ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers met in Mexico last week (March 1-6, 2009) to discuss changes to the Domain Name System. As the governing body for Internet addresses and domain names, the changes they discussed are very important to anyone interested in the web, especially business oriented users.

Some of the changes that will be coming down the pipe include:

• A massive expansion of generic top-level domains. These new domains such as .eco, .green, .beer, etc., could be the next gold mine for internet companies. Imagine Zappos.shoes instead of .com.
• International Domain Name. The domain name system is English based and only the roman character set is supported. ICANN plans to allow the use of Arabic characters, Chinese characters, Cyrillic, and other languages in their domains.
• Expansion of country and language specific domains. Many countries already have these, .uk, .fr, .eu, etc. The plan is to expand these into even more countries and even languages.
• Switch to IPv6. The ip address protocol system that is used to find every computer and website on the internet is running out of addresses. Companies have slowly and begrudgingly been moving their programs to the new protocol. ICANN wants this to be pushed forward faster.

All of these changes are very important to the continued growth and vitality of the internet. Lets face it, the domain name system has become very stagnant at this point. So much so, that companies make up words to call themselves just because the domain name for it is available. Expanding the amount of domain names would start a whole new wave of investment from developing countries and established businesses.

Instead of everyone vying for the few .com domains left we could have domains that accurately reflect the content. This would be a huge improvement. Lets hope these changes gets rolled out soon.

With the recent, record purchase price of fund.com for ten million dollars, the value of a good domain name is easy to see. At Inlet Media we include domain registration services within all of our web design contracts. But, what should a web site owner or potential web site owner be looking for in a domain name?

First, and foremost you should be looking for a top level domain. One that ends in either .com, .org, or .net. There are others that you can use for your business, but they are all mostly rubbish and not worth considering. If you are launching an educational site or an international site then other top level domains should be considered. Overall though you should focus on acquiring a .com domain as this is the only domain most people consider when searching the internet.

To check the availability of a possible domain use the free search engine by Domain Tools.

At this point almost all of the best domains have already been registered and are in use. This means that either you need to spend money branding your domain, and advertising, or you need to purchase a domain. Using a poor domain to save money is one of the most dangerous things a website owner can do. If you are going to cut corners then do not do it with your domain name. A good domain name is worth its weight in gold, and buying a domain name is often not as expensive as you might guess.

Most of all though a domain is a brand. It is going to be the word or phrase that your potential customers have to remember you by. Make sure that it is something you will want to be using five to ten years from now.