Domainers

Domain name speculation is the practice of identifying and registering or acquiring Internet domain names as an investment with the intent of selling them later for a profit.

The main targets of domain name speculation are generic words which can be valuable for type-in traffic and for the dominant position they would have in any field due to their descriptive nature. Hence generic words and phrases such as poker, insurance, travel, creditcards, sex and others are attractive targets of domain speculation in any top-level domain.

The speculative characteristics of domain names may be linked to news reports or current events. However, the effective period during which such opportunities exist may be limited. Quick turnaround in the resale of domains is often called domain flipping. Domain flipping may also involve the process of buying a valuable domain name and building a related website around it, all this with the objective of selling the domain and newly built website to an interested party.

Sometimes, domain name speculation involves finding domain names early in a market, particularly when a new top-level domain is launched, registering them and waiting until the market grows to sell them. Domains such as sex.com, marijuana.com and business.com have sold for millions of US dollars.

The COM top-level domain (or 'TLD') is the focus of most domain speculation activity as it is the largest TLD. Domain speculation occurs in other TLDs as well, such as NET and to a lesser extent in ORG, INFO, and BIZ. Of the gTLDs, INFO is the most popular by registration volume compared to BIZ gTLD due to the low cost of initial registration and the recognisability of 'info' as being an abbreviation of 'information'.

Domain name speculation also occurs in country code top-level domains (ccTLDs) such as .uk, .de and .us. The German TLD consists of over 12 million domains. The UK's domain has over 7.7 million domains registered according to Nominet's domain registration statistics webpage, mainly in its commercial sub-domain co.uk. These TLDs are mature markets where good domain names may command high prices. The EU ccTLD is an example of what happens when speculative activity overtakes "ordinary" domain registrations. A combination of an inept registry (EURid) and excessive speculation by businesses exploiting a poorly structured regulatory framework meant that, according to EURid's own statistics at the end of 2006, over 50% of the registrations could be considered at best speculative and at worst domain name warehousing.

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