Today was an important day in the domain name world. ICANN, the organization that oversees the global domain name system, revealed the applications for the next round of new internet extensions.
There were more than 1,600 applications for close to 1,000 different extensions, and what stood out to me was not simply the volume, but who showed up and what they are betting on.
Google, GoDaddy, Meta, OpenAI, Identity Digital, XYZ and a number of other major technology and registry companies all applied for new extensions. Some filed for dozens. Others filed for more than 100.
The biggest area of competition was clearly AI.
The most contested extension in the entire round was .agent, with 13 different applicants. Other highly contested names included .api, .agi, .robot, .hub and .bit.
That tells you something.
These companies are not simply speculating on domain names. They are making bets on how the internet may evolve over the next decade.
If AI agents become a major part of how we search, shop, communicate, book travel, manage money and run businesses, then the infrastructure around those agents becomes valuable. Names, identity, APIs, payments and trusted destinations all become part of that ecosystem.
For entrepreneurs, I think that is the more interesting story.
Whenever a major technology shift happens, everyone tends to focus on the obvious applications being built on top of it. But some of the biggest businesses are often created one layer below, in the infrastructure.
We saw that with cloud computing, payments, mobile apps and the original internet itself.
Domain names are part of that infrastructure.
I have some history here.
Back in the last ICANN round, I founded .CLUB and spent years building it into one of the most successful new domain extensions in the world. At its peak, .CLUB had more than one million registrations and became one of the best-known new extensions launched from that round.
We ultimately sold the registry business to GoDaddy in 2021.
So I have been through this process before, and I can tell you that what happened today matters. These applications represent real capital, real strategy and, in many cases, a willingness to spend significant amounts of money to control a single word on the right side of the dot.
Startup Club also applied for one domain extension in this round.
We are going to hold off announcing which one for now, but it has been fascinating to watch the process unfold from the inside again.
One of the biggest differences this time is the role of AI.
The last round was largely about expanding the internet beyond .com, .net and .org.
This round feels much more focused on categories that companies believe could define the next version of the internet.
That is why extensions like .agent and .agi are attracting so much interest.
Whether every one of these extensions succeeds is another question. Many will not. Some will get caught in expensive contention battles. Others will never achieve meaningful adoption.
But that is always how new markets develop.
There is usually a lot of noise, a lot of money and a lot of failed ideas.
And somewhere in the middle of all of it, a few very large businesses get built.
That is what makes today’s reveal interesting.
It is not really a story about domain names.
It is a story about where some of the largest technology companies in the world think the internet is going next.
And yet it is still a story about domain names as domain names still matter in the new age based on the AI companies registering them.
Check out my article with tips for Launching a Top-Level Domain here!