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Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

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Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#71

Post by moribvndvs »

I got the vanity email address of (almost) my dreams: first@flastna.me (not actual tld, and the reason I had to add the first initial to my last name was because some jerk off squatter has lastna.me).

It looks so cool, and I kinda hate it. Why? Because people I need to give my email to (contractors, HR, doctors, insurance, bank, etc.) are completely baffled by the TLD and just enter it as flastname.com. To a lesser extent, I do still have sites reject the TLD (some surprising ones, for example office 365). I ended up creating an alias for first@firstlastname.com and mostly use that.

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#73

Post by mastazi »

bluedino wrote: post #64
mastazi wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that .ch is not an uncommon tld at all, it is the national tld of a country and it has existed for decades. I also think that the issue you had with forms requiring .com must have been an amateur made website because I can't imagine someone who develops for a living doing that type of mistake.

I would argue for most people, anything other than a .com, .edu could be "uncommon". I have had people question .net or .org... American perspective, I'm assuming people in Europe are used to things like the individual country domains. But it seems rare to even see .us here...

Yes the fact that you don't use your country's tld is a uniquely USA thing. I lived in Italy, UK, Australia, Brazil, Thailand and Indonesia, in all those places the national tld (e.g. ".it" in Italy) is the most commonly used. Even American services usually have a localised version with that tld, e.g. google.it; Some American email providers offer local tlds as well, e.g. I used to have [username]@hotmail.it

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#74

Post by nlh »

noahjk wrote: post #70
nlh wrote: post #37

I have a .me address and I've been totally happy with it. My domain is my initials (same as my HN username - nlh) and I love that my email is just nlh @ nlh . me -- it's actually shorter and better than any .com I could reasonably come up with or purchase. There is confusion maybe 10% of the time - it's fine. Most of the confused people think I mean "me.com", but it hasn't been a real issue. Honestly the more confusi…

re: side story: Our name is fairly unique (at least for me, I've only met one or two others around my age with our name). The past decade, and especially what feels like the past five years, have been very jarring now that I hear the name elsewhere - I always react, even when I don't recognize the voice. It's invariably some 5-11 year old being called on. I assume people with more common names don't have this reactio…

Definitely odd! I grew up my whole life with 0-1 other Noahs around (usually 1 other around -- it was weird we always were in pairs). It is weird how suddenly everyone loves the name. I guess our parents were ahead of the trend! :)

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#75

Post by popcalc »

amcrouch wrote: post #15

I brought a .ch (swiss, worked for my name) domain and have only ever had a small handful of bad sites that "validate" via checking for .com. I would say if you're going to make it a lifetime domain then perhaps something that works in a personal and professional setting might be worth considering.

.CH and .LI should be the first pick if you're buying in long term. .COM etc. are Verisign Corp (essentially US Gov) names and you're screwed if there's a global conflict down the line and want to be treated neutrally. I'm not tying myself to the future Montenegrin (.ME) administration or god forbid some fly-by-night meme gTLD run out of Hong Kong that goes bankrupt in two years and defaults on their ICANN payments, getting wiped from the root zone.

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#76

Post by citrin_ru »

All anti-spam systems have false positives (some less, some more). Unusual things like an uncommon TLD make it more likely that you’ll be affected by an FP (and less likely that someone else would report it). You don’t need to stick to .com but I would avoid a TLD which has a low volume of legitimate emails.

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#77

Post by homebrewer »

ozim wrote: post #57
atlintots wrote: post #24

Do NOT use an uncommon TLD. I was using .lol recently and missed a job interview because the employer wasn't receiving any of my emails -- they kept getting rejected by their email servers! And I was only informed by Thunderbird weeks later when it was too late. Ever since then, I've just been using gmail for everything.

I think if you set your domain as custom domain with big provider and set DNS entries you will have much better results. But for personal mail it feels like waste of money instead of just using one of big providers domain directly.

It won't feel that way anymore when the big provider is closed or kicks you off because of another glitch in one of its anti-fraud systems which nobody seems to fully understand.

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#78

Post by popcalc »

bluedino wrote: post #64
mastazi wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that .ch is not an uncommon tld at all, it is the national tld of a country and it has existed for decades. I also think that the issue you had with forms requiring .com must have been an amateur made website because I can't imagine someone who develops for a living doing that type of mistake.

I would argue for most people, anything other than a .com, .edu could be "uncommon". I have had people question .net or .org... American perspective, I'm assuming people in Europe are used to things like the individual country domains. But it seems rare to even see .us here...

Because .COM is administered by a major US player in the military industrial complex, it's the de-facto US TLD. By choosing a dotcom you're signalling your commitment to play ball with US policy. This is why Rubmaps switched to .CH around the time of FOSTA-SESTA.

Re: Ask HN: Is it a bad idea to make an email domain with an uncommon TLD?

#79

Post by homebrewer »

popcalc wrote: post #75
amcrouch wrote: post #15

I brought a .ch (swiss, worked for my name) domain and have only ever had a small handful of bad sites that "validate" via checking for .com. I would say if you're going to make it a lifetime domain then perhaps something that works in a personal and professional setting might be worth considering.

.CH and .LI should be the first pick if you're buying in long term. .COM etc. are Verisign Corp (essentially US Gov) names and you're screwed if there's a global conflict down the line and want to be treated neutrally. I'm not tying myself to the future Montenegrin (.ME) administration or god forbid some fly-by-night meme gTLD run out of Hong Kong that goes bankrupt in two years and defaults on their ICANN payments,…

> getting wiped from the root zone

It won't come to that, there's an established process for transferring gTLDs to other registries. Every registry is required to provide a full backup of their domain data to ICANN every couple of weeks or so, I don't remember the exact period. You might get hit by significantly increased renewal fees, though.

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