I was just listening to an interview on Mixergy with the guy who runs the .co registry. (I tried posting a link, but DP won't let me. So Google it.) Pardon my ignorance, but I didn't realize .co is considered a legit extension (more so than .net, as claimed in the interview). I thought .co was just used by domain shorteners, but after looking into it, it seems that businesses are using the extension for their public facing domain names. I'm just curious why people would prefer dot "co" over dot "net." Frankly, I'd rather come up with some wonky .ly domain name before I'd use dot co. Am I the only one?
Well now it doesn't matter, you can have .well .now .it --oops noo, this is for Italy .does ... .dot .anything
Yes, some businesses purchase .co. No, not everybody prefers it to .net. Basically, people want the most brand for their buck. But it's a little bit more complicated. To many people, ".co" strongly suggests a "company". Whereas, ".net" brings to mind "internet" and websites. For example, compare TheMediterranean.co to TheMediterranean.net. At first glance, I would expect the first one to be a company with physical offices somewhere; and there's a good chance that the .net would correspond to just an informational website. Granted, those associations might not be based in fact. But they're the impressions people would probably have initially; and those impressions can count for something. [Truth in advertising: that .co is mine.]