Inspired by new and old propaganda, we at IDNTools have a bit of a teaser for you. Something big is coming soon. The solution lies on the web of course. And your clue is below. Enjoy.

You only know English, but you are aware that there are opportunities in other non-English speaking countries. If you want to buy IDNs or other foreign domains for investment or development purposes, you absolutely need to verify the translation of your purchase. The seller isn’t necessarily going to be knowledgable.

While purists correctly stress that you need a native to manually take a look at a name to verify its translation, there are times when you should buy an IDN without a native’s input. For instance, some great IDNs were posted at bargain basement prices today on IDNForums. If you are concerned about missing a great opportunity while you are waiting for a translation to come through, and if the purchase price of the name is worth the risk (ie- it is not a $1,000+ purchase) then translate it using a quick and dirty method. Use Google Translate (or another quality autotranslator) and use Google Images to verify that the name is what you are looking for.

As an example, I bought キャップ.jp (Caps).jp. If you enter キャップ into Google images, you will see a bunch of baseball caps, which is exactly what I was looking for. If you don’t perform this check, you might be surprised with what you end up with:

Q: Is it correct that you recently bought РФ.com (“RF” or “Russian Federation” in Russian) for $60,000?

A: Yes

Q: How do you value this name? Is the forthcoming launch of the .РФ ccTLD a main reason for your purchase?

A: Absolutely, the launch of .РФ is mostly the reason for the purchase. I think that in light of the new IDN ccTLD, my domain has great potential aside from the obvious type-in traffic it’s going to get. I don’t relate so much to the price I paid or the upcoming increase in value, as my development plans will increase the value of the domain to completely different levels.

Q: When did you begin investing in IDNs? What other IDNs and domains in general do you own?

A: I am not a big IDN investor, my portfolio is rather modest so far. I prefer to keep my other assets confidential, for the moment. However I would say that my big purchases are always meant for development. I find it hard to understand those who buy premium domains for hundreds of thousands and just park them for years.

Q: What are your thoughts on the IDN market in general and on the Russian IDN market in particular?

A: I think that with the launch of the IDN ccTLDs the game is going to change. It may take a couple of years but ultimately people will be using domain names in their own language, just like they search in their own language.

Q: Do you plan to develop РФ.com, and if so, how? Do you plan to sell subdomains on the РФ.com name?

A: Absolutely – the site is going to be ready very soon and it is going to be a comprehensive directory for all the sites on the .РФ zone and a general information and community site about the russian IDN Internet. Later on it can develop in different directions. Selling subdomains at the moment is not so rellevant, however once I will have РФ.КОМ the sky is the limit, and selling subdomains is definitely an option. Especially as it seems that many desirable .РФ domains will be awarded to interested parties and government organizations, eliminating most of premium names from public access, so РФ.КОМ can become a great alternative, potentially even chewing into .РФ as the standard TLD for public use.

Q: Thank you for your time, and congratulations on a great purchase.

A: Thank you for a great blog, keep up the good work!

DomainFest New York this week was a big hit. Oversee.net CEO Jeff Kupietzky started off with a talk focused on dispelling domaining myths. Among Jeff’s key points was that the rise of apps and mobile devices may reduce the use of domains as navigational tools, but the brandable value of domains will remain a constant. Also interesting were Jeff’s examples of sites that Moniker itself owns and built out such as a Degrees.com, which is a great looking lead generation site.

Next, Naresh Rekhi of comScore spoke about Internet trends. Naresh’s presentation was statistics based, and as a bit of a numbers junkie myself it was interesting to digest the key growth areas such as video, international markets and entertainment sites. I had the opportunity to ask about the value of IDNs and foreign language online content in the Q&A portion of the presentation. Naresh’s response was that in some countries such as India using IDNs and foreign language content it isn’t as useful given the prevalent usage of English, but in other countries, locals prefer their native language to English both online and in print.



The keynote speaker, David Mason, Senior Vice President from AOL addressed content creation with an emphasis on his video content creation platform StudioNow. Though he admitted that his pricing is not yet cheap enough for domainers looking to populate hundreds of sites, over time this is worth keeping on eye on as a development solution.


Perhaps the most enjoyable part of DomainFest was the lunch and structured networking sessions. I personally met many new faces in the domaining community and it was fun to have so many innovative people in one room.

As a recap of this week’s “Domain Masters” show on Webmaster Radio,
I was fortunate to have the opportunity to discuss IDNs with Chef Patrick and the audio is available here.

1. How to Measure an Investment Opportunity

I am aware of new extensions that are likely to eclipse the total number of IDNs registered in the near future. Does this mean that IDNs are a poor opportunity, and that you should invest in what everyone else is investing in? Precisely the opposite.

Would you like to go into an apple orchard right after many millions have already been there to pick the best fruit? Of course not. The complete reverse is also not adviseable. I am not suggesting that you go and pick apples by yourself in completely undesirable and rotten orchards, (i.e. domains types with no prospects for growth) but that you go to find opportunities where others didn’t have the perseverance to get there. If people are writing off an investment type because of laziness or because it is too complex to understand, a lightbulb should go off. Here is your opportunity. Jump on it. Warren Buffett said “stick to what you know”, but he never said “don’t try to learn new things.” Kudos to guys like Patrick, Elliot, Andrew, Morgan, Ron, Shane and others who have engaged in a friendly and interested dialogue about IDNs rather than ignoring them altogether.

2. Think for Yourself About Prospects for Growth

Weigh the pros and cons of IDNs for yourself. People want to speak in their native languages. Would you like it if you had to register domain names in Chinese or Russian? Consider that in those populous, wealthy, nationalistic countries, businesses and individuals will likely be very eager to register domains in their language as awareness increases that they already have the capacity to do so. So what that parking platforms are not yet where they should be in terms of being IDN friendly, and resales are rising but are not yet equivalent to that of the Latin (ASCII) world. You can’t have it both ways. If you want a time warp to the early 1990s, you will not get all of the luxuries of a mature market.

3. Social Proof

Don’t do things just so you’ll have “social proof” to look cool in the eyes of others. As Patrick and I emphasized on the show it is better to have a small quality portfolio than a large one. You don’t have to register thousands of names to be a domainer. If you have 3 quality names that is often much better than 5,000 mediocre ones and the accompanying reg fees.

4. Understand Aliasing and New ccTLDs

Why now? Weren’t IDNs available since 2000? If they didn’t catch on yet why will they catch on now? (A) Because of aliasing, owners of IDN.com likely will own IDN.[com-IDN]. (B) Because a number of IDN ccTLDs are being introduced and will raise awareness as to the availability of IDNs.