Nivi · May 4th, 2010
Say hello to vh.co, our new short URL, powered by bit.ly Pro.
.co domains will be available to the general public in June. But! the registrar has created a program called .CO Founder to give legit startups early access to .co domains. That’s how we got vh.co.
I’m pretty psyched about .co. Other domains like .us, .es, and .ly are cool but I don’t know if they make sense to normal people. I think .co has a good chance of going mainstream and we’re putting our money where our mouth is.
venturehacks.com is staying right where it is — we’re just using vh.co for short URLs on Twitter. You can also enter vh.co in your mobile Web browser and we’ll take you to the mobile version of venturehacks.com.
Startups who want to put .co domains to good use should apply to the .CO Founder program. Tell ’em we sent you. Everyone else can pre-register for general availability at their favorite registrar.
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Problem is that this is just re-selling on the Columbian .co extension because the Columbian government saw a quick, easy buck. Google always rank sites low from South American countries and that likely won’t change with this. Depends how they decide to view the situation.
If you don’t need a high search ranking, then that’s ok.
If you do, then could be an issue.
Not true… the only thing that matters to G are the linking patterns. Look at .ME and .TV … both ccTLDs marketed to a broader audience. If search engines were archaic enough to rely on the extension of a domain to determine geographic location, they simply wouldn’t work.
IMHO, this is going to be huge. Good move.
You seriously have to apply for .CO Founder by applying via PDF?
I worry it might be too close to .com domains: for example is it vh.com or vh.co ?
How much detail did you need to provide as responses for the questions on the CO founders form? Seems like a rather extensive document for a domain name…
@SeanMurphy – I have a similar concern with the domain name – probably ok for URL shorteners, but if you try to give the domain to anyone verbally or visually, I think it would be a point of confusion.