In case anyone had stopped wondering why The Boston Globe shouldn’t be trusted with large sums of cash, guess who turned out to be the only American newspaper to apply for a Top Level Domain Name (TLD).
This month, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) released its list of 1,930 applications for new Top Level Domain names as ICANN prepares to increase the number of recognized Top Level Domains.
With its $185,000 “investment” The Boston Globe joined the illustrious ranks of Knob Town LLC and Qatar’s Supreme Council of Information and Communication Technology in seeking its very own TLD as well as the right to control that same TLD.
TLDs are the extensions on the back end of web addresses, such as .com, .org, or .net. With the new expansion, web developers will be able to forgo the traditional .com ending to a website address for one that makes less sense and will likely be forgotten within weeks.
As the Washington Post broke it down last week, it cost $185,000 just to apply, which doesn’t account for the additional costs of operating as registrar for the TLD.
We bet that sounds good to all of the full-time Boston.com correspondents who were stiffed by the Globe with a bigger tax bill last April thanks to the benefits of being “independent contractors.”
The application was filled out by Jeff Moriarity, VP of Digital Productions at the Globe. Considering the high cost of the application, one can only imagine how much of the Globe’s cash he’s blown on frivolous tech innovations.
We’re assuming his office is the one with the Twitter toilet and the life-size love robot. The application touts the number of uses the city could get out of a .Boston extension, with new websites such as mayor.Boston, or police.Boston, which the Globe says it will provide the city—most likely free of charge.
In return, the city sent a letter of support on behalf of the Globe to obtain the TLD.
Who cares that the Globe and the City seem to have formed a business relationship? It’s like one is ethically charged to act as a watch dog against the other—oh wait …
In addition to all this, who knows how much money the Globe plans to throw at the creation of a Boston.com streaming radio station, helmed by former WFNX outcasts?
More importantly, how will a media outlet as culturally numb as the Globe live up to the expectations of what will likely be treated as a resurrected WFNX?
Perhaps that’s just the Globe’s new business model—buy a larger readership base one expensive niche at a time.
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