I always thought these TLDs were a flight risk to be used in any serious capacity. What if the random state decides you/your business are in violation of [whatever] and kick you off?
The owners of `queer.af` thought that AF only meant “as f*ck”, without realizing that AF also happens to the be the ISO 3166 code for a country controlled by the Taliban, who didn’t like their domain name [1].
Brits that had `.eu` domains lost their domains due to Brexit [2] (unless they had some other EEA ties).
And if the Chagos deal goes ahead [3] and the British Indian Ocean Territory ceases to exist, then all `.io` domains might disappear too (although considering that `.su`/Soviet Union domains are still a thing, they probably would have stayed around).
Assuming the British/American air base remains on some agreement with the Mauritian government, then the Chagos Islands may remain as a special territory of Mauritius, justifying the continual existence of an ISO 3166 code for it.
And the .sy boom until startups got enough heat for, you know, funding the Assad regime.
Apparently nobody cares that .af is now funding the Taliban
The terms of using that tld say it must comply with Sharia law
pretty strict and apparently the Minister of that agency doesnt care that .af is a domain hack for “as fuck” in the west
In other words, he doesn't give a fuck
Perhaps he does - dontgive.af does not resolve.
1. Be Sharia law
2. Sell domain name that's against Sharia law
3. Retake it back when someone buys it, because it's against the law
4. Repeat and profit
yeah it was right there
What website/service actually uses that?
A Mastodon instance used it: https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/12/24071036/queer-af-mastodo...
I thought that ended up being because the registrar didn't pay it's bill to the Afghan government?
During Pride Month?!?
The .ai TLD is some tiny island with a few thousand people
.io is (British) Indian Ocean (Territory).
I always thought these TLDs were a flight risk to be used in any serious capacity. What if the random state decides you/your business are in violation of [whatever] and kick you off?
I seem to remember bit.ly had some issues when turmoil happened in Libya
Notion just migrated from their Somali domain to a normal .com
What if they sent out a hit squad to your house?
My latest domain (five chars!) that I am actually using recently went down because my registrar is (was?) in Gaza.
The registry thankfully was able to sort it out and I was able to get it back and registered with a regisrar not currently being actively genocided.
I felt like a real dick, emailing people in Gaza in 2026 how to renew my domain.
What if an elephant steps on the power cable to the server room?
The owners of `queer.af` thought that AF only meant “as f*ck”, without realizing that AF also happens to the be the ISO 3166 code for a country controlled by the Taliban, who didn’t like their domain name [1].
Brits that had `.eu` domains lost their domains due to Brexit [2] (unless they had some other EEA ties).
And if the Chagos deal goes ahead [3] and the British Indian Ocean Territory ceases to exist, then all `.io` domains might disappear too (although considering that `.su`/Soviet Union domains are still a thing, they probably would have stayed around).
[1]: https://www.404media.co/taliban-shuts-down-queer-af-domain-b...
[2]: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/registering-and-renewing-eu-doma...
[3]: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce9m47y1ez2o
Assuming the British/American air base remains on some agreement with the Mauritian government, then the Chagos Islands may remain as a special territory of Mauritius, justifying the continual existence of an ISO 3166 code for it.
>Brits that had `.eu` domains lost their domains due to Brexit
Ouch, that must've hurt. Brexit is the most stupid thing that Britain has ever imposed on itself.
haha yeah I've bet the last 12 months of my career on a .io