EnCirca the registry of the .Pro domain announced today that the extension will be relaunched on September 8th. The relaunch of the .pro domain is now allows all licensed Professionals from every country in the world. Previously, .pro was limited to professionals in the engineering,accounting, legal, and medical fields in the United States and three other countries. Now all licensed professionals from Australia, Canada France, Denmark, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Italy, Japan, England, China, Brazil, Germany and everywhere else in the world are eligible for .pro. Currently pre-registrations are being taken at $49 a year, for trademark owners and businesses possessing license credentials, on a first-come, first-served basis. All applicants will be required to submit license credentials to qualify. Once .Pro relaunches on September 8, 2008, the price of owning a .pro domain will decrease to less than $25 a year. "The .pro registry is anticipating a rush of transactions to occur at its relaunch," says Thomas Barrett, President of EnCirca. "We strongly advise our customers offering professional services to safeguard their brands and trademarks by pre-registering their trademarks with us before September 8." All international businesses and individuals holding professional licenses can take advantage of this domain including: -- Lawyers, attorneys, barristers, solicitors; advokat, Jurist (Danish); advocaat (Dutch); avocat, juriste (French); Rechtsanwalt, Jurist (German); avvocato, giurista (Italian); advogado (Portuguese); abogado, jurista, jurisconsulto, jurisperito (Spanish); jurist, advokat, lagklok (Swedish) - Doctors; doktor (Danish); dokter, doctor, reparateur (Dutch) docteur (French); Arzt, Doktor (German); medico, dottore (Italian) doutor (Portuguese); medico, facultativo, doctor (Spanish); doktor, vard Skeppskock (Swedish) - Accountants; bogholder, revisor (Danish); accountant (Dutch); comptable (French); Buchprufer, Rechnungsprufer, Wirtschaftsprufer, Buchhalter (German);ragioniere, contabile (Italian); contador, auditor (Portuguese); contador, contable (Spanish); revisor (Swedish) -- Dentists; tandarts (Dutch); dentiste (French); Zahnarzt (German);dentista (Italian); dentista (Portuguese); dentista, odontologo (Spanish) For more information, visit http://www.encirca.com
Yawn.
wow, what a way to restrict your market penetration!
Can anyone say “flawed business model”???
And they want to charge (reduced of course from 49) $25 — that’s $5 more than a .ME, which even though it’s new has so much more potential than .PRO
the only way that a .PRO could make it is if they open reg to everyone instead of a tiny market — but then again that would defeat the purpose of .PRO
it’s dead domain walking
.PRO To ReLaunch on September 8th – they have missed the plot
They just don’t get it.
Last year, as a n00b, I tried registering my .pro first name.
Glad I couldn’t get it.
Lame.
Same last gasp as .travel.
When I see a .pro conversation (because I have NEVER seen a developed .pro domain) I think of prostitute.
So, good luck .pro registry, you’re going to need it.
.me is a blogging extension that only works with verbs and .asia is geo-specific. .pro works with just about every keyword type and is pitched at professionals and business. That’s where the money is. The word pro appears 15,000 times in the US trademark registry, that makes it the most naturally brandable domain extension available. .pro has been held back by ridiculously high reg fees and over the top restrictions. Reg fees have been slashed by 75%, restrictions have been relaxed, and more registrars will be offering it. The .pro business does suck but it is gradually changing. If you want to see some developed .pros go to Motion.pro. There is a long list of them.
http://www.lesbian.pro is a .pro that is quite successful to a particular gender and sexuality group. Is the only .pro that I visit regularly. I will admit to thinking the .pro extension meant prostitute as Rob suggested above too.
I think they are on a winner here with this – I guess they were lucky to grab it. I tend to agree with Proteus that we haven’t seen the potential of this ext yet – but it could go either way.