This was a horrible idea back when it was first proposed, and now it’s just going to end up costing the wrong people a hell of a lot of money…
Colleges, Businesses Snap Up .xxx Domains
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57340834-93/colleges-businesses-snap-up-.xxx-domains/
For those unfamiliar with the story, the concept was innocent enough – somebody had the idea to create a new top-level domain (like .com, .net, .edu) with the intent of corralling pornographic websites off into a specific corner of the Internet to better allow parents and companies to filter them out for underage or inappropriate audiences. So kinkysex.com might instead become kinkysex.xxx, with the .xxx extension helping to designate that the site was pornographic in nature.
One little problem, though … there’s no actual way to force such companies to only buy .xxx domain names, as opposed to their coveted .com names that have been actively in place for more than a decade!
So instead of doing any actual good, in essence ICANN (the governing body that oversees the domain registry) basically gave ICM – the company who solicited the rights to operate the new TLD, a license to print money and exploit normal, everyday companies because while porn companies have really no drive or desire to purchase these names, other non-pornographic companies and colleges and whatnot have considerable reason to purchase them simply so that someone else doesn’t register disney.xxx or target.xxx and put up something that might tarnish their company’s reputation.
ICM will get rich, pornographers won’t bat an eye, and it’s pretty much all ICANN’s fault. Way to regulate, guys… 👿