Tech 35

Tech #9803

What’s in a name? It’s partly how you say it! This is especially true for cute, functional and easy to remember electronic addresses like w dot portfolioweekly dot com, or w dot O-D-U dot e-d-u. Did he say easy to remember?

O.K., if you are not frequently on-line you may not understand gibberish like “w dot” or “dot-e-d-u”. It’s a verbal shorthand for what can be complicated Internet addresses. These addresses, or “paths” lead your computer to other computers around the globe. The first part of a world wide web address always starts with “http://” Next in most cases comes “www.”, as in “http://www.portfolioweekly.com” Since most addresses start with the three w’s followed by a period or “dot”, it’s become commonplace to just say “w-dot” That sure beats the tongue twisting “w-w-w”. The last part of an Internet address is called the domain name, and for now there are just a few ‑‑ such as .com, .edu, .net, or .org.

Soon there may be another handful to contend with. Because address names have been snapped up by the millions, the people in charge of that sort of thing (the Internet Council of Registrars or CORE) has announced  plans to introduce seven new generic top‑level domains. Sometime in March you’ll see .firm, .shop, .web, .arts, .rec, .info, and .nom.

I can just see it now — “till you drop – dot – shop” for the local Mall web site,  or how about “ab’s – dot – firm” for the local gym!