The .nyc TLD will benefit the tourism industry, small businesses, entrepreneurs, and global corporations. Innovative use of the Internet's networking features will facilitate trust and collaboration and help the city remain a global economic force.

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Low Hanging Fruit

The availability of the .nyc TLD name set will provide several immediate advantages and set the foundation for future growth. Some early advantages:

• Good Domain Names - Short, descriptive, and memorable domain names will be available for the city's businesses. With 70,000,000 .issued, locating a good .com name is near-impossible.

• Identity - A .nyc domain name says "Made in New York" or "From New York." And it advertises the city with every use. Billions of free ads per year.
• Intuitive Names - Many local businesses will have the opportunity to acquire their traditional and familiar names within the.nyc TLD. Residents will learn to trust their intuition, trying www.pizzaboy.nyc, making it a friendlier, more navigable city.
  

• Small Business Benefits - The new set of good domain names will reduce the time consuming task of locating a good domain name. The .nyc names will provide identity - saying 'made' or 'from' New York City. They will assist with Search Engine Optimization, helping city businesses rise to the top of Google search results. (See Advantaged Search Engine Positioning below.)

• Big Business Benefits - Firms like Chase, Citibank, and Coke have invested millions in their domain names and will not switch to .nyc. However, those with a city presence might choose a local TLD for more focused communication. For example, Coke might select coke.nyc to let residents know of their local jobs, distributors, concerts, and other community events they sponsor.

• Tourism Boost - The city can better market itself globally as a tourist destination and business market by organizing its resources for presentation on .nyc's more intuitive Internet. With an organized and accessible directory of the city's digital resources, and domain names like www.hotels.nyc set aside to assist visitors, the city can better present itself on a global scale. Names like www.hotels.nyc and www.tours.nyc will economically present the city's resources in an organized manner.
  

• Marketing Efficiencies - A Google search for "New York City Hotels" returns more than 1,000,000 results for the city's 402 hotels. Who pays for the innumerable intermediaries? The tourist through higher hotel rates. Or looked at more broadly, all New Yorkers through a smaller tourist trade and diminished economy. One example of a domain name presenting marketing efficiencies is www.hotels.nyc.
  
• Jobs / New Businesses - Hundreds of new businesses will arise as companies reorganize the city's existing resources around new domain names, e.g., www.best-tours.nyc.
  

• Better Business Environment - Life in the city will become easier for residents and businesses with a more organized and intuitive Internet. For example, if one is searching for a school s/he can begin a search at www.schools.nyc. And as residents more effectively communicate with one another, civic awareness and pride will flourish (see proximity and networking below. A more livable city will lead current businesses to want to stay and others to want to move here.

• Billions of Free Ads for New York City - With every email sent or web page accessed using a .nyc name, people will be reminded of our great city.
  

• Domain Name Revenue - Every domain name issued or renewed by a city business or resident now sends at least $6 of domain name fees to firms outside the city. Most .nyc TLD revenue will remain in the city.

Proximity and Networking

Effectively connecting ideas, people, products, and resources is the basis for New York's existence and its economic success. And its role in the global economy depends on a social informality and a local web of specialized and supporting human infrastructure. (See Cities & Networking sidebar.)

These proximity and networking features, once key city advantages, were diminished by the distance-insensitive Internet and the globalizing .com TLD. With the Internet's arrival in the mid1990's, commerce and ideas flowed globally at the blink of an eye, making local resources seem quaint and unnecessary: Why consult the parish priest when you can instantly connect with the Vatican?

Repairing the .com's globalization impacts provides rich but difficult opportunities for the .nyc TLD. We will explore the possibility that a geographically aware TLD, with mobility intimate, will enable New Yorkers to efficiently locate and acquire local resources, helping to rekindle the city's traditional proximity advantages. And we will explore how improved networking can facilitate civic awareness and pride, raising consciousness about resident's role in making New York a visitor-friendly city. See the Development Environment and GIS and city-TLDs for more on these opportunities.

Advantaged Search Engine Positions

Using a .nyc name will assist with search engine optimization, helping businesses using .nyc names rise to the top of Google search results. Local businesses will discover that, when people enter a search for a New York resource, search engines will place those using the .nyc TLD higher in listings than those under the .com TLD. This will make them easier to find and enable them to avoid some .com competitors. For example, a search for "east side bakery in Manhattan" will show www.eastsidebakery.nyc higher in Google’s listing than www.eastsidebakery.com.

Awareness of this advantage for .nyc domain names arose from a conversation Dirk Kirschenowski, CEO of the .berlin initiative, had in conversations with search engine executives. They indicated that if a short domain like office.berlin is among the top search results, the engine will perceive this as a "good = clearly identifiable and trustable search result.” The .nyc TLD will make thousands of short, more findable, domain names available.

Trusted TLD

In contrast to open TLDs like .com, .net, and .org, we will establish criteria for those seeking to acquire a .nyc domain and provide ongoing oversight. Eligibility for a .nyc TLD will require some form of presence in the city, or nexus as the lawyers call it. It has been suggested that we adopt requirements similar to Singapore, where a local postal address is required to purchase a .sg TLD. (Join the Eligibility Criteria discussion.)

We will create an oversight structure that assures the public that websites operating under the .nyc umbrella are accountable. For inspiration we think of the comfort one feels within a more managed TLD like .gov or .edu. We will offer an advantage over the .open TLDs in this regard. Not FDIC secure, but more trusted than a .com.

We will also strive for flexibility that enables business to launch rapidly, to create an atmosphere inviting to new ideas, where the First Amendment can live within the .nyc TLD.

Providing trust and accountability will start with selecting our board of directors. This will be composed of ex-officio seats for representatives of respected city institutions (city government, libraries, tourist bureau, chamber of commerce…), and representatives of civic organizations, users, and the Internet community. See our board of directors page.

Local “Trademark”

Another search benefit of .nyc will arise with increased availability of local names, or what might be called local trademarks. Trademarks were traditionally local in scope. And there are thousands of local businesses (bakeries, copy shops, delis, hair cutters etc.) who use generic business identifiers like Star, Blue, York, Cook, Magic, Link, Finest, Sun etc. The .nyc TLD will enable more local identity for companies using the same name used in other cities. While Chicago's Fresh Bakery may use freshbakery.com and Toronto has freshbakery.biz, New York will have a freshbakery.nyc. With city-TLDs we can return a bit to traditions and quality, as judged by local residents.

Other Benefits

• Identity, Trust, Community, Justice and Civic Pride - Good domain names for new ideas and local causes will be made available by the .nyc TLD. A planned TLD, networked proximity, and an intuitive Internet will enable residents to more easily locate and network with one another. If neighbors can locate one another, discuss issues, and collaborate within a realm of informed decision making, the prospects for a just society brighten. A just society promotes stability and economic vitality.
  

• Strengthened Public-Private Partnerships - Good local networking will facilitate strong local governance and help sustain the public part of the "public-private partnerships" that seem to dominate global thinking. Local communication in New York City has always been difficult and the globalizing TLDs like .com and .org has made it even more so. A key goal of the .nyc TLD will be to provide new venues for local civic discourse where residents can more easily locate and network with one another within an organized and managed .nyc top level domain.
  

• Meeting the Competition - New York City will be better able to serve as a corporate headquarters city with competitors like Singapore (.sg) and Hong Kong (.hk) which already have TLDs.

• An Intuitive Internet - When the Commissioners Plan of 1811 created Manhattan’s street grid, it organized and provided ready access to the city’s real estate resources to great economic gain. Imagine .nyc as a digital parallel to the city’s street grid, organizing and facilitating access to the city’s Internet resources. The .nyc directory and Intuitive names will provide this 1811-benefit.

• The Directory Business - Directory-type pages with names like schools.nyc, hotels.nyc, and parks.nyc, will be set aside as search aids. The number of directory pages and the qualifications and responsibilities of their developers - yellow page operator, an industry group, or small businesses - has not yet been made. Editorial and advertising content will also be found on directory pages, with advertising revenue shared between the page maintainer and .nyc. Creating these pages and advertising sales will create local jobs. A Directory Page Management discussion addresses the how, how many, and who of directory pages.
  
• Internet Training & Access - Funds raised through name sales and other revenue opportunities will be invested in Internet access, training, education, and creating networking applications, all basic to a strong local economy.

Key .nyc Pages

• The .nyc TLD Wiki Home Page
• Advantages of the .nyc TLD
• Identity, Trust, Community, Justice, and Civic Pride
• Connecting.nyc Inc.'s Home Page