EVENT:
Organized by ABC Namebank, a boutique naming consultancy now in its 30th year and being led by
Naseem Javed a recognized world authority on global naming complexities and corporate nomenclature.

TOPIC:
Which dictionary words will win gold, silver or bronze medal as top level domain names?
Each one of the 542 proposed dictionary word top level domains will be analyzed and categorized

AUDIENCE:
Global domain name expansion community, registrars, registries, domainers, trademark community,
branding & marketing professionals, entrepreneurs & private and public business sectors of the world.

OVERVIEW:
When a professional name evaluation based on the rules of naming and laws of corporate nomenclature are applied to each of the 542 dictionary words submitted as top level domains a blurry picture appears. It shows lots of winners but also lots of troublesome name choices. As the discussions are being heated by the day, now misinformation and unrealistic debates are surfacing causing confusion in the domain name industry, global business community and consumers at large.

This highly focused naming analysis based on laws of naming and rules of corporate nomenclature should create positive percussions on determining the value of proposed names during auctions and swaps. It will also provoke new marketing ideas based on name usage and offer sharper knowledge on navigation in global naming complexities. For trademark lawyers it will provide advance level creative nomenclature understanding and for marketing branding agencies, strategic options on branding issues. For ICANN and owners of gTLDs they will find this high value and timely ‘soft power’ education.

This individual name-by-name evaluation process incorporates many key steps.

The focus will be on name’s usability, suitability, and functionality, with marketing implications based on alpha structure and observations about obvious or hidden messages impacting longevity and global usage.

Assessing a name’s ease of use and recall based on its inherited alpha-structure, and marketability, if the name emulates single or multiple messages.  Longevity assesses if the name appears to have brandable values and also entices ownership by end users. Stretchability assesses, if the name appears to have elasticity to arch into other markets.  Long term registrability issues, although generic names are not trademark-able but some are even more diluted in varied terms causing communication failure and difficulties.

Such stringent professional analysis can predict the performance and longevity of a name.

ALL 542 GENERIC NAMES WILL BE CLASSIFIED AS FOLLOW

GOLD NAMES:
Safe Journey: Highly-Suitable Names; Where the name appears capable of delivering a clear message associated with the purpose, easy to work with and posses stretchability into expanding markets.

SILVER NAMES
Bumpy Roads: Moderately Suitable Names; Where the name appears as only capable to deliver its objective to a limited market and may impose some other or series of limitations.

BRONZE NAMES
Lost In the Jungle: Not-Suitable Names: Where the name appears to lack clarity and requires constant explanation to avoid confusion with other issues. Create long term costs to stay popular.

SUMMARY:
Despite all the technical brilliance and legal archery, at the end of the day, a gTLD is just a ‘name’. It makes no difference where the dot is placed it’s still a name and subjected to rules of corporate nomenclature and trademark laws.  Solid knowledge of global naming and corporate nomenclature is critical pre-requisite
 in gTLD name games. At this stage, the domain name expansion is unstoppable, the global hunger for brand name visibility is irresistible and the clash of the two is now inevitable. Denial of such facts may result in failures.

FACTS:
ICANN despite serious opposition has performed extremely well and is on right course to deliver gTLDs and global domain name expansion. However, ICANN seems to have viewed domain name only as a device to open websites, but today it’s in the in the eye of the storm of global ‘naming’ complexities where soft power of corporate nomenclature dominates the landscape. Sooner or later ICANN will have to show expertise in ‘soft power’ issues of naming and work parallel with ‘hard asset’ of technical sides or when accommodating trademark industry procedures. The gaps created by ignoring soft aspects of naming are creating massive confusion
in the market place. ICANN as a technical and hard asset issue management company must explore the balanced ‘soft-power’ aspects as a world-class organization.

FACTS:
By their mandate, trademark lawyers play a critical role in name conflicts, apply wisdom and clauses to defend and protect trademarks. However, such conflicts are post name selection issues; their mandate does not allow them to provide much earlier needed opinions on naming to their clients. As a result, the legal profession basically focuses on black and white issues and not the soft power nomenclature areas.

Here as a very small example; if ‘apple’ is in conflict with ‘abble’ they will apply the rules but are not mandated to create ‘pineapple’ ‘banana’ or ‘apple juice’ as alternate marketing solution. Such strategies are the realms of corporate nomenclature discipline. Now that the global naming complexities are so much on the forefront it is becoming increasingly important for lawyers to become well informed global naming experts. Where, when and how names are created and what really happens to ‘name suitability’ if wrongly thrown in the complex naming jungle to earn brand name equity.

Despite all the trademark protection and legal input, the entire proposed gTLD name applications, across the board, shows lack of name selection skills; on one side large numbers of weaker or dysfunctional names have been proposed and on the other real good winners were completely ignored.

FACTS:
Of all the related professional business services the advertising and branding agencies of world were best suited to take the lead and bridge the information gap on gTLD program. Their early and blunt refusal to entertain any of the gTLD issues or to engage in any serious fashion on global naming complexities only added confusion in the market place. Despite all that they are still best poised to lead the charge provided they get fully and openly engaged and attempt to become global experts on advanced level of corporate nomenclature alongside their traditional creative services.

FACTS:
From the start of e-commerce, the domain name industry, registrars, registries and domainers have seen amazing ups and down and full spectrum of domain naming.  However the upcoming sudden shifts from scarcity to massive abundance will force the industry professionals to be more acquainted with world-class naming rules. Incorporation of such soft side thinking of global naming along with their hard wire mentality of volume selling will be beneficial to the entire industry.

FACTS:
The outcry of the silent business majority due to seriously limited options of naming to allow decent brand building is where the next battles are hidden. The out of control trade mark registration and litigation costs are where the next major adjustments lie. All points to the critical need of global naming solutions for long
term benefits of the ever expanding marketplace. Dumping improperly conceived random gTLDs, will only create massive high volume defensive-registrations, and traffic jams at trademark clearing house. The future of global domain expansion is far brighter and skillful naming management must be at the core of this progression.

Naseem Javed

Founder      ABC Namebank                                now in 30th year
Author         Image Supremacy                             2013
Author         Domination, the gTLD name game   2012
Author         Naming for Power                             1993
Biography    Naseem Javed

Naseem Javed is a world recognized authority on corporate nomenclature, global and domain naming complexities, and cyber affairs. He is founder of ABC Namebank, a world-class speaker, syndicated columnist and author of several books. Naseem has led teams and personally created the name identities; TELUS, CELESTICA, INTRIA, GENNUM, VINCOR, DUPLIUM, AGRICORE, POLLARA, TRANZUM, INTEQNA and ZARLINK and hundreds more. He has also helped clients on various naming complexities like IBM, General Motors, Texaco, Honeywell, Bell Canada, KPMG, Bell South, RBH, GENTRA, CENTERPOST, OMNI-TV, Royal Bank, Sasktel, Johnson & Johnson, Air Canada, Radio Shack, Merck, BBDO, Petro Canada, ROGERS and COMPORIUM and hundreds more.