Why .WANG the Newest Chinese TLD Is Taking Over
July 24, 2014
By jbourne
Have you heard of .WANG? WANG, which translates to “dot net”, or “king” is one of the most common names in China.
As the newest Chinese top-level domain (TLD) on the block it is quickly overtaking the competition. It registered on July 14, 2014 and is one of 171 TLDs now open to public registration. Since that time it has made some major achievements including:
- Within 48 hours of its public availability it received more than 20,000 registrations.
- After four weeks on the market, .WANG was the 6th most popular new TLD with 38,992 registrations
How Have Multi-National Companies Embraced .WANG?
As expected, major multinational corporations, such as Amazon, Microsoft and Rolex, are among the first companies to register within .WANG.
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Registration data for .WANG from ntldstats.com on July 14, 2014
How Have Multi-National Companies Embraced .WANG?
As expected, major multinational corporations, such as Amazon, Microsoft and Rolex, are among the first companies to register within .WANG.
With an eye toward protecting its brands, Amazon, registered Amazon.WANG during the sunrise period (when trademark owners get the first shot at registration) and snatched up almost 100 additional strings within the first minute the TLD became available to the public.
1800Flowers also registered several of its brands, even though the company doesn’t conduct business in mainland China.
The majority of registrants appear to be domain investors and companies with a strong Internet presence.
Why Does the Roman Script .WANG Out-Perform Chinese Character TLDs?
So, why would the Roman script transliteration of a Chinese word out-perform the new top-level domains in Chinese characters, known as Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs)? Several reasons may be:
- .WANG registration is cheaper than an IDN registration, in, for example, 中国, which means “China.”.WANG registrations are going for 49 RMB, or $7.90 a year, compared to 320 RMB, or $51.56 for 中国.That makes .WANG a bargain if a company is registering domains in large quantities.
- .WANG is more colloquial than .中国 (China) or .公司, which translates to “company”. So, for example, Amazon.wang literally means “the website of Amazon.”Almost all websites or brands can be associated with .WANG.
- Counterintuitively, .WANG also may be more user-friendly to average Chinese netizens because it is akin to what they are used to.Historically, Chinese brand owners have registered in English top-level domains such as .COM and .CN.The behavior of the big market players will always influence Internet user habits. At the least, .WANG serves as a stepping stone for the coming bulk of Chinese-character TLDs.
Eighteen Chinese character IDNs and two Pinyin top-level domains have been delegated so far, and over 60 more are in the making. As more come online, companies and individuals may find a better fit than .WANG, diminishing its popularity.
