile devices now, but you can with .mobi. Nobody on a pc wants to view a mobi website - what's the point? In the end it's this quote that sums it all up, "They continue to boost the domain extension for a reason - and that reason has nothing to do with you and your investment and everything to do with their own." I can't say this any more kindly, you don't need .mobi to develop a mobile website. iPhone has proven ANY website is a mobile website.
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Anonymous
Jul 12, 2007
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To the above
oops - that should read "can't with mobi" instead of "can".
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PG
Jul 12, 2007
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Don't need .ca either
Don't need this and don't need that. Does the world NEED .ca either? No but it's making it's place in this world anyway. When are you people going to actually READ the mTLD coding requirements? There are only 3 and they only apply to the default presentation. The coding standards don't address the phones of yesterday, they address the phones of today, over a billion of them can browse the internet right now except the internet looks like crap on them. The .mobi standards work and you you can go ahead and build a fully enabled PC site or iPhone site if you wish. No problem! .mobi is a trustmark for mobile users. It works and it's hear to stay. Deal with it and move on.
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Garrett
Jul 12, 2007
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.mobi useless?
OK, let me put this in perspective. If I were the owner of 'cars.mobi' and decided that I wanted to sell it to the writer of this blog for $1000, would he buy it? I think we'd see a quick change in his perspective on .mobi at that point. If .mobi was so useless, there would be zero market for .mobi names.
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Admin
Jul 12, 2007
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Don't make me moderate! LOL
I hate to delete or otherwise edit any comments so please keep it civil and ON-TOPIC! I will though remove those comments that are too personal or are too far removed from the current topic at hand. To those that have emailed asking for whom dotCom is - I don't know and why does it matter? The person using that moniker signed up as any one of you can do, and submitted the post via the contact form. If you want to write a rebuttal article you can be sure I will give it equal opportunity. Use the contact form link at the top of the page or submit it to the forum where you are all free to post anything domain name related. Thanks! Kyle
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Jb
Jul 12, 2007
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Right on.
For those of you comparing .net, .us to .mobi remember, .mobi restricts the type of content you use.
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Martin
Jul 12, 2007
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Indeed - what a joke
I hate horizontal scrolling !!
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karl kasual
Jul 12, 2007
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mobi mania
I am curious to know the REAL reason why the coder that started this posting is so freaked over .mobi and their adamant stand that .mobi is useless before its even started? I would think that a worldwide class action lawsuit would be brought down on the mtld people if this was strictly a grab for more $$. Seems like someone missed out on the landrush now they are knocking .mobi badly now to lower the values so they can grab the cheap names people dump due to posts like theirs.
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Anonymous
Jul 14, 2007
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Interesting Perspective but lacking Vision & Intelligence ;-)
There have been naysayers since the dawn of time for all kinds of things. When Noah built his ark, there were naysayers saying that it would not rain. When early astronomers said that the world was round, there were naysayers plotting to have these great individuals killed for contradicting popular opinion. When the first automobile was seen, naysayers were complaining that it was too expensive for the common person. Even in the early days of the Internet, naysayers were indicating that it was just a fad because computers were too expensive for the common person. My point: When there is something new and different, there will always be naysayers. It just how the human society functions. People like that are needed in order to force change and innovation. DotMobi is not an instant fix for the Internet nor is it a magic solution for handheld devices. DotMobi is an basic element for building a foundation for other services and products. Just as TCP/IP was a foundation for building networking services, DotMobi will be for handheld devices. As more and more development occurs and as technology advances, additional functions, feature sets and protocols will be added to DotMobi just as it did with the original ARPANET. It is good to have a healthy discussion about the extension and even read comments from naysayers because this is how change occurs. ;-)
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Anonymous
Jul 14, 2007
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Mobi VS Tel
If .mobi is useless then .tel is even worst. Sell all your dot mobi now otherwise it is too late.
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dotcom
Jul 14, 2007
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Wow the booster club has arrived!
I see my words have rankled a few feathers, yet not one has made the case of why someone wanting to develop content for mobile devices should choose .mobi over every other tld. The open source software behind the Safari web browser IS making mobi obsolete each passing minute. That's a fact, and as soon as the other cell companies switch to the same or similar or for the mobi crowd, god forbid - better software, it really is game over for mobi as the mobile extension. Give me .biz over .mobi LOL
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Anonymous
Jul 15, 2007
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test
just a test
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Anonymous
Jul 15, 2007
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another test as unlogged user
If your comment is not accepted upon submitting it and you have not included more than one link, or used any swear words - both of which trigger an automatic deletion via the comment module, then please use the contact link at the top of the page and let us know. Please include the time you tried, and whether you are using a proxy secured/unsecured or not - the system also denies comments from an ip blacklist that are known to be used by spammers. WhiteBark
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Anonymous
Sep 16, 2007
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Cant you just use CSS for mobile users?
What happened to designing a site with valid xhtml and using different css style sheets for screen, print and mobile? Why do you need to build a separate site for .mobi?
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Anonymous
Oct 11, 2007
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dotmobi is needed! Data costs a bundle in many countries!
Hi yeh you can develop using CSS and maybe the iPhone is the bee's knees but not everywhere worldwide is cheap for data. e.g. Ireland and we're a developed country. Think of the potential in South America, Eastern Europe Asia etc. You're presuming way too much, I think. I use a Nokia E61, beats an iphone hands down in my opinion, but even as a business owner, I wouldnt pay the outlandish data costs? I use Opera Mini when possible. Sites look awful. If dotmobi assures customers that their entry point into the net will be a comfortable experience, then those 1 billion plus handsets will be used. Dotmobi sites can be integrated into marketing campaigns surely, and may indeed only be a page of links, phone numbers and options. But isn't that a help and a good start for bored commuters and mobi users worldwide? I think so. I think dotcom is being over-critical of the dotmobi domain. I have numerous websites built and will also be creating 'taster' websites on dotmobi for mopeds which I import. There are many possibilities with dotmobi, IF its purpose is marketed to end-users. Of course it will be made obsolete by phone techniology, but hey that would happen anyway. Thats modern life folks. Wait long enough, and you will be obsolete too !! Anrirua Ireland
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Robert
Dec 03, 2007
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.mobi... why?
.mobi will be as popular as .biz... it just won't be. With the invention of real browsers for phones the extension and format of a website will make no difference. It was realized a long time ago that the mobile phone is advancing and adapting faster than the internet. After all... why ask Amazon or Ebay to modify their site for your phone? Just upgrade the phone. As always, there is a reason to use a particular domain. .info is great for an info heavy site. .biz works if you are a business. .org for organizations. But .mobi .tv .etc... still not a top level domain and don't think will ever be quite as recognized. Then again, it's all about how you market your site and what you plan to do with it.
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Hanglo
Feb 08, 2008
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I like mobi
mobi is easy to develop for. Saves lots of time and is perfect for mobile phones.
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BluesJazz
Aug 11, 2008
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mobi sucks
I've never seen a mobi website advertised anywhere. Not on TV, not on the radio, not in a magazine or newspaper. I don't think I've ever seen one advertised on the internet either. Nobody important is using them.
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stew
Mar 04, 2009
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failure
It's been a failure. Name one .mobi website that everyone knows and uses. Not fox.mobi but one real people on the street talk about and actually use... that's right there are none. Sales have plummeted and lll.mobi are regfee. Ouch!
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ex
Aug 30, 2009
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abandonment
Well your prophecy is fulfilled - .mobi is abandoning their requirement to deliver content formatted for mobiles - and that was their whole reason to exist - or was it just to make money? - looks like they're not doing that either. There's a whole story on the meltdown on gomonews.com
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