All the new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) that have come out over the last year have really helped to add some much needed diversity to the web. People have been making some great pages on things like the .sports gTLD and others. With a new batch of 50 gTLDs there is one that is really standing out from the rest. That is the ‘.sucks’ gTLD.
Obviously, this has some potential to cause problems. With the rise of ‘negative SEO’ over the past few years, this gTLD will almost certainly be used for that purpose. Anyone who doesn’t like a particular person or company will be able to buy out various .sucks domains and attempt to spread rumors or otherwise hurt the company.
Some people may be tempted to buy up their own .sucks domains just to get some level of protection, but that might not be as simple as you had hoped. The owner of the .sucks gTLD (Momentous) is looking to make some serious profit from their domains. For the average person it will be possible to buy a .sucks domain for just $9.95 per year (until September of 2015). After that, the price jumps up to $249 per year, which is quite an expensive domain.
But it gets worse. For any domain that is determined to be ‘premium’ it will cost $2499 per year for the .sucks site. Premium will undoubtedly be any major brand name, celebrity or other entity that the .sucks owner believes will have the money to pay the price.
What should You Do?
The big question for marketers and advertisers now is what they should do. Does it make sense to pay the price to keep their brand name away from a potentially negative site? Even if it is only the $10 per year, do you really want to cave to this type of extortion?
There are opinions on all sides of this argument. Legally, most experts agree that if someone puts up a ‘yourBrand.sucks’ site, it will be protected under the law.
Personally, I think the best course of action is to simply ignore the .sucks gTLD all together. The chances are that it won’t ever really catch on in any significant way anyway, and the last thing any industry wants to do is set a president for caving to this type of activity.
What do you think? Would you consider buying your own .sucks domain for your name or business? Comment below.
