Digital Services Lab

Happy New Year! Here’s to feeling thankful for the year behind and enthusiastic for the year ahead 🥂🎉

This is a post for people with a .com.au and .org.au domains.

You are likely receiving prompts from various domain registrars and government bodies encouraging you to take up the .au version of your domain. You are able to use the priority securing process that ends on the 20th of September 2022.

Of course, it’s up to your business or organisation to determine if you want to take up the .au domain.

It may be wise to secure it to avoid unscrupulous parties from trying to profit from your own brand names but there is likely no benefit from actually transitioning to, or using the .au domain.

The position Australian business have been put in here can be considered a costly imposition.

It’s unfortunate that auDA have launched .au direct domains as it actively works against the built reputation of .com.au domains with Australian consumers. It has taken a long time for trust to be built with .com.au domains.

It all smells of a money grab that doesn’t benefit Australian businesses and if looking at other countries, it most likely won't be taken up. According to reports from UK registrars, attempts to do the same in the UK with .uk direct domains have failed dismally with only a truly tiny portion of businesses taking up the new domain many years down the track.

Our businesses will reluctantly purchase the new .au version of our existing domain simply to protect our brand, irrespective of our intention to actually use the domain (we won't be).

Many unidentifiable parties may purchase, or attempt to purchase, .au domains of other businesses in an attempt to profit from the hard work of others.

There will be many emails sent around by Domain Registrars pushing it because they are one of the only ones who stand to profit from it along with auDA.

Please share this.