.XXX has been approved.
A few days ago, ICANN -- the quasi-government corporation that oversees the internet’s naming and numbering system, approved the .XXX top level domain. .XXX will operate much like .COM does now -- meaning it will be a domain name people can type into their browsers to take them to a website -- but similar to the way .GOV is reserved for governmental organizations, .XXX will be reserved for pornographic or adult content websites.

Current expectations are that .XXX will be available for purchase and use by year’s end.

I called upon ICANN to approve .XXX.
In my keynote speech recently delivered at the annual Domain Roundtable Conference industry meeting in Seattle on May 25th, I called upon ICANN to approve the .XXX top level domain. I personally believe that out of all the new top level domains being approved, .XXX is one that makes a great deal of sense and will serve a useful purpose.

I support .XXX for the following reasons:

• It quickly and obviously describes the content of the website associated with the .XXX domain name. Thus, if people don’t want to view adult content, they will know immediately not to click on the link or type the name in their browser. In a similar fashion, those that seek this stuff out will know that the content probably associated with a .XXX domain name may be what they want to see.
• It will allow better monitoring for parents who want to keep their kids away from adult content websites. They can use the .XXX extension in their outgoing filters to block access, or they can readily see in their browsing activity logs if .XXX websites were visited. This is much more difficult to do if the adult sites use .COM domain names.
• It will allow for better filtering for emails originating from incoming .XXX emails. Because the .XXX top level domain is easily identified as being associated with adult content, blocking it is much simpler.

.XXX is not a perfect solution.
Is .XXX a complete solution to eliminating accidental access to adult sites, or for parents and others to completely control access to these sites, or to filter their incoming email? The answer to this question would be an absolute no.

Adult website operators will not voluntarily let go of their .COM names.
The reason .XXX is not a perfect solution, is because most of the adult content sites currently use .COM extensions. You can be sure that adult site operators will most certainly snap up their .XXX equivalents (i.e., the owners of girls.com will purchase girls.xxx – or at least attempt to do so). However, they will be very reluctant to let go of their .COM domain names. This will detract from the effectiveness of .XXX.

It’s going to take awhile for .XXX to really work.
Still, the significance of .XXX names will grow in importance as new adult sites register their names to .XXX, and existing adult sites migrate away from .COM (and .other top level domains) to use .XXX exclusively. I suspect that it will take some sort of government intervention to require adult sites to use only .XXX extensions. It’s anybody’s guess when and if the government will take such action here.

It’s going to take action by private industry and the government to resolve the matter entirely.
Another solution might be for browser manufacturers to only allow users to access adult websites when a .XXX domain name is used. In other words, attempts to access websites containing adult content with web site addresses that use other top level domain extensions such as .COM or .NET, simply wouldn’t resolve. I suspect that we will need a combination of government and private solutions to solve the adult content issues to most everyone's satisfaction.

Some religious groups oppose .XXX.
As can be expected, certain religious groups oppose .XXX. One is a right-wing group called the Family Research Council. They released a statement immediately after ICANN approved the .XXX extension. Its statement read as follows:

"The new domain would do more harm than good," said Patrick Trueman, FRC's senior legal counsel and former chief of the U.S. Department of Justice's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section. "The .com domain has been a cash cow for the porn industry and pornographers will not give it up and remove themselves to the '.xxx' domain. Instead, they will populate the .xxx domain and perhaps double the number of porn sites available on the Web."

According to the web news service PressEsc the above group also blamed the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq on MTV. So it makes sense to take what they say with a huge grain of salt.

.XXX is a start.
I admit that the .XXX extension is not the overall solution. However, it’s a start -- and it’s one that makes sense to implemente. After .XXX becomes a reality, we’ll be able to see more clearly what the next steps should be.

Annual Cost of a .XXX domain name.
As of this writing, I do not know for sure what a .XXX domain name will cost. Early contacts we've made indicate that the price to registrars will be $60. Registrars will then mark it up from there, so it could very well cost the end user anywhere from $70 to well over $100, depending upon where it is registered. If that rumoured pricing turns out to be true, I personally think it's a dumb move by the registry, and that it will backfire in two ways. The first is that there will be far less adoption of .XXX (meaning many porn sites, especially budding ones, simply will purchase a .COM or .NET instead) and second, the registry will realize far less earnings that it otherwise would. I would hope the registry and ICANN both wake up here, and that the price to registrars is dropped to below $10.

.PRO is a case study for a failed domain name.
The high pricing of .XXX reminds me of the introduction of .PRO, which took place a few years ago. .PRO has to be the biggest failure of any new domain name of which I'm aware. The price for a .PRO was set in the hundreds of dollars -- initially I think it was something stupid like $500 -- and it required the registrant to submit proof of their standing as a professional -- such as an architect or a doctor. So it was both expensive and a pain to register. Since that's a deadly combination for selling anything, the .PRO domain went nowhere, and to this day it's meaningless. In fact, in spite of repeated requests from the registry, I've refused to offer it. I think the .PRO people might be better served by redefining the domain name so that, rather than being for white collar professionals, it becomes exclusive to hookers (as you might know from watching any episode of The Shield or other police drama, hookers are often called "pros." Plus, there's the added bonus that if the re-launch is successful, we might even start calling them dot pros ). The .PRO registry, of course, would also need to drastically lower the price.

GoDaddy.com plans to offer .XXX names.
I’ve been asked many times if Go Daddy plans to offer .XXX domain names when they become available. The answer to that question is yes. I will also say that if the price for a .XXX is high my enthusiasm for selling it will be somewhat chilled.

As always, you can expect our prices to be very competitive with the rest of the industry.