CLICK HERE TO WATCH THIS VIDEO

It shows the utility of having all your contact data in one place and apparently the added benefit of using it to pick up your local health practitioner.

My line is always – “dot tel – it’s useful, not sexy” – maybe I’m going to have to change that to “it’s useful and sexy”.

Anyways, read Luke’s article re-posted below, it opens the door to the underlying potential of .TEL that seems to be missing from much of the current dialogue about the new extension.

Are .TEL Addresses the New Vanity Phone Numbers?

Follow me for a second; in just a few lines, I aim to convince you that .tel addresses are not another TLD. There’s really something else going on here.

By far the most convincing attribute of .tel addresses isn’t what most blogs are talking about — quickly updating data, no hosting, etc. — but that, if apps are developed for mobile phones, instead of having phone numbers in your phone, you could store .tel domains that your friends can update as their info changes (putting your friends in control of *their* contact information stored in *your* phone). This means no more “dead numbers” or emails flying back and forth saying “I changed my number.” There must be 1,000s of Facebook status updates and 100,000s of emails daily that inform people of changes in phone numbers. All of these people would immediately understand what .tel offers: It takes a headache away for them — and that alone is worth the $10-$20/year to register a .tel.

What does this mean in the short term? It means that .tel addresses could become a new way to contact people (it’s easier to remember than a phone number AND, as the data stored on the .tel changes, those changes will automatically propagate to all the mobile devices the .tel contact is saved on). There are privacy issues that will need to be ironed out — not everyone wants just anyone to be able to contact them (as an aside, corporations do!) – but everyone evaluating .tel should understand this: It’s not what *you* see on the .tel “page”; it’s what your mobile device sees – up-to-date contact information stored not on your phone, but on a central server.

What does this mean in the long term? It means that .tel domains could become the new vanity phone numbers. Remember the trade in 1-800 numbers of the 1990s? Many early domainers do – that’s what got them to recognize the scarcity of domains early on.

Here’s a long shot: It’s possible that generic .tel domains could become more valuable than generic 1-800 numbers. If the concept of .tel domains as proxies for phone numbers takes off, you’ll get more unsolicited, pre-qualified leads from people typing RealEstate.tel (not one of mine) into a browser or mobile device than you would from 1-800-RealEstate. My rationale: When is the last time you dialed a generic 1-800 number when looking for something? For me, never. When is the last time you typed in a generic domain when you were looking for something? For me, a few times a day. .tel could have the characteristics of vanity 1-800 numbers AND some of the type-in-traffic benefits of TLDs.

If you agree with any of this at all, send it to Digg or Reddit, link to it, Twitter it, etc. and let’s let the public debate it.

Additional thought:
I emailed a version of this post to a friend the other day. Let’s say his name is John Doe. Right before I clicked “send,” I thought, “What if on my phone I typed JohnDoe2.tel (assuming JohnDoe.tel is taken) to call my friend and to email him I did the same – just typed JohnDoe2.tel into the email “To” field?” Similar to the discussion above, either my email provider or an app I’m using would identify my friend’s email address from JohnDoe2.tel and send the email to that. I wouldn’t have to remember his email address or look it up.

More Information:

Continuing with exploration of how .TEL can and might be used as things unfold, also check out our previously published article, .TEL – The Ultimate in Online Identity Protection.

Check out Luke’s blog Domain Synergies for further reading on domain names and related topics.

In partnerships with several ICANN accredited registrars, MySpace began offering .TEL last week.

MySpace has over 130 million active users, 20 million of which access the community via mobile devices each month.  This is a huge market for .TEL, and a great opportunity to mobilize, en masse, .TEL’s global directory.

On the surface of things, .TEL and MySpace appear to be a good fit. MySpace users can utilize their .TEL to promote their MySpace pages in organic search and securely share their more private contact information with non-MySpace users who wish to contact them.

After clicking on the creative and running through the MySpace .TEL registration process, I have to admit Myspace has done a good job with its UI. The dot TEL search and registration process is smooth, the price is right, so only time will tell if MySpace users embrace .TEL like MySpace and Telnic hope they will.

Read More:
Telnic Limited to Offer .TEL Domains Through MySpace

And here are some examples of the dot TEL creative MySpace is running:

When Telnic opens .TEL registration to the public, prices will drop to an average of $20 US from the Landrush price of $375. The day before a TLD opens for General Registration is always a busy time for domain investors and participating registrars – and judging by talk on blogs and Twitter, TEL is no exception. Registrars are reporting thousands of last minute pre-registrations.

I was curious to see if there were quality names left, so I did some quick dot-TEL searches on random words and phrases. It appears that tonnes of GREAT names are still available on this last day of Landrush. While this shouldn’t be a big surprise give the price tag for Landrush, it’s exciting because it means those willing to invest in .TEL names at $20 a pop will probably snag some good ones.

Here’s a sample of what I found in 10 minutes of searching:

In other .TEL news, Telnic, the .TEL registry operator recently launched a free, open source iPhone application for .TEL names that has been submitted to the Apple App Store and should be available in the near future.

Register .TEL on March 24 with an official .TEL registrar.

The premium fees that were applied during the public Landrush registration period to dissuade domain squatters from buying .TEL domains for resale purposes will drop by 90% on Tuesday, March 24, 2009. General Registration will see registration fees fall from nearly $400 USD to approximately $20 USD at many participating registrars.

The Sunrise registration period was reserved for Trademark owners and allowed them exclusive rights to protect their trademark names. The first-come, first-served Landrush registration period has been designed to allow anyone to apply early for brand oriented names not protected by a trademark, as well as premium names.

With the floodgates opening on .TEL next Tuesday, businesses and organizations might want to act now to ensure they control important .TEL domains related to their initiatives. While all businesses risk losing important variations of their primary domain names by neglecting to register them, it is typically high-traffic, high profile companies or organizations that are targeted.

Even if trademark laws are on your side, the Landrush registration fee is probably a bargain when compared to costs of legally wresting your domain back from a cybersquatter. The cheapest and easiest method to protecting your trademarks and variants online is to register your domains before someone else does.

Businesses and organizations should also consider registering variations of their trademarks and brands including: common misspellings and/or typos, plurals and singulars.

Register .TEL names during Landrush, or Pre-book .TEL names risk free for General Registration with an official .TEL registrar.

The .TEL WHOIS Lookup is presently available off of Telnic’s website, and that of other official .TEL registrars. A .TEL WhoIs entry varies slightly from other TLD’s and ccTLD’s in the following addition at the end:

By executing this query, in any manner whatsoever, you agree to abide by these terms.
Contact information: Disclosure of contact data is restricted because of UK and EU Data Protection legislation. The contact details for this contact ID may be available by looking up a domain object in the WHOIS system. The information can also be obtained through the Telnic Special Access Service. Visit http://www.sas.nic.tel for more details.

Visit Telnic’s site for more information about .TEL Privacy and how private data is encrypted and stored inside to NAPTR records of type “x-crypto”. A PDF of Telnic’s WhoIs Policy can be found here.

TEL WHOIS example - BMW.tel

Register/Pre-register .TEL domains risk free for Landrush and General Registration with an official .TEL registrar.

An important point to remember is that this period (along with .TEL Landrush and General Registration) is on a first come, first served basis. There may be multiple applications for a trademarked domain being submitted, but only the first  will be successful.

A few notes about Sunrise:

• Trademark application date must be prior to May 30, 2008.
• Trademark registration date must be prior to December 3, 2008.
• Applications are considered on a world-wide basis, independently assessed by Deloitte and are awarded on a first come, first served basis.
• Application fee of US$399 applies for all submitted applications whether successful or not. If the application is successful, Webnames.ca will provide a three year registration (minimum term specified by the registry) of the name at no extra charge.

Register/Prebook your .TEL domain name today with Webnames.ca, an official .TEL registrar.

My answer usually is, “it depends.” I typically come back with a number of questions to qualify whether someone actually needs a new domain: 

• Do you have a trademark to defend?
• What is your risk for a competitor to get the name?
• For a country specific domain, are you doing business in that country now or in the future?
• Do you care if someone in another geographical location gets the same name?
• What is your budget?

The launch of .TEL is imminent. Consequently, my business owning friends are emailing me again. They want to know, “should I get a .TEL?”  This time, my answer is simple. “Yes you should.”

How is .TEL different from other domain extensions? Well, for starters .TEL is technically different and serves a different purpose than all other domains names before it. With a .COM or a .CA, the domain is usually for a website or for forwarding to an existing website. .TEL on the other hand, functions as a business’ easy-to-remember single contact point.
 
Just like yourbusiness.com helps to direct customers to your website without them having to remember an IP address like 123.234.567.789, yourbusiness.tel enables customers to find you without having to remember your physical address, email address, various phone numbers or even your website.

Everyone has tried to go to a company’s “contact us” page using a mobile device to try to find phone numbers and emails, only to get frustrated because the webpage is not designed for easy mobile browsing. With.TEL, all the contact information is displayed in a simple format and the user scrolls over the phone number or email address and simply clicks for instant connection. It is fast because all the information is stored at the DNS level so no web page has to be served for you to get to the information.

 The most powerful part of this is that customers only need to remember yourbusiness.tel and can always find you even if your phone, email and other contact information change ever in the future. And the chances are, if your business grows, you will likely move or change a phone number at some point during the life of your business. All of this information as well as company blog, Skype, MSN, keywords, coordinates that generate a Google map and so much more can be stored to ensure that your customers will be able to find you quickly and easily.
 
For all the marketing dollars and effort sales businesses spend on visibility, .TEL is a simple and economical way to be found quickly and easily. The key point for all businesses is to gain a competitive advantage. When prospects can find you faster and more easily than your competition because of yourbusiness.tel, you can judge for yourself why my recommendation would be “Get your .TEL!”

So do you jump or do you wait?  If you get laid off, you have to tell all your friends, family members, professional associates and clients that you can no longer be reached at your work email and phone. 

If you are lucky enough to get another job, you have to tell all your friends, family members, professional associates and clients that you can now be reached at your new work email and phone. 
 
I don’t know about you, but I never put people’s email addresses in my Contacts in Outlook anymore.  The nickname or autocomplete feature has taken away the need for that.  I type a letter or two and it shows me a list of names to choose from.

So now I am either at home or at my new office and I have to re-type all of the info into the address bar and send out the email that I can now be reached at the following address and phone.  Sure, I might have been a clever clogs and copied my .nk2 file from my old machine and copied it onto my new machine, thus preserving my nicknames, but how many people remember to do that?

Employed or unemployed, there has to be a better way. .tel shines a much needed beacon of hope onto the whole mess.

I have lisa.tel.  All my friends have laura.tel, dave.tel, suzi.tel etc.  We are “friended” within the Telnic TelHosting system.

I arrive at my new job and I install the .tel Outlook tool (there is a beta version available from Telnic at the time of this writing).  I log in via the tool and all of my friends’ information comes down into my Outlook.  I don’t have to type their addresses in from a list.

But wait – it gets better.  I don’t have to email them that I have a new job. 

When they log into their Outlook in the morning, the .tel Outlook tool goes out to the TelHosting platform and polls to see if there are any changes.  Your new email address that you updated the night before, comes zooming down into their Outlook. 

They might not catch on for weeks that the address they are sending to has changed.  Your name comes up, they email you, you keep responding to dinner invites.

With .tel, staying connected just got easier.

Being found and protecting your maintaining your privacy used to be mutually exclusive. Now with the .TEL domain name it is possible to have your contact information in the public domain while maintaining full control of it.

Once you’ve registered your .TEL name, you’ll be able to configure and manage the information through the TelHosting interface.  It is possible to publish your contact details in a secure way and decide the level of privacy that you need.

Start by adding some contact information. For example:

• Work Website
• Work Telephone
• Cell Phone
• Work E-mail Address
• Home Telephone
• Gmail Address
• MSN Instant Message ID

You can then create security groups to which users may be added. For example:

• Coworkers
• Business Associates
• Friends
• Family

From there, it’s simply a question of mapping contact information to security groups to determine who can see what information.

In this case, the only thing that a member of the general public could see is your work website address.

How “Friending” words

To have access to some or all of your contact details, someone would have to send a “Friending” request. This is a request that includes their name, email address and a short message. You can manage your friending requests through the TelHosting interface and assign each requestor to the appropriate group. If you don’t know the friending requestor, simply decline the request.

Encryption

All private contact records (held as NAPTR records in the DNS) are encrypted with 1024 bit encryption, so unless you explicitly allow someone to see a record through the security groups you create and the friending requests you allow, there’s no way for them to see your information.

Public/Private Key Encryption

The friending process is built on a popular and well used security model based on public and private “key” pairs. When you allow someone you’ve ‘friended’ to see secured information, the system encrypts the data using their public key. No one other than the recipient can unlock the data, but when the recipient receives the information, they can unlock it using their private key.

This is all managed transparently by the TelHosting software so it’s not something you need to be knowledgeable about in order to use it.