by Oluwatobi Solumbo

There was and still is .COM, .ORG, .NET, .ME, .NAME, .INFO, .US, and now .XXX (for porn sites). The sale of the .XXX domain extension commenced earlier this week after its approval by Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

Now that ICANN has successfully created an independent extension for porn sites, it will become easier for parents to prevent their kids from visiting porn sites

Though, the debate to create a separate extension for sites with pornographic contents has been on since year 2000, the implication of this is that internet users can now register domain names that end with .XXX.

Some categories of people have been against this move and are still doing everything possible within their capacity to prevent the widespread adoption of this initiative. On the other hand, another group of internet users believe it’s a great move. I must accept that this issue has been a controversial one and basically, the primary aim of this piece is not to decide on whether the idea is moral or not.

First, it is important to note that the .XXX domain extension is not only meant for porn sites. It’s equally great for companies who want to protect their brand to acquire a ‘.XXX’ extension of their primary domain. This is necessary so as to prevent internet evil doers from attacking their brand by building a porn site in their name. As a result of this, companies like Pepsi, Nike and some other popular brands have reserved a ‘.XXX’ extension for their brand. It was even reported that a couple of Universities in America have reserved some ‘.XXX’ extensions of names related to their universities. For instance, Kansas University reportedly paid about $3,000 to reserve some triple X domain names.

Now that ICANN has successfully created an independent extension for porn sites, it will become easier for parents to prevent their kids from visiting porn sites. All they have to do is to disable all ‘.XXX’ domain names. This is based on the assumption that all porn sites will register or even migrate completely to the new ‘.XXX’ extension. If not, this argument becomes invalid.

Porn sites have actually been generally negative to this development. Most of them are afraid of being censored if they register a ‘.XXX’ extension of their domain name. If this trend continues, then the ‘.XXX’ extension may not gain more popularity some years down the line (just like the .mobi extension).

“Let’s be adult about it. Create an adult Web presence or protect your brand.” That’s Godaddy’s statement on its ‘.XXX’ Domain registration page. Godaddy now sells a ‘.XXX’ domain at 99.99$ per year. I hope none of the readers here will register one for immoral reasons. Keep Evolving!

Oluwapelumi