The .US web address is the official country code of the United States. While .com became a popular mainstay during the internet’s early growth period, the .US domain space became available to the general public in 2002 and is America’s web address. Some .com investors are bothered by this and are concerned that the widespread adoption of .US may threaten their .com investments eventually.

Personally, I do not feel this is the case. My position is that .com and .US will co-exist very well alongside one another. Both domains offer excellent alternatives to U.S. based corporations and individual internet users looking for a recognizable web address.

I enjoy seeing American companies embrace their .US domain name. An up and coming player in the security and surveillance market is Charlotte-based Iverify.US Inc. They are located at www.iverify.us and have already established themselves as a technology leader and fast rising local company.

Iverify.US have been covered by the Charlotte Business Journal on several occasions with the most recent article ranking Iverify as #5 on the local Charlotte Fast 50 companies. Iverify offer unrivaled in-store monitoring and 24/7 interactivity such that they can communicate instantly with both store personnel and customers.

So effective is their technology at reducing shoplifting and other store crimes that they have been awarded expanded contracts with a number of chain retail stores and private corporations. The company bought, and now occupy, a 40,000 square foot building where 185 employees work in three 8-hour shifts to provide constant video and audio surveillance monitoring for their customers.

Once again, quality American businesses utilizing the .US web address in the manner for which it was intended.

.US Domain Names .us, Charlotte, iverify

I was researching the Bank of America building in Charlotte, North Carolina and discovered that it is managed by Lincoln Harris. They are a full service commercial real estate firm in Charlotte who oversee the BOA Corporate Center which happens to be the tallest skyscraper (at 871 feet) between Philadelphia and Atlanta.

Of interest to domainers is their use of the .info web address as the portal to the Bank of America Corporate Center at 100 N. Tryon Street. The official website address is TheCorporateCenter.info and it contains essential facts and “information” about the facility.

The Corporate Center is a landmark in Charlotte standing above every other skyscraper and visible for many miles as one approaches North Carolina’s Queen city. The building weighs 300 million pounds. It was completed in 1992 and took the combined efforts of several architectural firms to finalize its ultimate design and plan of construction.

Bank of America is the largest bank in the United States. With its headquarters now in Charlotte, Charlotte is regarded as the second largest financial center in the USA behind only New York City.

The .info web address is ideal for business purposes as well as a good general purpose domain for city & state websites, specific subjects, and the hotel & travel industry. .INFO is an unrestricted domain and may be registered by anyone in the world. .INFO currently enjoys 6,817,548 global registrations making it one of the leading domain name extensions in the world. .INFO is managed by the Afilias Registry.

* Visit PremiumDomains.US to browse premium quality .info domain names.

.INFO Domain Names .info, bank of america, Charlotte

Developing a geodomain offers many options and requires many decisions. These choices typically revolve around website content, website structure, and the site’s identity as perceived by visitors. My overriding goal with this project was to settle on a development model and “unique personality” which could be duplicated across many cities.

In building Charlotte.US from the ground up, I reviewed both the positive and negative aspects of a number of other geo sites. I also considered the platform on which to build Charlotte.US such as “static html” files vs. WordPress.

Content can be modified much more easily than can site structure. Structure is something which you will be married to and which cannot be easily converted. For this project, WordPress was selected due to its many automated features, plug-ins, publishing options, and excellent universal compatibility.

Actually, I had been looking for a geo portal template for some time that would allow me to add and subtract content components. Eventually, I found a news oriented portal, built on WordPress, that I could heavily edit. The current version, now viewable at Charlotte.US, has been dramatically modified from the original template.

The site is in what I consider a workable early form right now. There are a variety of auto-updating feeds & content such that revisiting the site numerous times per day will provide the user with new material. This concept I hope to take to an even higher level over time. I have had good success obtaining permissions where required, and I plan to develop partnerships with local businesses as time permits. Local advertising revenue will be pursued though no hurry on this at the moment.

Future upgrades will aim to customize the content sections especially in the real estate, apartments, entertainment, and online services area. Currently, these are linked to local service providers via Superpages content. The Ticketmaster section is fairly well done as is.

Interested readers may also like to follow Detroit.US which is being modeled after the Charlotte site.

.US Domain Names .us, Charlotte, geo domain, geodomain

Around the internet and on the blogs I’m seeing comments about country code top level domains. It seems logical that as the internet becomes increasingly crowded, a system of logic and organization become even more important, more commonplace.

That was the prospective intent of having domain extensions like .US, .info, .biz, etc. There is an intentional meaning contained in the domain extension that works in conjunction with whatever keyword sits on the left side of the dot. Domains like Charlotte.US, Health.info, and RealEstate.biz make good sense.

On the other hand, I have been receiving inquiries if I would like to buy, for example, “AustinCondos.cn”, presumably because I own AustinCondos.US. dotCN is the country code for China. This is an example of poor synergy between a keyword and its extension. I am doubtful that there is a city named Austin in the country of China. However, AustinCondos.US is a fitting domain for real estate in the Austin, Texas area (make that United States, not China).

Many domainers know that the .US namespace was originally created for local government, public schools and libraries. Thousands of these institutions launched their websites using the original .US extension and related subdomains.

For example, the City of Charlotte is located at: http://www.ci.charlotte.nc.us/. Charlotte public schools are located at: http://www.cms.k12.nc.us/. And Charlotte Public Libraries at:  http://www.plcmc.lib.nc.us/. These lengthy, odd domain names are holdovers from the early days of the internet.

In 2002, the U.S. Government opened the .US namespace for general registration. I acquired Charlotte.US in 2002 and have cycled through several website variations and monetization strategies over the years. Charlotte is also a large county in the state of Florida as well as a popular female name. I lived in Charlotte, NC in the 1980′s and can attest to what a well-rounded, exciting city it was … and is.

Country codes are very important and will become increasingly moreso as countries come to preserve and distinguish their unique identities across the globe. In America, .com was the first major unrestricted tld launched and became synonymous with America’s internet. This was a good thing, and .com showed itself to be widely embraced.

That being said, our official country code, .US (for United States), will continue to garner increased support & use, both nationally and internationally. The two letter designation for a country is already globally accepted … such as .CA for Canada, .JP for Japan, and .CN for China.

As a geodomain investor, I love pure city names and geo-targeted domain names. I have always felt they offered the best investment and development opportunities. I still do.

.US Domain Names .us, Charlotte, dot US