Bit.ly, the URL shortener now used by Twitter, is not the first company to craft its name out of a county code top-level domain (ccTLD).
But Bit.ly does appear to be the first company to do so with the Libyan ccTLD.
As some have speculated, Bit.ly could put itself into a precarious position should it begin hosting URLs for the adult industry, or any other industry that violates Libyan laws. It’s always important to keep in mind that a company can’t “own” a domain the way it owns real estate.
But this is all just speculation. The registrar Libyan Spider clearly is hoping to capitalize on all the “ly” permutations of a word or brand name. And the fact of the matter is that more and more countries are viewing their country codes as profit centers.
Which leads me to a brief inventory of the sites that I am aware of that use ccTLDs as part of their names:
- Delicio.us (USA)
- Pdk.to (Tonga)
- Short.LA (Laos)
- fav.or.it (Italy)
- good.is (Iceland)
- drop.io (British Indian Ocean Territory)
- MyID.is (Iceland)
- Outside.in (India)
- imo.im (Isle of Man)
- Tr.im (Isle of Man)
- Pi.pe (Peru)
- notify.me (Montenegro)
- Rafi.ki (Kiribati)
- Su.pr (Puerto Rico)
- look.fo (Faroe Islands)
I’m rather surprised at the range of countries represented here. Montenegro, by the way, has already sold more than 250,000 domains so far. Not bad for a country that’s less than a few years old.
Any companies that I missed?
UPDATE: Thanks to the commenter below I’ve added Tri.im — and I also came across Pi.pe. Any more I should include?
UPDATE 2: Just added Su.pr — yet another URL shortener.
UPDATE 3: Added good.is
UPDATE 4: Added Look.fo. Faroe Islands. Go figure.
