On May 22, the domain “dot-mobi,” a domain specifically designed for mobile devices, officially went live. However, it has not received unanimous support.
Some experts argue that the “dot-mobi” domain is simply an unnecessary development plan.
The Mobile Top Level Domain (mTLD) – a company granted the authority by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to manage this new domain since last summer – officially opened registrations for the “dot-mobi” domain on the previous Monday. mTLD is a coalition of Ericsson, Google, Microsoft, Nokia, Samsung Electronics, T-Mobile, and Vodafone.
Despite the widespread popularity of mobile phones and the Internet in today’s society, very few people actually use their phones to browse the web. One of the primary reasons is that accessing web content on mobile devices can be relatively difficult; some websites require support for WAP protocols, while others only need a simple dot-com domain. Additionally, users often struggle to remember which websites use traditional web domains.
The dot-mobi domain promises to solve this problem. The idea behind creating this domain is to help users understand that if they access a website with a dot-mobi domain, it will be formatted specifically for mobile devices.
“Some websites have been optimized for mobile users, but others have not,” said Vance Hedderel, a spokesperson for mTLD. “We are striving to simplify the identification of which websites are accessible via mobile devices. We have established optimal usage guidelines and practices for developers to make mobile browsing easier and more efficient.”
On the first day of opening registrations for the dot-mobi domain, thousands of domains were registered. Yahoo, Google, 20th Century Fox, Nokia, Sony, Vodafone, and Microsoft were among the first registrants.
However, not everyone in the mobile community believes that the dot-mobi domain is necessary to promote the adoption of mobile Internet.
Anil Malhotra, Vice President of Product Marketing at Bango – a company specializing in mobile website solutions – believes that the launch of the dot-mobi domain will temporarily hinder the development of mobile Internet.
“Content providers should only promote one link for their website rather than adding another dot-mobi address, as this will only consume additional time and costs for promotion and help users recognize the new address,” Malhotra stated.
However, Malhotra also believes that there should be no restrictions on developers using the dot-mobi domain to build websites specifically for mobile devices, as this will ensure that content is displayed more accurately on those devices.
Malhotra is confident that major brand names will still be willing to spend an additional $200 to register a dot-mobi domain to protect their brand identity on the Internet.
The registration of the dot-mobi domain will officially open to all parties starting August 28.
Hoàng Dũng
