By Nick Patience
Network Solutions Inc will today launch its Dot Com Directory, a tool that uses the extensive database of companies that have registered domain names through NSI and combines it with information from other database companies to produce a rival to the numerous yellow pages-like directories on the web.
Companies that register their domains through NSI will automatically qualify for a listing and those that registered through one of the handful of companies that can compete with NSI in the domain name registration market can pay $119 to be included for two years. The advantage this has over other directories, says NSI VP marketing Doug Wolford is that the companies can alter their listing themselves at any time. And the advantage for NSI is that it has this ready-made database of companies that have registered names, because until a few weeks ago it held the worldwide monopoly on the service.
There is a lot of debate in the internet community at the moment over who exactly owns the rights to the registry database, which contains all the domains registered in .com, .net and .org. NSI reasserted its claim last week to the rights to the intellectual property. However, Wolford points out that this is less controversial because it is the registrar database that NSI is working from, which until very recently was exactly the same as the registry, but now that other companies can register names directly into the registry operated by NSI under its agreement with the US government, this service becomes one of the value- adds that NSI can offer registrant that register their names through NSI.
NIS has partnered with infoUSA to compile its database of businesses with the ones that have registered domain names to construct what Wolford calls a business hub on the web, aimed primarily at small- to medium-sized businesses. It has also partnered with GTE SuperPages and Looksmart who will help spread the word through links. The second phase, which will be rolled out within three months will offer businesses a placeholder web site until they can get their own up and running, and the third phase will offer the ability for businesses to be certified as a supplier of particular products and services in the hope of creating trading communities. Financial information and news on the companies is provided through a deal with Hoover’s and Infoseek spin-off Newsreal Inc. The service will have 1.8 million businesses in the database at launch today and NSI will move its other dot com: branded tools, such as dot com mail and the dot com toolkit to a new site at dotcomdirectory.com.
