layout: post title: Google Registrar Concepts created: 1107458568 categories:

• Search Engine Voodoo
• Web 2.0
• Personal Publishing

I've been thinking about this since I heard the news, and CircleID's 10 Things Google Could do as a Domain Registrar post made me remember to post.

Chalk these ideas up in the "rumours/predictions" list, but I think all of the thoughts below are ones that "make sense" for Google.

There are some good points in CircleID's list, and I tend to agree with #2 (Domains for Blogger hosting) and #10 (Free domain + website with automatic adsense). Actually, I think these two amount to the same thing -- what is Blogger besides a hosted CMS/blogging tool?

As I stated in my Picking a Blogging Platform post, the first thing that anyone using Blogger needs to do is get a domain name so that they can control the future of their content.

This creates a barrier to the continued ease of use of Blogger. Blogware lets you start with a free subdomain (subdomain.blogware.com) and then easily point a domain at it later. It would make sense that Google would offer something similar for people wanting to move off their subdomain.blogspot.com address.

Yahoo has a similar strategy, although they don't have a blogging platform. They offer domain registration, DNS management, and their Yahoo Stores are widely used as an easy e-commerce platform.

I could also see Google "re-inventing" domain registration/DNS management. The only good interfaces for this that I have seen also carry premium pricing (EasyDNS comes to mind -- fantastic, first-class DNS management, service, and uptime, but high costs). Google could pull a "Gmail" and create an innovative interface that is also low-cost. Heck, where's the 1-click shopping equivalent in the domain world?

Speaking of Gmail, this could also be pointing towards a premium version of that: rather than just forwarding, allow people to host their email directly on Google's systems.

Probably enough <acronym title="Stupid Wild Ass Guesses">SWAG</acronym>s for the day :P