The ICANN-gTLD myth: it will hurt big trademark owners

For example, great names such as Google, Sony, Panasonic, Rolex, Microsoft or CNN are not losing sleep over gTLD, while other mega-corporations of the world, with names such as United, National, Star, Total, Union, Monster, Metro or General are all scrambling and find refuge in declaring gTLD a new major threat.

Typically, when a name's alpha structure is too weak to be distinct, diluted with hundreds of identical or similar names, it becomes incapable of withstanding the scrutiny and, as such, hangs in limbo - it just co-exists; it can neither enforce its rights nor stop others using the same name.

Names in limbo

Tens of millions of big businesses around the world have names in limbo, where they feel stuck in the historic pride of their own name at its odd struggle and often do not have unlimited budgets to declare all-out trademark wars. Most names in use today are often not qualified enough to be trademarked on any serious global plan.

A quick review of any global trade directory in any industry sector will provide a glaring proof of massive duplication.

Good name identities have nothing to fear, while diluted and poorly structured names should not complain about gTLD but rather conduct internal name-evaluation reviews and boldly explore the burden of confusion in the market place and figure out long-term winning solutions. Such name evaluation reports often become a power play within internal corporate politics as explained here.

However, it's possible that a breakaway gTLD may easily encircle and choke a powerful established brand by the power of its new name personality and for being too appealing, innovative and fiercely competitive. For this reason alone, established brands should review their current name-identity position and carefully weigh against possible competitive new name identity adjustments.

Rare and exceptional opportunity

The corporate-nomenclature challenges are the most dramatic issues at this junction and especially for any .brand application. The legal profession has a rare and an exceptional opportunity to introduce some powerful logic in the corporate boardrooms and replace weak trademark portfolios and with solid Five Star Standard of Naming solutions.

Here are three serious questions for boardrooms:

1. If the current name is clearly not available for global use, then why is the corporation still struggling in creating a global presence all this time?
   
2. At what point will the corporation bite the bullet and make a decision to solve this most critical issue?
   
3. What will be that magical solution for parking the future destiny of the organisation?
   

Just like the sweeping change to global marketing and branding caused by the invention of a domain name, the next wave of gTLD will be many times more powerful and dramatic. The winners and the losers of the new game will be easily identifiable.

But, unlike the early domain name game, this one is ultra-classy and a sophisticated manoeuvre.