You’ve probably already noticed, but tomorrow, we officially announce the big news: Aplus.net is proud to present to the world an all new website, logo, and identity!

That’s right — the company you’ve come to know and depend upon to provide world-class Internet services like web hosting, domain name registration, and premium web design just got a makeover. Our new website was designed specifically to make the Aplus.net experience easier and more rewarding for our hundreds of thousands of customers worldwide. Check out the new website for yourself here! And, as always, make sure to leave us any feedback in the comments here at the Aplus.net Blog.

Next month, ICANN (The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the organization that largely controls the world of domain names and registries) will be holding a forum in Cairo, Egypt to determine whether or not to add more new top-level domain names to those currently offered.

A top-level domain (TLD) is the term for the basic suffixes that all domain names must have, such as .com, .net, and .org. Since the introduction of newer TLDs such as .info a few years ago, there has been a renewed interest in domain name activity and speculation.

This news comes on top of a huge announcement this summer that ICANN will also be expanding TLDs to include customized, brand name-oriented names — .nike, for example, or .disney could become viable TLDs under the proposed new rules that may go into effect as early as next year.

All such plans to expand the range of available TLDs have drawn criticism. Some say that the wider variety of TLDs mean that online branding is getting watered down. Since there are so many new options, it’s hard to tell just which is the most legitimate. Are companies supposed to buy new domain names in each new TLD as it becomes available? If they don’t, what are the risks of someone else snatching it up?

ICANN defends its plans, claiming that it’s trying to provide online businesses with an increased number of options: “It’s an expansion in Internet real estate so that people have got more choices in the kind of searches they do,” said Paul Levins, vice president of corporate affairs for ICANN (as quoted in the Orlando Sentinel last week).

Yet, with these new customized domains likely costing at least $100,000, it’s not at all clear what kind of advantages they’re going to offer in the long run; and it seems apparent that smaller companies will have a harder time becoming competitive under the new rules of the online business game.

More from the Orlando Sentinel:

Supporters say the move will make browsing the Internet more intuitive and also give companies a new way to reinforce their brand names. But others warn that it could confuse consumers and become a headache for companies that may not want to purchase a bunch of new domains.

Besides the obvious benefit of a company such as Disney being able to direct visitors to a URL such as “parks.Disney” instead of the current “Disney.com/parks,” the expansion of domain names could benefit geographic regions.

For instance, if the .orlando domain were established by the city government or an economic-development group, it could streamline searching for local services by having a directory of plumbers listed at “plumbers.orlando,” or a list of swimming pools at “pools.orlando.” Businesses licensed by the city also could be granted a .orlando address. …

And since it won’t be a first-come, first-served basis, businesses and individuals will have a better shot at getting their desired Web addresses than they did during the first Internet gold rush. …

Levins said applicants will have to pay at least $100,000 to apply and will have to prove that if they are granted a top-level domain, they are capable of then selling Web addresses within that domain … .

“This is no $6 exercise,” said Levins, adding that an independent board will oversee the process. “Running a top-level domain is actually a big business.”

Palage said cities and special-interest groups such as the National Rifle Association or the University of Florida Alumni Association could see the biggest benefit from having their own top-level domains because it’s similar to offering specialty license plates with that group’s name on them.

“[If I am a business,] I want a .orlando because I want to associate with my customers to show I am a member of the local community,” Palage said.

A spokeswoman for the Walt Disney Co. said the company is aware of the new domain-name plan but would not comment.

Palage said many companies aren’t pleased with the new domains because it means that after years spending time and money to protect their brands with the existing domains, they’re going to have to do it again.

The law firm Cash Klemchuck Powers Taylor LLP also envisions negative outcomes resulting from these changes. From a news release issued by that firm:

“ICANN’s goal is to give end-users more choice in their presence on the Internet and stimulate competition,” said Darin M. Klemchuk. “However, critics have compared the introduction of new domains with the printing of money: the value of your current registration is decreased because of possible brand dilution and public confusion, while the cost of protecting one’s brand increases.”

ICANN encourages users to avoid registering gTLDs that are confusingly similar to an already existing gTLD in order to prevent confusion in the marketplace. The introduction of new gTLDs will increase the open avenues for registering confusingly similar variations of brand names. ICANN encourages applicants to adopt curative measures, such as Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP), to cure such confusion. Additional preventative measures include the registration of many domain names. “With the multiplication of top level domain registrations, businesses will experience difficulty in policing their brands online and will likely incur substantial costs,” noted Mr. Klemchuk. “This expansion of domain names will also make phishing schemes more prevalent. All of this will require businesses to be more vigilant and proactive in protecting their online brands.”

Read “Explosion of New Domain Names Presents Risks for Online Brands” here. Read “What’s in a dot.com name … ” in the Orlando Sentinel here.

Late in September, the state of Kentucky issued a court order to the registrars for 141 domain names, announcing that the domains would be seized by the state. The justification? These domain names were allegedly associated with websites that promoted or directly engaged in online gambling.

Online gambling was effectively made illegal in the U.S. with 2006’s Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA). However, there’s been a great deal of argument over just how far that law goes. Lawmakers are sparring over the exact wording of the bill, which effectively places the burden of enforcement on the shoulders of financial institutions, rather than the government itself. In any case, Kentucky’s action goes considerably beyond the scope of the law.

Furthermore, most of the seized domain names — which included large, well-known companies such as PokerStars and Bodog — are based in the United Kingdom, with no assets or formal operations in North America.

The case has generated a huge amount of controversy. However, it’s understandable if you haven’t heard about it, considering the relative lack of attention it’s received in the mainstream media. Considering it’s essentially a case of international property seizure (a situation with enormous implications) it’s so far garnered a surprisingly low profile from the American press — with the following exception. Last week, the Washington Post finally weighed in with its overview of the situation:

An effort by the state of Kentucky to seize more than 140 online gambling Web site names is raising novel legal questions about the physical location of digital property and the reach of local and regional governments on the global Internet.

Last month, a Kentucky circuit court judge granted a request by the governor to have 141 Web site names used by online gaming operations transferred to the state’s control. The action was filed by a Chicago law firm on behalf of Gov. Steve Beshear (D), who was elected in part on the strength of a promise to bring casino gambling to the state.

The domains include some of the most popular online gaming sites on the Internet, including UltimateBet.com and FullTiltPoker.com. According to the state, residents spend roughly $170 million each year gambling at online casinos, potentially taxable revenue that might otherwise have been spent at the state’s own gaming operations, which include regulated betting on horse racing and bingo.
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Attorneys for the state convinced Judge Thomas Wingate that the gambling Web site names were tangible “gambling devices” that could be seized under Kentucky’s gaming statutes. Wingate’s order compels the entities that manage the registration of those domains, known as domain registrars, to transfer control over the Web sites to the state.

Jennifer Brislin, spokeswoman for the Kentucky justice department, said the state is seeking unspecified damages from the casinos, but that its primary goal is to force the Web sites to block Kentucky residents from visiting them. She said the majority of the registrars affected by the judge’s order had “locked” the domains in question to prevent them from being transferred to another registrar pending the outcome of the case.

“We think it creates a tremendous disadvantage for our legitimate, licensed and taxed gaming interests, and there are some damages that are due to the commonwealth as a result,” Brislin said.

Opponents of the decision say the Kentucky has no legal authority to seize the casino Web site names, as neither the individuals who registered the Web sites nor the registrars themselves are physically located there. All of the online casinos are operated outside of the United States. Many online gaming companies are lobbying on Capitol Hill to be legalized, regulated and taxed in the United States, which would allow them to market to U.S. consumers.

Bret Fausett, a domain name expert and attorney with the Los Angeles law firm Adorno, Yoss, Alvarado & Smith, notes that Kentucky’s gaming regulations were written long before the advent of the commercial Internet, and make no mention of virtual casinos.

“This is a little bit like if the Home Shopping TV network was accused of fraud, and Kentucky decided to seize the show’s cameras and set even though HSN’s real location is nowhere near the state,” Fausett said.

What do you think? Is Kentucky overstepping its jurisdiction here, or is this action justified in light of UIGEA? Do you think a state can legitimately seize international property, or is this a mistake that’s only going to hurt America’s international trade? Weigh in and let us know.

View the state’s original court order, including a complete list of all the seized domain names, here.

Lately, we’ve been discussing the world of domain names and domain name registration a lot here at the Aplus.Net Blog — how to successfully buy and sell domains, how to structure them, even how you can make money from the domain names you own but aren’t using.

And all of this discussion has revolved around the most fundamental domain naming strategy: attaching an effective name to an available suffix — also known as the TLD, or “top level domain,” the .net in aplus.net, for example, or the .com in amazon.com. In recent years, we’ve seen the TLD market grow by leaps and bounds. Where you could once only buy basic TLDs like .com, .net, and .org, there are now dozens to choose from, ranging from the affordable and accessible like .info to the expensive and highly specialized, like, say, .museum.

But, according to a recent article by TechNewsWorld.com’s Renay San Miguel, all this will soon change, in a revolutionary way. In an article entitled “ICANN Approves Dot-KitchenSink Internet Address Policy“,  Mr. San Miguel tells us that ICANN has recently approved a new policy that allows organizations to name their domain name anything they want. Their TLD doesn’t have to be a preset suffix, it can be their company brand, like .coke or .nike.

From the article:

The Internet is about to get a lot crazier. Anyone who’s willing to fork over a fairly grand sum, possibly in the $100,00 ball park, will be able to buy the rights to a branded domain. That means no one who’s anyone will be a lowly dot-com anymore — and the practice of snatching up domain names with the hope of selling them for big bucks later will be a lot less lucrative.

The universe of Internet domains will soon experience a Big Bang, thanks to Thursday’s vote by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers Latest News about Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) approving a new system for handing out Web addresses.

Corporations and other public and private entities will no longer be limited to Web extensions like .com, .net or .org; for a fee that will likely start at US$100,000, a company can register a more personalized top-level domain (TLD) with its own brand name extension, such as .coke, .apple or .prada. Cities will be able to apply for .newyork, .berlin or .moscow.

ICANN also voted for the first time to allow non-Roman characters in Web addresses, which means that Chinese companies can register suffixes in Mandarin script, Russian companies in Cyrillic, and so on.

Beginning in spring 2009, the Internet address possibilities will truly be .endless.

Although this opens up a whole new world of legal headaches (with cybersquatting about to get a lot more lucrative), the possibilities it allows are nothing short of world-changing as far as online business is concerned. Some say it will make the value of existing domain names plummet; others say it will add value to the old .com standards. Obviously, ICANN wouldn’t have approved the process if they weren’t confident that it would have a positive effect. But given the dramatic nature of this change, it’s hard to say for sure just what the ultimate impact will be.

Either way, the plan (which is still not 100 percent carved in stone) would go into effect in the second quarter of 2009, according to the current proposal. (Read the official ICANN news release on this topic here.)

What do you think? Is it a good idea to make the domain name system this changeable? Will this new policy endanger an important fundamental of the World Wide Web, if suddenly any brand name can become a TLD? Or is the logical next step in a marketplace where TLDs already number in the dozens (or hundreds, if you count country code TLDs)?

Despite weathering some well-known difficulties in recent years, the Los Angeles Times has still managed to maintain its status as one of the nation’s leading newspapers, and in particular, a reliable source of info for the business community. And no small part of that reputation comes from an author who’s been penning the newspaper’s small business advice section since the early ’90s, Karen E. Klein.

An accomplished online entrepreneur in her own right, Ms. Klein’s question-and-answer column at the L.A. Times has accumulated an incredible amount of small business management info over the years, covering everything from marketing to balancing the books.

One of Ms. Klein’s recent articles touched on a subject that we’ve been spending a lot of time discussing here at the Aplus.Net Blog — and that we’ll soon be spending a lot more time talking about: What’s in a domain name?

Picking the right domain name

Dear Karen: My preferred domain name is taken. How do I create another one?

Answer: Identify the keywords your target customers will search and use those words in your domain name, putting your most important keyword first. “Keep it short. Use no more than three or four short words – 55 characters, max – in your domain name,” said Caroline Melberg, founder of Small Business Mavericks.

Consider using hyphens between the words, which makes your domain easier to read. “If your main keyword choices are taken, consider making one a plural or singular version,” Melberg said. “Or try adding numbers to find a clever, catchy domain name.” You could also add supporting words, such as “online” or “pro,” to your keywords.

“Imagine you are giving your website address over the phone to someone who does not have a pen and paper handy, or over the radio where people are listening in their cars. If your domain makes sense to your prospects, they are much more likely to remember it and type it in once they get to their computer,” Melberg said.

Read the original article here. Klein also writes for The Chicago Tribune, Newsweek, and BusinessWeek. Check out her L.A. Times column here.