There aren’t too many people who visit the Internet regularly that haven’t seen or heard of one of the worlds most widely used and popular domain shorteners;
Sedo.com is currently holding an auction for the domain name which would be the ultimate shortener of one of the best known and most often used shorteners:
The auction sale not only includes the domain B.ly but also includes Be.ly, and Bee.ly.
How popular is the shortener bit.ly?
According to a post on its company blog that appeared on October 7, 2010:
“So far this year, bit.ly links have been clicked over 40.6 billion times.”
“There have been over 4 billion unique URLs shortened using bit.ly.”
“The bit.ly web site is now the 69th largest in the world according to Google’s Doubleclick”
Of course the possible downside to the domain name is that the .LY extension is the country code for Libya, which just about a month ago seized the domain name VB.ly which was also being used as a shortener.
Even scarier the Libyan government issues this warning after the seizure:
“”As to the decision to keep the registration of domain names shorter than 4 symbols long under .ly only for entities with a local Libyan presence, this comes in accordance with NIC.ly’s concern that the rise in popularity of URL shorteners from abroad taking up all these names has deprived locals of their right to register the important 3 letter abbreviations of their various businesses and interests.””
“”We as a Registry would prefer seeing art.ly used for a website about Libyan art for instance, or lda.ly used by the Libyan De-mining Association, rather than adding more URL shorteners under our National TLD.””
Of course the domain shortener space has also gotten a lot more competitive this year, with Twitter grabbing T.co for its official shortener, Godaddy.com grabbing X.co for its shortener service that allows vanity registrations and Word Press grabbing WP.Me for its official shortener.
Certainly a no brainier for the folks at bit.ly which is a well funded company or for any company with a “presence” in Libya.
For the rest of us, this is certainly an interesting domain and special situation and should make for quite a lively auction.
I think the seller is missing the point that “bit” actually has a real relevant meaning. Small or tiny fragment or piece.
The letter B has no relevant meaning for a URL shortener. So, Bit.ly won’t be interested in purchasing this domain at all because it would only work against their brand.
Bit.ly was so popular because of twitter. But now twitter will use it’s own url shortner t.co. So bit.ly should be loosing some market share in future. b.ly, if used as a url shortner, then it will be a big competitor to bit.ly imo. further,it has the added advantage of become the bit.ly typo as well.
but, are the .ly issues, over?
the BEST domain of this kind surely would be B.IT but it isn’t yet allowed
anyhow, B.ly + Be.ly + Bee.ly for only $4,200 is a VERY good price!
Just like how j.mp is used, bit.ly could use b.ly as their shorter alternate…I think it is an opportunity for bitly that they shouldn’t miss. If another entity picks it up bit.ly should be worried.
b.ly could be the next bit.ly ‘killer’
Ultimately you’re dealing with Libya so good luck.
I Can See Clearly…
BITT CO
by.te is impossible (no .te TLD) while byt.es exists and (of course) is already taken
“Sedo.com is currently holding an auction for the domain name which would be the ultimate shortener of one of the best known and most often used shorteners: B.ly”
“So far this year, bit.ly links have been clicked over 40.6 billion times.”
“There have been over 4 billion unique URLs shortened using bit.ly.”
Your article highights the major problem with the domain space that being the percieved value of domain names that have the potential to confuse and to trade off of the goodwill of well established brands. B.ly would have very limited if any value in the absence of those 40 billion clients of bit.ly and in fact if bit.ly did not exist neither would this story.
B.ly has a lot of potential in the online social marketplace, can’t deny that. I called and spoke to the lybia domain registrar, the transfer process is as simple and standard as it is with all other domain registrars. I’m placing a bid for 3500 eur a couple hours before the auction ends and we’ll see what happens. Exciting…
Kadafi
Why can’t the domain space and domainers be innovators like anyone else on earth?
For example do you think Apple made the first MP3 player?
No several companies came out with an Mp3 Player years before the 1st iPod.
Apple didn’t think of the idea or create the 1st or even the 4th of these types of players.
So if someone buys b.ly and develops it into something (the domain itself has some traffic but extremely minimal compared to bit.ly) then how is that different than any other industry
I’m more concerned that Libya will just take the name once someone starts using it for porn shortening. For the .ly register to up and grab it leaves me to think it will happen again. I own a number of 2 letter .Bz names (a1.bz and Ym.bz), I’m concerned about creating a domain name shortner and losing it for just the same reason.
UPDATE
Looks like this domain sold for 3,000 euro’s on 1 bid
http://sedo.com/auction/auction_history.php?language=us&auction_id=107501&tracked=&partnerid=35426&language=us
“Looks like this domain sold for 3,000 euro’s on 1 bid”
very good for the buyer… its value is much higher… 🙂
just for curiosity… few minutes ago, I’ve found a service that is the INVERSE of short-URLs… longurl.org
You are correct Mike, it would be fine for domainers to be “innovators” however history has shown that domainers are more “immitators” than innovators.
Kadafi
And there is nothing wrong with being an immitator, that is the second or third one to come up with the same idea and present it in a slightly different way
Google wasn’t even the 20th search engine was it?
You are correct sir, google was not the 1st second or third search engine howwever had they called themselves Yahoogle or AskGeeves they may have had a problem