Ok so keeping it very simple to begin with lets explain what a REGISTRY is. In the world of domaining this is an entity which is responsible for maintaining the database of domain names for a specific Top Level Domain. For example Versign is the registry operator for all .com TLDs. As new TLDs are added so can new Registries under supervision.

A REGISTRAR on the otherhand deals more with the transactional side of buying and selling domains and is more likely to be a company name that the general public is familiar with such as GoDaddy and ENom. Though with over 160 ICANN accredited Registrars out there as a consumer in this industry there is plenty of choice of Registrars to use when buying and selling your domains.

In the early days of domaining this was a different story though with really only one company Network Solutions operating in both spaces. It wasnt untill another company called NetNames developed the concept that GoDaddy has been so successful with of having standalone Registrars competing for the consumers business and loyalty that shaped the landscape we see and deal with today.

The World Wide Authority on Domain Registration

All Registrars need to be accredited by the ICANN – which stands for Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers this a non profit entity created in 1998 dedicated to maintaining the security and stability of the internet. With members from all over the world the corporation plays a pivotal role in the evoloution and expansion of the internet and oversees the creation of new GTLDS and TLDS as well as all of the accredited Registrars.

For the full list of ICANN accredited Registries go to www.icann.org/en/resources/registries/listing.

The most up to date list of Domain Registrars can be found http://www.internic.net/alpha.html

GTLD…? .com..? .biz..? .club!

Ok so I know you are thinking enough of the acronoyms – so lets explain..

TLD simply stands for Top Level Domain and describes the domain extention that everyone has afixed to the end of the domain name. TLD’s are broken into several categories making it easier for different market sectors and countries to advertise the type of website they have through the domain extention.

GTLD stands for Generic Top Level Domain they are overseen by a department of ICANN called IANA which stands for Internet Assigned Number Authority.  The most well know GTLD is .com followed by .biz, .org and .net. They are described as generic as they typically can appy to many different sectors and are widely used across the world and are not country specific.

CCTLD’s are Country Code Top Level Domains – these are typically country specific and include the likes of .co.uk and .cn.

Others you may come across are ITLD – Infastructure Top Level Domain and IDNS – Internationalized Country Code Domains.

For an uptodate list of the GTLD’s go http://data.iana.org/TLD/tlds-alpha-by-domain.txt.

So with all that explained next time we can start to really dig deeper into the process of buying and selling expired domains….

Clare Coggins clare@expired-domains.co