Recent Posts
- Is a .tree gTLD very cool or very silly?
- The internet just got its first new TLD since 2022
- Kid-friendly domains could be reborn
- Shrinking .us TLD is up for grabs
- Namecheap saw 116,000 phishing attacks last year
- .io safe for now as Trump puts Chagos deal on ice
- Amazon sells three gTLDs to Identity Digital
- .radio’s new owners might have a fight on their hands
- WIPO doubles the speed of UDRP cases
- Amazon joining GlobalBlock
- Unstoppable buys 10 new registrars
- ICANN cleaning house, cans four more registrars
- ICANN to throw millions more at cheapo gTLDs
- Introducing Stringtel, my new free new gTLD tool
- GlobalBlock signs the two best deals it will ever get
- Seven registrars get terminated
- GoDaddy launches DomainMaxxing to optimize your domains
- .latino gTLD to launch soon
- Amazon readies .pay gTLD
- Nominet reveals first DNS tech funding recipients
- ICANN hit with tinfoil-hat lawsuit
- .pn relaunches — you’ll never guess what they say it means
- Unstoppable focuses on proper domains, admits crypto was “craze”
- ICANN boss: no plans to scrap Oman meeting
- China domains dip in 2026
- ICANN maps out new gTLD timeline
- War disrupts ICANN 85
- Namecheap abandons fight for .org price caps
- Identity Digital acquires another gTLD
- Seven dead registrars on the out
- Sav.com owner takes over .radio gTLD
- .com zone tops 160 million domains
- ai.com, the most-expensive domain sale ever
- .ai hits seven figures, raises prices
- Typosquatter gets two years in jail
- Epstein low-balled registrants to get his exact-match domain
- Epstein bought “mother” domains for Fergie while serving time
- Two former ICANN directors want back in
- Former ICANN director could lose control of ccTLD
- UK launches “police.ai”, but does it own the domain?
- Team Internet still in talks to sell off domains unit
- NamesCon returning to Miami in November
- “Mad Dog” politician registers nazis.us, redirects to Trump admin site
- “Lowest Price Guaranteed!” $48 .com registrar canned
- No RDAP? No accreditation
- Fifth-largest gTLD not dead after all
- Half of registrar’s domains are abusive, ICANN says
- Burr joins PIR after leaving ICANN board
- Refunds galore as gTLD losers finally bow out
- .goo terminated as search engine closes down
- GoDaddy to offer domain blocking to people who don’t have trademarks
- Happy new year expected for domain industry, says ICANN
- Salesforce to apply for a dot-brand
- Team Internet looking to break up
- Noss to leave Tucows corner office
- Rubens Kühl has died
- Sinha angry with Chapman’s firing as ICANN vice chair
- Glitch redux: ICANN screws up new gTLD security again
- CentralNic claims second-largest TLD migration ever
- DNS issue at Amazon takes out major apps and sites
- .io sales almost double over three years
- Amazon delays book and fashion gTLDs
- Lindqvist shuffles the exec deck
- GoDaddy launches “ultra-premium” domain marketplace
- .mobi to get a new rival in .mobile
- Bye-bye .boomer! Blockchain players abandon new gTLD plans
- Decades-old US registrar gets a spanking
- love.you sold in apparent five-figure deal
- Bogus harassment complaints could get you an ICANN ban
- ICANN slaps open-mic ban on conflicted lawyers
- Final GTFO warning for 19 failed new gTLD bids
- Nominet opens $500,000 fund for open source projects
- Com Laude buys larger rival Markmonitor
- Epik took down Charlie Kirk doxing site
- Number of subsidized gTLD bidders far lower than thought
- Another registrar goes AWOL
- gTLD loses its second-largest registrar after breach
- Com Laude buys Fairwinds
- Unstoppable wants to be a registry back-end
- Sixteen new gTLD bids could face the firing squad
- Registry to release one-letter domains tomorrow
- New ICANN funding rules will cost smaller ccTLDs more
- .ai rival lines up gTLD bid
- Team Internet lays off 200
- Sixteen more orgs vie for cheap gTLDs, but…
- So who’s registering sunrise domains these days?
- Cloud gTLD gets launch dates
- Governments say new gTLD program “credibility” at stake
- NIXI planning doomed new gTLD bids
- AI experts replace Chapman on ICANN board
- RDRS may not be dead
- Single-letter .com lawsuit thrown out of court
- Golding challenges McCarthy for Nominet board seat
- Three applicants qualify for cheapo gTLDs
- Blockchain crisis looming for new gTLD next round
- Two more dot-brands leave Verisign for GoDaddy
- ICANN looking at new bulk reg rules
- Reseller loss hits Tucows’ DUM but not revenue
- GoDaddy counts cost of losing .co deal
- Wine producers worried about new gTLDs
- Goodyear tires of its dot-brand
- Team Internet loses Radix to Tucows
- ICANN’s “review of reviews” kicks off
- Huge registrars flee from RDRS
- Namecheap loses attempt to bring back .org price caps
- Registrar shamed for alleged crypto abuse neglect
- Poblete’s ICANN board seat safe
- .com off to strong start in Q3
- .my is growing like crazy
- ICANN settles $77 million sexual harassment suit
- Chinese domain spikiness ends in first half
- Registrars agree to higher ICANN fees
- ICANN to review reviews after review review request fails
- Got junk? June’s biggest gTLD growers do
- ICANN ditches Oman due to Middle-East conflicts
- ICANN’s mighty overlord flexes on transparency
- ICANN faces first pushback over DEI U-turn
- Loads of firms flunk out of next-round gTLD back-end program
- presidenttrump.xxx among thousands of dead .xxx domains suddenly springing to life
- One of the dumbest gTLDs just switched back-ends
- GoDaddy loses .co to Team Internet
- Governments erect bulk-reg barrier to new gTLD next round
- Little interest in cheapo gTLD program
- US government opposes most new gTLDs
- GoDaddy loses last Amazon business to Identity Digital
Is a .tree gTLD very cool or very silly?
.tree is one of the first-ever publicly announced gTLD applications, predating even the 2012 application round, and it seems to have been proposed for a second time.
A web site using dottree.org, registered a week ago, is saying there’s a plan to apply for .tree in the forthcoming ICANN application round, with a charitable goal.
The project says it will donate a dollar from every .tree domain registration and annual renewal to a charity that plants trees in Dubai, with each $1 donation putting one tree in the ground.
At first glance, it seems like a nice idea, but I’m not sure it holds up to closer inspection.
There may be virtue-signalling advantages to running a site on a .tree domain if you’re in the environmental game or lumber business.
But if a registrant’s primarily interest is getting trees planted, why not just donate a buck to a reforestation charity directly? Why not donate the full amount you would otherwise have spent on the domain? Or more?
And how much demand would there be for .tree domains on their own merits?
Fortunately, DI’s new Stringtel tool has some data there. According to Stringtel, about 47,000 current .com/.net/.org domain names end in the substring “tree”, which may give an indication of potential registrations. About 2,000 of those end in “familytree”.
That’s the same frequency as we see domains end in “wine”, “dog”, or “paris”, and the three gTLDs matching those strings each have 17,000 to 18,000 domains under management, which is not terrible.
Should .tree perform just as well, envelope-based calculation suggest it would create the equivalent of a smallish forest that could be traversed on foot in minutes and not really suck much CO2 out of our increasingly fragile atmosphere.
But the .tree proposal would have a second forest of the same size planted in the second year (assuming 100% domain renewals) and so on. The effect would stack up over time, so maybe the idea does have merit.
Domain Incite relies on support from readers like you to survive. Please consider making a one-off or recurring donation via PayPal. Please support Domain Incite, the independent source of news, analysis and opinion for the domain name industry and ICANN community.
Recent Comments