Everything on the Internet starts with a domain name!

I know that may come off as a bit over reaching - but its true. From email to news, search, video or anything else on the Internet - you have to know where you’re going which is only achieved by a domain name.

The ABC’s of domain names, which as a title may come off as a little corny to you, is an exercise that makes you think about your industry or business, what you’re doing in it, and how you go about doing what you do as it relates to domain names. The use of the ABC’s format is to provide a simple, back to basics approach to deliver fundamental concepts that provoke thoughts, ideas and questions on domain names and how they are a part of your world.

The wild debate about Google’s increasingly hardline stance against paid links looks like Wimbledon, with Matt Cutts taking on Rich Skrenta, while Danny Sullivan volleys against Michael Gray.

Internet Drama, in the form of the ongoing paid links debate, received a couple of new entries to fan the flames. Webmasters see paid links as a way to boost their search engine presence against the competition. Google perceives paid links as a mechanism that devalues their core organic search results.

Rich Skrenta posted his stream-of-consciousness thoughts about the paid link debate. He said “PageRank wrecked the web,” a reference to part of Google’s model of weighting search results based on inbound links.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the quasi-independent organization that oversees domain and registry practices, have launched an investigation into the practice of “domain tasting.”

Domain tasting occurs when registrants take advantage of the grace period offered by ICANN when registering new domains in order to test profitability. Registrants have five days to finalize the purchase, and if they decide against it during the Add Grace Period (AGP), they are refunded registration fees.

Within that period, domain tasters will measure the popularity of the site to see if the potential revenue will surpass the yearly registration fee (approximately $6).