The time is counting down for the general release of the dot-eu domains. April 7th is less than two months away and pre-registrations are already moving along. Some sources are reporting expectations hitting as much as 1.5 million.
Many companies have already signed up for their dot-eu names, particularly those of many major companies. Silicon.com posted an interesting feature regarding the upcoming release. Some critics pointed out not everyone is ready for the idea.
A spokesperson for the registrar Nominet told Silicon.com UK applications make up for less than one in 10 and that the process for registering dot.eu domains may have discouraged companies from signing up. “Many businesses do not feel the need or do not want to register a dot-eu domain name when they already have a well recognized dot-uk brand in which people have confidence and trust.”
On the other hand Damian Schmidt, CEO of another registrar company called Strato saw things differently. While he did tell Silicon.com, “We think that in Great Britain the dot-eu domain just isn’t a topic which is interesting people.” He went on to say he wasn’t sure there was a political reason or UK businesses were just unaware and he’s urging them to realize the potential of owning the dot-eu domain.
“Dot-eu will be as strong as dot-com in a couple of years,” predicting that it will overtake a lot of smaller country-specific European top level domains fairly quickly in terms of prestige.”
Schmidt also said companies like Amazon have already register and that companies that miss the April 7th date may have problems and might even have to fight for their domain names.
This should make for an interesting next few weeks as various companies wishing to both improve their business but also to protect their name through domains try and get things together. While there are several weeks left, time is starting to wear down so one can expect to see the efforts to grow much like the U.S. tax day at around the same time.
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John Stith is a staff writer for murdok covering technology and business.
