Josh Bourne ⬥ February 20
“Spectacular execution of a wonderful event.” That was the assessment of one participant at the Beyond the Dot 2014 conference Wednesday at the Newseum in Washington, D.C.
The conference focused on the effect of new top-level domains on average Internet users and drew a capacity crowd of over 150, several well-received speakers, and multiple media stories.
In Washington D.C., #beyondthedot was even trending on Twitter yesterday afternoon.
Guests came from as far away as the west coast and Europe and included applicants for new top-level domains, brand owners, marketers, lawyers, and industry insiders.
Over the course of the day, skilled moderators led seven panels in lively discussions about how Internet governance is evolving, exactly what the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) does, and how brands are crafting digital strategies to accommodate the revolution in the domain name space.
New top-level domain owners, including luxury brands owner Richemont and storage giant Extra Space Storage, said they originally applied as a hedge to protect their brands but came to realize the opportunity new top-level domains hold.
Google’s so-called “gTLD guy” Jordyn Buchanan said Google realized the security benefits of a new top-level domain after a number of its sites in country code top-level domains – such as .IN for India or .PK for Pakistan – were repeatedly hacked.
Erwin Cruz said industrial supply company Grainger applied for .SAFETY to create a community for safety professionals. And Melissa Madigan of the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy gave four reasons for their .PHARMACY application: Legitimacy, trustworthiness, security, and safety.
“You guys thought of (every) detail and put (together) an agenda that was extremely relevant,” said Shaul Jolles, owner of .UNO, which aims to be the Spanish version of .COM “I have yet to be (at) a conference that absolutely everybody felt was well done. Well, here it was the consensus. Well done.”
In the mean time, reach out to us to have a conversation about what you need to know to adapt your own digital strategy, and keep your eye on this blog for video clips of the event.