How to invest in .xyz and DAO domains

Welcome to Domains Insider for March 30th, 2022 — the FREE version.

Today, we have a mishmash of domain news & info, and some great opportunities courtesy of our friends at DAOdotcoms and two private domain sellers on DAN.

Plus, we’re going to have a look at the rise of .XYZ domains, and how these present a great opportunity for self-directed investors.

Let’s go

.XYZ domains

If you’ve visited a crypto company’s website recently, you’ve probably visited a URL ending in “.xyz” instead of .com

.xyz has become the go-to URL ending for many web3 companies, including mirror.xyz, paradigm.xyz, sound.xyz, genie.xyz, block.xyz, etc.

But what does it mean, and why has it caught on in the web3 space?

Google sort of kicked off the .xyz domain craze. They registered alphabet.xyz in 2014 because the perfect URL for their parent company — alphabet.com — was already taken by BMW. Oh, and American Broadcasting Corporation was using abc.com.

Since then, .xyz has become one of the top five top-level domains (TLDs) in the world by traffic. And the reason is because .xyz is an ENS Domain.

Thinking of investing in XYZ?
I looked at last 12 months of data.
*prices
*type of name
*length
*current use
*sell-through-rate#domains #analysis #XYZ
Details @NamePros Blog : https://t.co/hmoYKrff1k pic.twitter.com/mZdPSSV1u9

— Bob Hawkes (@AGreatDomain) January 27, 2022

What is an ENS domain?

An Ethereum Name Service (ENS) domain offers a decentralized and secure way to translate human-memorable text into Ethereum addresses. ENS domains currently end with . eth and have seven or more characters.

Think of ENS domains as short URLs for your Ethereum “0x…” address. ENS allows users to create a universal nickname for their crypto addresses, providing a more easily accessible way to make crypto wallets that live on a variety of other platforms.

Users can now create profiles to share their social media handles or other personal information in ENS using either its native .eth domain or on a .xyz domain.

Although .xyz domains still fall under the purview of the DNS system, managed by internet regulatory authority ICANN, several parties are now working to develop a decentralized alternative to this system to underpin web3.

I like to say that domains are the original NFTs. Now, .xyz’s strategy to align itself proactively with web3 companies could present new monetization opportunities in a decentralized web as this generation of Internet users stakes new claims on domains.

How to invest in .xyz domains

Our friend Victor has some terrific .xyz domains for sale.

Check these out:

• contract.xyz
• cart.xyz
• phrase.xyz
• post.xyz
• capture.xyz
• license.xyz
• niche.xyz

If you’re interested in picking any of these up, visit Victor’s website.

You can also get in touch with Victor directly at [email protected].

DAO Domains

Before we get started here, here’s a recap on what a DAO is.

By all accounts, the DAO domain market is on fire right now. It’s one of the major financial concepts of 2022. Anyone who can picture these becoming a major disruptive force would do well to jump on these while they’re still (relatively) nascent.

Here are some recent sales to prove the market demand in this space:

1. DAO.co – Dec 29, 2021. 45,000 USD
2. DAO.uk – Feb 11, 2022. 9,250 GBP
3. PokeDAO.com – Feb 08, 2022. 10,000 USD
4. VacaDAO.com – Feb 09, 2022. 4,888 USD
5. SpacDAO.com – Feb 17, 2022. 4,888 USD

How to invest in DAO domains

Our friend Jan is a crypto domain entrepreneur from the Czech Republic (the land of beer) and the founder of DAO DotComs.

He owns 671 DAO .com domains in over 30 categories, which makes his the biggest DAO .com collection in the world. He’s way ahead of the curve, and notes that some DAOs are using an exact match .com address:

1. MakerDAO.com
2. OdysseyDAO.com
3. MantraDAO.com
4. DeveloperDAO.com
5. MolochDAO.com
6. MuffinDAO.com
7. SavannaDAO.com

You can see his full up-to-date collection of domains for sale in three ways:

1. On his own site (easiest for browsing by category)
2. On DAN.com (easiest for searching for particular words)
3. This excel sheet (easiest to see prices)

If you want to know more, drop Jan an email at [email protected]

WYSIWYG Domains

Paul is an Alts community member with an interesting collection of domains. While these aren’t as short & catchy as Jan’s, there are some interesting ones in here for sure.

You can see his full collection for sale here, but these are some of our faves:

• the.hosting
• credits.report
• port.immo
• 1drive.cloud
• maritim.immo
• maritime.estate

Having started out by focusing on short, catchy URLs, Paul has changed tack and now buys/sells exotic and undervalued new TLD’s (like the .immo extension).

For anyone working in the tech space, he might be sitting on exactly the domain you need.

Feel free to reach out directly to Paul at [email protected].

.ai and .io Domains

Short, catchy and easy to remember, these domains really stand out for startups. You may know that .ai stands for “artificial intelligence” but did you know .io stands for “innovation”?

The rise of these domains usually mean a higher price, but there are still some bargains to be had.

Here are some of our faves that are currently for sale:

• privacy.io
• storage.io
• percent.io
• quark.io
• seam.io
• qn.io
• knox.io
• relayer.io
• valentine.io
• kard.io
• upright.io
• cassava.io
• paragraph.io
• clipboard.io
• covet.io
• stack.ai
• solar.ai
• pedal.ai
• perch.ai
• phase.ai
• format.ai
• section.ai
• dose.ai
• upgrade.ai
• globe.ai
• clipboard.ai
• guest.ai

How to invest in .ai and .io domains

All the above are for sale through our friend Victor (who actually originally owned alts.co, before we bought it from him!)

Once again, Victor can be reached at [email protected].

Other news

• .org domains aren’t as trustworthy as they seem. A lot of sites with .org in their addresses are publishers of false or misleading information
• Google Domains is live after 7 years in beta. The service is now available in 26 countries, and has “millions of active registrations.”
• .au domains are now available to Australians. These are much cleaner than the “.com.au”, which was a mouthful. But you need an ABN (Australian Business Number) to register one.
• .org domains aren’t as trustworthy as they seem. A lot of sites with .org in their addresses are publishers of false or misleading information
• Google Domains is live after 7 years in beta. The service is now available in 26 countries, and has “millions of active registrations.”
• .au domains are now available to Australians. These are much cleaner than the “.com.au”, which was a mouthful. But you need an ABN (Australian Business Number) to register one.

That’s it for this issue!

Do you have domains you’re looking to sell?

Let us know. We’d love to include them in the next issue.

In the meantime, I’ll leave you with this domain investing wisdom:

Domaining is 95% a game of numbers. You need to do is find a profitable angle and scale as fast as you can go through your list. Otherwise You are simply throwing darts at a wall and drawing the bulls eye around it later.

— 💡 Tony (@TonyNames) December 15, 2021