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TLD Registrar Wants To Charge $300 For .Pro Names

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the mercantilsm-has-its-privileges dept.

dipfan writes: "The commercialization of the net continues: RegistryPro, the ICANN-approved registrar of the new TLD name, wants to charge up to $300 for .Pro addresses - or about 10 times the price of a .com address. The company says it will restrict .Pro to doctors, lawyers or accountants: 'qualified professionals in good standing ... .pro will be a premium brand, enabling effective, secure communication between professionals and users for the first time in the history of the Internet.' The Washington Post quotes RegistryPro's chief executive: 'The goal of RegistryPro is to build out a gated community for professionals on the Internet.' Is this what happens when you give one company a license to print money?"

3 of 381 comments (clear)

  1. .gfy TLD by BocaLoca · · Score: 0, Troll

    That's ok, we can just lobby to create a .gfy TLD & keep those three professions out of it...

  2. I like .pro by jhtr216 · · Score: 0, Troll

    Now when I am searching for a penis enlargement doctor, it will be easier to find one.

  3. Re:In good standing ?? by Grishnakh · · Score: 1, Troll

    Well here in the U.S., it's a little different. Engineers don't have any special titles for themselves, unless they got a PhD (in which case they'd be a professor at a university, not a practicing engineer). Engineering is just some job people go into because it pays halfway decent, but there's no real status in it. It's certainly not a "top career"; as an engineer, you're just a peon for your company, and when the economy goes down a little, the company will lay you off so they can meet their earnings projections for that quarter and keep their stockholders happy. Engineers who really want to advance their career, gain stability, and a good salary will get into management as soon as possible, since this is a much more prestigious and important position than being an engineer, who is managed.

    The "top careers" here are doctors, lawyers, and accountants, which reflects perfectly what the ICANN is allowing for their .pro domain. Since engineering is just another low-status career like web development, truck driving, and sanitation engineering (janitors), they certainly don't deserve a .pro domain.