.ink Approved by MIIT of China

On February 6th, Top Level Design’s .ink received the official approval by China’s MIIT (Ministry of Industry and Information Technology). It is also the 6th new gTLD in the Latin alphabet approved for sale in mainland China.

.ink is in the 3rd batch of new gTLDs to get China’s approval. It’s also the only one in English in this batch. The other four are all Chinese IDNs.

The Chinese government requires all TLDs to be certified by MIIT. Being approved means that Chinese residents can register and host .ink names in mainland China.

Since the launch of .ink, a hype for the TLD has been spreading all over the Chinese domain market. Chinese domain buyers recognize and appreciate the connection between .ink and Chinese history of calligraphy and literature. It’s easy to memorize and also been interpreted as an abbreviation for ‘Internet King’.

As of February 14th, 2017, 25,728 .ink domains are registered worldwide, 74% of which are managed by Chinese registrars. With the MIIT certification, we are excited to see more tractions for .ink domains in China.

Additional info.:

Where to buy .ink

Examples of live .ink websites

Major .design usage from Facebook, Airbnb, T-Mobile

Major .design usage from Facebook, Airbnb, T-Mobile

The benefits of new top-level domains (nTLDs) for companies and individuals that were never able to get a great .com are obvious. Now, they can have unique, short and brandable domain names and, with options like .design, they can add context in a way that .com never could.

Recently, there have been some really exciting developments for .design in particular. While it has already differentiated itself as one of the most successful new TLDs, it now seems to be one of the only extensions that is receiving significant traction with the world’s largest and hottest companies, which are creating sites like facebook.design, airbnb.design, medium.design, and telekom.design (from T-Mobile’s parent company, Deutsche Telekom).

.design founder series: fvwebsite.design

.design founder series: fvwebsite.design

Karen and Dave Rose are the owners of Fraser Valley Website Design, now found at fvwebsite.design. The business has grown considerably as they’ve expanded from SEO to graphic design, photography, drone imaging, car wraps, oh, and they also happened to get married in the process!

If Karen’s path from dairy farmer to SEO guru wasn’t already non-traditional, it seems that the recent switch from a .com domain to a keyword heavy .design name, fvwebsite.design, has created a noticeable uptick in their Google ranking, especially as displayed on Google Maps.

Airbnb.design; the most impressive use of a new domain in 2+ years

Airbnb.design; the most impressive use of a new domain in 2+ years

Everyone in the new domain name industry keeps their eyes on the horizon even while new TLD adoption is steadily rising. There are 18 million names and the market is healthy and bullish, but within that 18 million we’ve all been waiting for those really big use cases from major brands and high-profile leaders.