Rick Schwartz: “Underwater domain investors FORCED to sell cheap.”

Rick Schwartz is not a big fan of New gTLDs as I guess you might have heard over the past few years. He had been very critical on new extensions on his blog but then he stopped blogging.

His last blog post was in June 2014. He has only made 1 post (in 3 parts) since that and it was to celebrate his 20th anniversary in domaining. That was in December 2015.

In the past 3 years he has only given a few select interviews. But on Saturday he broke his silence. And he broke his silence on Twitter @DomainKing.

He is once again talking against New gTLDs but also about .xxx that I wrote about in November 2016 and of course .com and his buying habits. (“Bought more domains last 12 months than anytime in a decade.”)

His first tweet since 2015 was of course about New gTLDs and their 3 year anniversary this month.

He also said that he sold the domain name 977.com and that the Chinese market is alive and well.

Here are a few of Rick Schwartz’s tweets since Saturday:

Over 15 Million gTLD’s registered in 2016. Now, just a gain of 330,000 for 1st quarter 2017. Flat lining everywhere. Lots of drops coming!!

.Berlin had 156k registrations 2 years ago. Now 59k. 52% still parked. Domain investors big losers! ntldstats.com/tld/berlin #domains

Over 400 new gTLD’s only 30 w/ more than 100k regs. Over 300 have less than 20k. Flat lines and declines everywhere!

12 of top 20 gTLD’s flat lining or declining in registrations. The 3 year biz wall is here! ntldstats.com/tld #domains #fakedomains

.kiwi stuck at 10k regs for 2 years. 190k regs in just a few days in Dec. 98.3% parked! ntldstats.com/tld/kiwi #domains #foolishinvestor

It takes 3 years to determine a business success. Numbers don’t lie. The climb from here gets hard! Collapse or consolidation coming.

Going thru my .xxx domains and other non .com extensions. Quickly learning the most value is taking total loss on 2017 taxes. #dumbdomains

Geo gTLD’s among worst performers. Stalled, declining city after city. The net is about *Expanding* your markets not limiting them. #domains

Just sold 977.com. Chinese market alive and well! Great .Com Domains outperform EVERY single stock on the market! #domains

Booking.com spent more promoting “booking.yeah” (a non existent gtld) than all other gTLD’s combined & X. #domains #advertising

I think gTLD’s missed boat on their so-called Premium Domains. Imagine if .Mobi waited 3 years to sell theirs. Game over! #domains #noise

Can’t expect same result when gTLD recipe, playbook is completly opposite of .com. Only worth penny for 1 year. #domains #need #want #desire

I knew would take 3 years for this to manifest itself. Too much noise. Now domainers see losses and cost of their distraction. #domains

Dust of the Internet is still settling. Growth we have seen over the past 20 years can’t sustain. User bases topping off. #Domains #Facebook

Bought more domains last 12 months than anytime in a decade. Underwater domain investors FORCED to sell cheap. #Domains #domainsforsale

Waited many cycles for politicians to finally utilze/exploit Internet to their benefit. Twitter biggest winner. #Twitter #domains #politics

gTLD’s are a “Flotilla” but sinking 1 by 1. Key is to figure out 1 or 2 winners. Registations will NOT determine that. Ad $$ will. #Domains

UPDATE: Here are few more of Rick’s tweets:

Brands have the best shot at gTLD sucess. Problem is Domain Investors are not invited.

Gtlds smothered their own extensions. Did .com and netsol have premium domains? NO! They let the market evolve. Premium gTLDs? LOL #Domains

How many domain INVESTORS wasted 3 years and many dollars? How many took their eye off the .Com ball and now payng the price? #Domains #sad

There’s a glut & all suffer even .com. .Com prices have stalled. That is temporary. Change in demand. Meaningless domains are done. #domains

Brandable .com domains are hot but tough game to win. Most important thing in any ad is your website domain name. #madisonave #Domains

I love how they say gTLD’s are for startups! Really?? Probaly the best and fastest way to put yourself out of business. Just DUMB! #Domains

So, will it take another 3 years for domain INVESTORS to realize it is not an investment? Buying depreciating assets not smart! #domains

.com the single most advertised item in history. Few understand the magnitude. .com is to the Internet as the 800# is to telephone. #domains

It isn’t just gTLD’s that are stalled. ALL extensions are stalling. The demand by END USERS in 2017 is not what it was years ago. #Domains

The average business has a .com or country code domain and does not need or want another. Never will. #domains #saturated #criticalmass

Sold.Domains

About Konstantinos Zournas

I studied Computer Engineering and Computer Science in London, UK and I am now living in Athens, Greece. I went online in 1995, started coding in 1996 and began buying domain names and creating websites in 2000. I started the OnlineDomain.com blog in 2012.

20 comments

  1. While I tend to agree with a lot of the discussions going on about most new gTLDs heading towards a flatline. There is still a lot of potential in some of them. The bigger question here should be; What happens when one of the new gTLDs drop below the margin of profits for a registry and how will that affect investors stuck holding the bag? I think a lot of people may be interested in learning more about that risk in detail.

  2. How come Rock’s tweets sound like they are in Trump’ s voice? Lol. Come to thunk of it…they always did. Ahead of the curve…always.

    • Even fools.gold is available for sale 🙂

      • I didn’t even care to bother visiting the domain to find that out.

        It’s for sale alright and it looks like it will be for sale forever:
        https://auctions.godaddy.com/trpItemListing.aspx?miid=209504274&ci=44273&prog_id=GoDaddy

        Oddly enough, the company that owns it is only interested in buying high quality generic .com domain names as you can see on their website:
        http://innovationhq.com/

        Not sure if they just list Earth.com as an example on their site, but it could be an interesting story for you Konstantinos as Earth.com is currently in Domain Name Holding with Escrow.com so someone is making payments to purchase the domain. Not just any domain, one of the best domains in the world. Talk about a geo, this is the best, and with space exploration being tried for this time time ever this year, this domain is huge. Trips to the moon and all that are all faked until now. I am sure they whoever is getting the domain got it for a steal especially with a payment plan.

        We might have to build a wall around earth to keep all the aliens out, this is already such a serious problem.

  3. There’s days where I say to myself I like the new gTLD’s then I read articles like this one and it changes everything. 🙁

  4. DomainShane.ws is available(LMAO)

  5. I am so ready for this dust to settle. So many people propping this nonsense, we have seen this movie too many times. Let the real extensions get back to the limelight instead of this distraction.

  6. uniregistry and schilling got rich peddling s – – t gtlds I think. Schwartz told everyone to watch out but they didn’t listen now gtlds are officially dead.

  7. The Domain Name Association published an Infographic last month showing that the growth rate of new GTLDs is 145% over the last year. See: http://thedna.org/domain-name-stats/

  8. I am a follower of Rick I met him late but he was clear on my questions and immediately helped in a problem to have with a domain registrar, contact his lawyer and this contacted me.
    I think the gTLD error was the massive launch of extensions, Xyz, Club were the ones that took the biggest records, start NameCom year 2014 and a month of registration http://www.wine.club is auctioned and reaches more than $ 100,000
    If you see this any of us will invest as many questions as we do to make many expert domainers to Kostantinos on how many gTLDs to buy, if I remember I never loose pledge of how many have invested, so I read.
    Many guesses, you see again that in 60 days for $ 200 http://www.luxury.estate sells for $ 50,000 makes you think.
    I have http://www.gas.finance and gas.insurer and they are difficult to sell, I wonder why? If gas.business and gas.energy are sold in Afternic to more than $ 200,000 and I $ 2500 in each of mine do not sell, it is also interesting and recurrent that in www. Estibot.com http://www.gas business and gas energy is only valued at $ 500 and $ 450.
    The art of selling Frank Shilling is vital to know because it sells so many gTLDs to more than $ 5,000 and above this figure.
    I have many registered xyz and club some let expire I prefer to buy new domains of a single word that there are still many to register and also 3 letters and a number that there are still many to register. Com, org and co.
    By the way Mike Mann sold RiseUp.org for $ 75,000!
    The rest I dedicate myself to buying expired domain names. Com and sell is the most valid today in my way of seeing.

  9. Here are few more of Rick’s tweets:

    Brands have the best shot at gTLD sucess. Problem is Domain Investors are not invited.

    Gtlds smothered their own extensions. Did .com and netsol have premium domains? NO! They let the market evolve. Premium gTLDs? LOL #Domains

    How many domain INVESTORS wasted 3 years and many dollars? How many took their eye off the .Com ball and now payng the price? #Domains #sad

    There’s a glut & all suffer even .com. .Com prices have stalled. That is temporary. Change in demand. Meaningless domains are done. #domains

    Brandable .com domains are hot but tough game to win. Most important thing in any ad is your website domain name. #madisonave #Domains

    I love how they say gTLD’s are for startups! Really?? Probaly the best and fastest way to put yourself out of business. Just DUMB! #Domains

    So, will it take another 3 years for domain INVESTORS to realize it is not an investment? Buying depreciating assets not smart! #domains

    .com the single most advertised item in history. Few understand the magnitude. .com is to the Internet as the 800# is to telephone. #domains

    It isn’t just gTLD’s that are stalled. ALL extensions are stalling. The demand by END USERS in 2017 is not what it was years ago. #Domains

    The average business has a .com or country code domain and does not need or want another. Never will. #domains #saturated #criticalmass

  10. Rick’s perspective rings true in the short term, but doesn’t take into account the effect of .BRANDs being promoted in ads to make their owners look contemporary and hip. Within five years, .COMs will likely come to be seen as old-fashioned and stale.

    Once .BRANDs have pulled the stones out of the field (of public perception), then acceptance of some other nTLDs will improve. I’m already seeing some domains with nTLDs receiving type-in traffic that equals or exceeds the traffic to equivalent .COMs.

    nTLDs offer more COMPELLING possibilities than older .COMs. In a society that glorifies youth and “the next big thing,” nTLDs are not all guaranteed to succeed, but they nonetheless represent the future.

    There may not be more than 15k of truly compelling SLDs per nTLD. That thinness will limit the value of each new extension. However, within each 15k there are definitely some SLDs worth getting excited about. Let us not underestimate the power of mass media to change public perceptions about TLDs versus .COM.

  11. Rick Schwartz, understood the economic ramifications of new TLDs being introduced, and that the only people the new TLDs benefited were Search Engine Marketing Advocates Only. The new TLDs are totally dependent on the Search Engine Market platform for any minor relevance they enjoy. As anyone who has studied our Marketing Intelligence reports should know by now, The highest and best use of new Tlds is for their ability to be manipulated by S.E.M. Agorithms for the S.E.M. Platforms proprietary Manipulation for their own Profit.

    Also ricks bullet comments above are just plain spot on. He is absolutely correct in saying a change in Demand for .COM Equimoddity Platforms is fothcoming, and in our opinion the Perception of .COM Equimoddity Platform Assets and their unique strategic Advantage for savvy Marketing Strategists will poropel their Valuations ever higher. JAS 3/26/17

    Gratefully, Jeff Schneider (Contact Group) (Metal Tiger) Former ( Rockefeller I.B.E.C. Marketing Intelligence Analyst/Strategist) (Licensed C.B.O.E. Commodity Hedge Strategist) (UseBiz.com)

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