Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Change Your Name

paulgraham.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 355 posts

Re: Change Your Name

#201

Post by clamprecht »

machbio wrote: post #120

I have a doubt about names - sorry to stray away from the topic but it would help me giving away the domain i have for the future. I have a domain name which is registered as trademark by one of the organizations, can the organization claim the domain name since they own the trademark ?

I'd like to second this question - does anyone know? Many people grab the domain name, but don't file the trademark (which is more expensive). Can someone just file the trademark and then go after the domain name?

Re: Change Your Name

#202

Post by cpeterso »

rwallace wrote: post #156
cpeterso wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always wondered how long will domain squatters wait before they negotiate. Surely Tesla Motors has approached tesla.com and apparently been turned down. Telsa Motors has shown they don't need that domain name to succeed. So when will the squatter, if ever, cave to Tesla Motors' offer?

Maybe never. The Homo Economicus model of human behavior as optimizing for expected economic return is only a first approximation. In some cases, human behavior is more accurately modeled as "Mine! My precious!"

Yeah. I imagine if the offer and counteroffer are rebuffed, the squatter enters "well, now you're never gonna get it" mode.

Re: Change Your Name

#203

Post by pepon »

natch wrote: post #159
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #52

I couldn't disagree more with this article and am kinda surprised Paul wrote about this. Domain names are transitioning into becoming useless. When you open any web browser or mobile phone and go to look for a company it does a search. The most relevant results come back at the top. This type of trend, as we abstract away from using TLDs, is only going to continue. Owning a .com isn't nearly as meaningful today as it…

You completely ignored PG's argument about it signaling weakness. This is one of those perception versus reality things, where people's perceptions (those who are judging a startup) ARE the reality, whether those perceptions are theoretically refutable or not. In other words, let's say you're right, and owning the .com domain name is becoming less meaningful (an argument that PG already addressed, by the way). That d…

But changing perception is in our hands. If everybody starts not giving a F for the .com, then people will start not caring about that... If we keep fighting for the .com we are just supporting that ugly business of buying nice domain names in order to sell them for a ridiculous price to people that actually want create something.

Re: Change Your Name

#204

Post by clamprecht »

tzury wrote: post #150

PG a) Thanks for writing new posts. I have been missing your writings for quite long. b) IIRC, Dropbox started as getdropbox.com, just later on, when money "was not an issue", they purchased the more expensive one - dropbox.com. same applies to uber.com, square (which started as squareapp.com) and many others.

Best case I can think of is facebook, who started with "thefacebook.com", and later bought facebook.com. Also, didn't AirBNB start with airbedandbreakfast.com? (which now redirects to airbnb.com)

Re: Change Your Name

#205

Post by rokhayakebe »

jsalit wrote: post #97
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #52

I couldn't disagree more with this article and am kinda surprised Paul wrote about this. Domain names are transitioning into becoming useless. When you open any web browser or mobile phone and go to look for a company it does a search. The most relevant results come back at the top. This type of trend, as we abstract away from using TLDs, is only going to continue. Owning a .com isn't nearly as meaningful today as it…

You're assuming most people search first; many users don't even understand the difference between entering a search term versus a URL in a browser address bar. Yet, non-techy people know ".com".

Actually many non-techy do this:

1) Open browser, 2) Defaults to whatever search engine that add-on they have switch them to, 3) Type facebook, or facebook.com, or whatever they are looking for, 4) Click first result. If fails, go back, look around, click other result.

Re: Change Your Name

#206

Post by chaostheory »

ThomPete wrote: post #189
natch wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You completely ignored PG's argument about it signaling weakness. This is one of those perception versus reality things, where people's perceptions (those who are judging a startup) ARE the reality, whether those perceptions are theoretically refutable or not. In other words, let's say you're right, and owning the .com domain name is becoming less meaningful (an argument that PG already addressed, by the way). That d…

signaling weakness is an important factor for a fraction of companies for most others that is the very least of their worries. PG talks from a perspective that does not apply to most companies in this world. Again if you get a .com name that is great. But whether it's worth the effort of finding one it if you don't have it already is another discussion all together.

> But whether it's worth the effort of finding one it if you don't have it already is another discussion all together.

Whether or not you agree with pg, finding a decent .com is pretty cheap in terms of time and money when you have free domain name checking services that give you available .com variants of desired keywords. Even though I know this, I'm still always surprised when I see the 2-3 syllable .com domain names that I wanted, being available without auction or private seller inquiries.

Re: Change Your Name

#207

Post by rokhayakebe »

natch wrote: post #159
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #52

I couldn't disagree more with this article and am kinda surprised Paul wrote about this. Domain names are transitioning into becoming useless. When you open any web browser or mobile phone and go to look for a company it does a search. The most relevant results come back at the top. This type of trend, as we abstract away from using TLDs, is only going to continue. Owning a .com isn't nearly as meaningful today as it…

You completely ignored PG's argument about it signaling weakness. This is one of those perception versus reality things, where people's perceptions (those who are judging a startup) ARE the reality, whether those perceptions are theoretically refutable or not. In other words, let's say you're right, and owning the .com domain name is becoming less meaningful (an argument that PG already addressed, by the way). That d…

re:Signaling weakness.

True, but to whom. Most people don't know the difference between getDropbox.com and Dropbox.com.

Re: Change Your Name

#208

Post by martin-adams »

So it feels like this is a prejudice against startups who aren't using the .com TLD and I suspect would come more from investors and partners than users.

Maybe the point is that for startups that do get traction and funding, finding a .com is an inevitable task, one that could save a lot of money/energy by addressing it in the early stages. That inevitable task may be borne out of the CEO being tired of answering why they didn't go for a .com.

There has actually been no justification as to why a .com is required. Simply saying non .com is "marginal" and "it signals weakness" is not a root reason. All it shows is that some people have a differing opinion on the value of a .com and not agreeing with 'them' means you're weak.

I personally do feel more comfortable having a good sounding .com, but if I'm going to do it, it has to be for the right reasons. That I don't think has been clearly expressed in this essay.

My reasons are that it's a global identity, globally indexable by search engines, the most common global LTD and therefore the most memorable by end users, and more stable from a root server point of view. Would I think a startup with another name is weak? No. I would assume that they understand the implications of a non-.com TLD.

Re: Change Your Name

#209

Post by ozim »

natch wrote: post #159
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #52

I couldn't disagree more with this article and am kinda surprised Paul wrote about this. Domain names are transitioning into becoming useless. When you open any web browser or mobile phone and go to look for a company it does a search. The most relevant results come back at the top. This type of trend, as we abstract away from using TLDs, is only going to continue. Owning a .com isn't nearly as meaningful today as it…

You completely ignored PG's argument about it signaling weakness. This is one of those perception versus reality things, where people's perceptions (those who are judging a startup) ARE the reality, whether those perceptions are theoretically refutable or not. In other words, let's say you're right, and owning the .com domain name is becoming less meaningful (an argument that PG already addressed, by the way). That d…

I agree here with Natch, compare point about signaling weakness with sending your CV from "fancy_kid_45@gmail.com" to "firstname.lastname@gmail.com" or even "firstname@lastname.com" what looks most professional? Can you imagine reading CV of a person with fancy kid mail?

Re: Change Your Name

#210

Post by brianmurphy »

tsomctl wrote: post #94
seasoup wrote: post #77

Are you all seriously arguing with Paul Graham about something in his realm of expertise that only someone with a vast experience in multiple startups can form an informed opinion of, or someone that has undertaken a serious research study thereof? If you are not one of those two, just smile, nod, and change your name. If pg suggests something, he thinks it's important, if he thinks it's important enough to write an…

You might want to read up on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

tsomctl, the other side of the coin is that we have a bunch of people arguing the color of the bicycle shed instead of listening to an expert on the issue.
Post reply on HN