posted by CYF:
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del.icio.us rebranded as delicious.com in 2008.
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I'm not saying none exist, because obviously some do; however, it should be noted that the "complicated" nature of del.icio.us as a domain name made it all but certain that the site would have trouble getting out of its geek niche if they didn't rebrand -- that puts it in a slightly different category than other domain hacks. (It's also worth noting that the founder of Delicious didn't like the domain himself, and characterised it as a mistake years before the change. [fuck, still can't post links: randsinrepose.com/archives/2004/12/03/a_delicious_interview.html ])
The reason that I am questioning DH's post is the implication that it is somehow an inevitability that any domain hack will lose traction to its .com equivalent, and/or will eventually have to be shelved or rebranded or co-branded etc. How much traffic does bit.ly lose to bit.com? Interent users are a little smarter now about ccTLDs and generic "noncoms" than they used to be, and many of the smarter hacks are using the extension as a pronounceable party of the name, particularly those using .ly, .me and .us (vs. some idiots you can find at domain forums registering things like danc.es and saying "Look! Dances! Can you believe such a valuable domain was available?") Really, working it in as either a pronounceable aspect of the name or a reasonable association (eg. those ccTLDs that hapen to correspond to postal codes, leading to cool names like Atlanta.GA) are about the only ways to do a "proper" hack, and I'd much rather have something like Fuck.It than CoolVideosOfPeopleWhoDontGiveAFuck.com or Spank.Me than FreakyBitchesWhoLikeToBeSpanked.com which I think speaks more to the original poster's question than issues of potential brand leach to the .com My experience with ccTLD word plays is limited, but from what I can guess from owning gTLDs in bulk, I'm losing a lot more to .coms from my .nets than I am from my .mes
Frank