As the Internet and it’s users prepare for the release of new TLD’s there is a battle already brewing over who ICANN will choose to head the highly sought after .eco domain extension. .Eco seems to be the best fit for an extension that focuses solely on ‘green’ issues and raising money and global awareness in the name of the environment.
The two major groups jockeying for control of the .eco extension are SupportDotEco.com who’s figure head is Al Gore, former U.S. Vice President and supporting organizations such as Sierra Club and Surfriders. On the other side is DotEco.info founded by BigRoom.ca and Green Cross International has just levied it’s support as well. Mikhail Gorbachev is the founder of Green Cross Intl. While both groups intend to donate large chunks of generated revenue to their environmental organization of choice, there are huge differences in how the two entities wish to develop the .eco namespace.
Below are mission statements and videos from both sides. My viewpoints are in the paragraphs below the second video.
DotEco.info mission statement:
The .eco system will display current, detailed eco-information to anyone with a browser, anytime they need it, anywhere on the planet.
It will do this by collecting information from people when they register .eco domain names for their companies, organisations, products, or even themselves and then displaying that information on a standardised, open platform.
DotEco.info video:
SupportDotEco.com mission statement:
Our goal is to make .ECO a ubiquitous and recognizable web address, much like .ORG, that provides a steady and growing source of funding for leading environmental organizations.
SupportDotEco.com video:
What do you think?
It looks to me like U.S.A. control of .eco (by Al Gore and company) vs. International control of .eco.
So far all I understand from Al Gore and SupportDotEco.com is that they merely want to use this extension to raise money for environmental groups (of their choice) by opening up the .eco registry to the public ‘to generate a maximum amount of funds for the ecological movement.’ Of course SupportDotEco.com ensures that even with an open registry that ‘greenwashing’ will be prohibited (as defined in the .eco TOS) but will not pre-screen registrants since it is too time consuming and costly.
DotEco.info on the other hand seems to have a plan for registrants (not limited to businesses/organizations) to trace, calculate, share and compare their ecological footprints. With this .eco system registrants are likely to be held liable to keep their site updated with transparent information on their companies/organizations ecological background and goals. I would be much more in support of this future for .eco than SupportDotEco.com’s vision.
Even one of the largest ecological blogs on the net ecogeek.org has voiced it’s concern about the quality usage of .eco, but does not deny that it will go after it’s brand in the .eco extension.
Resources:
http://www.supportdoteco.com/green-paper/
http://doteco.info/about
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/08/al-gore-vs-mikhail-gorbachev-the-latest-on-the-dot-eco-domain-battle.php
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i think that the international team, i.e. DotEco.info should win. cos i dont want to get .eco under the bossy control of USA.
.eco sounds like an interesting domain name… but I doubt it will get much attention. I think it will be something like .me, which hardly anyone uses.
Well I for one do not have high hopes for the .eco domain extension. But there are pretty interesting websites you could develop with that extension.
[…] in August of 2009, I reported that there were two major groups already vying for the .eco TLD. We are only months away from […]