Firm begins marketing new Internet domain suffix in Utah

Texas-based Clear Channel Inc., which operates seven radio stations in Utah, has begun marketing a new Internet domain suffix in Utah.

Tom Sly, Clear Channel's Salt Lake City general manager, said the 650 residents of the Cocos Islands, a chain of 27 islands in the Indian Ocean, opted to team with Beverly Hills-based Sam's Direct Internet to launch the new suffix. Clear Channel was selected to market.cc, which works the same way as .com, .net and .org.

"If you wanted carpets.com and it was already taken, you can be carpets.cc," Sly said, explaining how the new suffix opens up a large number of concise domain names already occupied by companies using the other suffixes.

Names can be registered for $100 for two years. The majority of the proceeds will go to Sam's Direct and the Cocos Islands. Islanders hope the funds will help build a computer center, improve their irrigation system and build a new fresh water plant.

Sly said people can stand to make a substantial amount of money by "cyber-squatting," a process in which someone registers a domain name with the intention of selling it to the highest bidder in the future. "Somebody may get $100,000 a half million dollars or $1 million ... who knows what," he said.

Two weeks ago, Clear Channel stations in Houston and Miami started unveiling the new domain suffix, and last week local Clear Channel stations began promoting and advertising it as well.

By the end of the year, Sly said he expects there to be more than 1.5 million .cc names registered, which would surpass .net by a quarter of a million names and make it the second most popular domain suffix, second only to .com.

"It opens a tremendous opportunity for new Web businesses and for existing businesses to capitalize further on the Web," said Sly.

Sam's Direct is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sam's Direct Inc., which produces network and syndicated television programs.

Founded in 1972, Clear Channel operates 830 radio stations, 19 television stations and more than 550,000 outdoor advertising displays in the United States.