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Ask HN: Why is the .IO gTLD uncertainty not getting press here?

10 points by binarymax ↗ HN
There have been a small smattering of posts not making the front page. But the news is a BFD for the community here. As I write this there is yet another startup launching with an IO domain on the front page.

We need to be aware of this issue as a community and potentially petition ICANN to find a way to keep the IO domain alive.

25 comments

[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 72.7 ms ] thread
pestatije
BFD - Big Fucking Deal

not that i agree, but obscure acronyms are a PITA

JohnFen
I suspect that this isn't a big deal for those who don't hold .io domains.
remram
... And don't use GitHub Pages, GitLab Pages, or otherwise rely on permanent URLs on domains in .io... Sure, but who are those?
JohnFen
Well, if domain names change, then those people will have to change configurations. But is that actually a huge problem? If so, then it would be a good opportunity to fix things so changing in the future is easier. Domain names do change sometimes, after all.
remram
Cool URIs don't change https://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/URI

This will cause a massive amount of links to go dead on the web and that's a fact. It will definitely not only affect people who hold .io domains.

JohnFen
> Cool URIs don't change

That's talking about the portion of URIs after the domain name. In reality, domain names themselves do change from time to time and it's wise to be able to accommodate that.

A cool URI makes that change easier for the provider because it means the only part of the URI that would have to change is the domain name. The rest can remain the same as always.

> This will cause a massive amount of links to go dead on the web and that's a fact.

Well, sure, and the maintainer of those links need to change them. I'm not seeing how this is a major crisis. Link go dead all the time. It would be an annoyance, certainly.

LinuxBender
I can not speak for anyone else just me personally. Had I owned any .io domains that were being used for email or websites I would start redirecting to any of my other domains and put an inline easy to read but attention getting banner at the top of the page that said something like, "Redirected from old domain to new domain be sure to bookmark" and I would link that to a news page explaining why I was taking that precaution and I would email my customers and communities with a short but sweet easy to read email explaining the same thing and would credit customers for their trouble so there is something in it for them.

If it turned out to be a nothing-burger then I would use that .io for a blog page related to the community or something else non business or revenue critical and have links back to the new domain. I would keep the commercial content on the .com, the community forums on .net and philanthropic type content on .org or .io. i.e. news about donations to funding a new no-kill animal shelter and such

binarymax
Try buying a .com domain these days and let me know how that goes.
LinuxBender
Oh I know for sure. It takes some creativity or trading a golden leg and left brain hemisphere for one of the squatted 2 through 4 letter easy to remember and type when inebriated domains. For my hobby domains I mostly use .net and .org. If I started a business I would plan to spend some duckets on the .com variations.
dmart
I fully expect that an exception will be made to effectively treat it as a tech-related gTLD, which is how it has been used in practice all along anyway.

If ICANN really chooses to break every GitHub Pages, crates.io, gcr.io, quay.io, etc. URL just to blindly follow a policy, then they will have proven themselves an incompetent arbiter of the domain name system. This feels so unlikely that I'm not worried about it all.

dave4420
Don’t worry, there’ll be a transition period for people to migrate to other domains.
binarymax
Maybe that's fine for Microsoft/Github. Where are the bootstrapped startups supposed to go?
ipaddr
.info just two extra letters
hulitu
> Where are the bootstrapped startups supposed to go?

.crypto ? .ai ? That't where the hype is. /s

dave4420
Do their bazillions in funding not cover registering a new domain name?
j4nek
> URL just to blindly follow a policy, then they will have proven themselves an incompetent arbiter of the domain name system.

Of course I can understand if someone finds the situation stupid. However, ICANN is clear with its rules and every entrepreneur has to take possible (political) uncertainties into account when choosing a .tld, which many have simply not done. You could also accuse them of "incompetence".

When choosing a domain for .de, I explicitly decided against a podcast bro tld like .io / .ai etc. because of these reasons.

throw49sjwo1
They shouldn't have bought the domains, the rules were clear. What if the rules say that somebody else is supposed to get the IO domain?
hulitu
The rules are not for us. Except when they serve us. /s
Gooblebrai
Many people forget that laws, as long are not the laws of physics, are man-made. And as such, they can be changed at will to fit whatever scenario is convenient.
throw49sjwo1
Indeed, but what's convenient for a bunch of tech bros might not be convenient for the world order.
codingdave
Yes, we do need to be aware of it and deal with it. But part of that awareness is building resilience into your company's brand. As in, have a brand identity separate from a specific domain name. That may sound crazy when so many tech companies do/did tie their brand to their domain, but they are not the same thing.
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throw49sjwo1
> We need to be aware of this issue as a community and potentially petition ICANN to find a way to keep the IO domain alive.

No, we need to migrate off ccTLD.

faizmokh
There was a trending post few days ago on front page. I definitely read too many comments supporting colonialism just to justify continued use of .io domain.