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Business Mayor
19-05-2025
- Business
- Business Mayor
From dot-com to dot-AI: How we can learn from the last tech transformation (and avoid making the same mistakes)
Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More At the height of the dot-com boom, adding '.com' to a company's name was enough to send its stock price soaring — even if the business had no real customers, revenue or path to profitability. Today, history is repeating itself. Swap '.com' for 'AI,' and the story sounds eerily familiar. Companies are racing to sprinkle 'AI' into their pitch decks, product descriptions and domain names, hoping to ride the hype. As reported by Domain Name Stat, registrations for '.ai' domains surged about 77.1% year-over-year in 2024, driven by startups and incumbents alike rushing to associate themselves with artificial intelligence — whether they have a true AI advantage or not. The late 1990s made one thing clear: Using breakthrough technology isn't enough. The companies that survived the dot-com crash weren't chasing hype — they were solving real problems and scaling with purpose. AI is no different. It will reshape industries, but the winners won't be those slapping 'AI' on a landing page — they'll be the ones cutting through the hype and focusing on what matters. The first steps? Start small, find your wedge and scale deliberately. One of the most costly mistakes of the dot-com era was trying to go big too soon — a lesson AI product builders today can't afford to ignore. Take eBay, for example. It began as a simple online auction site for collectibles — starting with something as niche as Pez dispensers. Early users loved it because it solved a very specific problem: It connected hobbyists who couldn't find each other offline. Only after dominating that initial vertical did eBay expand into broader categories like electronics, fashion and, eventually, almost anything you can buy today. Read More The experience of enterprise software during war - Compare that to Webvan, another dot-com era startup with a much different strategy. Webvan aimed to revolutionize grocery shopping with online ordering and rapid home delivery — all at once, in multiple cities. It spent hundreds of millions of dollars building massive warehouses and complex delivery fleets before it had strong customer demand. When growth didn't materialize fast enough, the company collapsed under its own weight. The pattern is clear: Start with a sharp, specific user need. Focus on a narrow wedge you can dominate. Expand only when you have proof of strong demand. For AI product builders, this means resisting the urge to build an 'AI that does everything.' Take, for example, a generative AI tool for data analysis. Are you targeting product managers, designers or data scientists? Are you building for people who don't know SQL, those with limited experience or seasoned analysts? Each of those users has very different needs, workflows and expectations. Starting with a narrow, well-defined cohort — like technical project managers (PMs) with limited SQL experience who need quick insights to guide product decisions — allows you to deeply understand your user, fine-tune the experience and build something truly indispensable. From there, you can expand intentionally to adjacent personas or capabilities. In the race to build lasting gen AI products, the winners won't be the ones who try to serve everyone at once — they'll be the ones who start small, and serve someone incredibly well. Starting small helps you find product-market fit. But once you gain traction, your next priority is to build defensibility — and in the world of gen AI, that means owning your data. The companies that survived the dot-com boom didn't just capture users — they captured proprietary data. Amazon, for example, didn't stop at selling books. They tracked purchases and product views to improve recommendations, then used regional ordering data to optimize fulfillment. By analyzing buying patterns across cities and zip codes, they predicted demand, stocked warehouses smarter and streamlined shipping routes — laying the foundation for Prime's two-day delivery, a key advantage competitors couldn't match. None of it would have been possible without a data strategy baked into the product from day one. Google followed a similar path. Every query, click and correction became training data to improve search results — and later, ads. They didn't just build a search engine; they built a real-time feedback loop that constantly learned from users, creating a moat that made their results and targeting harder to beat. The lesson for gen AI product builders is clear: Long-term advantage won't come from simply having access to a powerful model — it will come from building proprietary data loops that improve their product over time. Today, anyone with enough resources can fine-tune an open-source large language model (LLM) or pay to access an API. What's much harder — and far more valuable — is gathering high-signal, real-world user interaction data that compounds over time. If you're building a gen AI product, you need to ask critical questions early: What unique data will we capture as users interact with us? How can we design feedback loops that continuously refine the product? Is there domain-specific data we can collect (ethically and securely) that competitors won't have? Take Duolingo, for example. With GPT-4, they've gone beyond basic personalization. Features like 'Explain My Answer' and AI role-play create richer user interactions — capturing not just answers, but how learners think and converse. Duolingo combines this data with their own AI to refine the experience, creating an advantage competitors can't easily match. In the gen AI era, data should be your compounding advantage. Companies that design their products to capture and learn from proprietary data will be the ones that survive and lead. The dot-com era showed us that hype fades fast, but fundamentals endure. The gen AI boom is no different. The companies that thrive won't be the ones chasing headlines — they'll be the ones solving real problems, scaling with discipline and building real moats. The future of AI will belong to builders who understand that it's a marathon — and have the grit to run it. Kailiang Fu is an AI product manager at Uber.
Forbes
31-03-2025
- Business
- Forbes
The Rise Of .AI Domains
In just a few short years, artificial intelligence has changed how we live and work. Few could have predicted the speed with which AI tools have become an essential part of many industries, and AI is rapidly integrating into our personal lives too. It powers everything from search and discovery to the music we listen to and the routes we take to work. Just like any other kind of business, AI brands need their own online real estate. This is one of the main catalysts behind a sustained rise in demand for .ai domains, which customers increasingly recognize as a premium brand asset. While .com will probably always be king when it comes to domains, the rise of AI — and the parallel rise of .ai domains — is creating new opportunities for brands and investors alike. The release of ChatGPT in November 2022 first brought attention to .ai domains. Data from Domain Name Stat shows that, after steady but slow .ai uptake through 2020 and 2021, registrations shot up in 2022. Year over year, .ai domain registrations grew 50% in 2022 and 230% in 2023 before soaring to 300% in 2024. According to Domain Name Wire, today there are almost 600,000 .ai domains registered – that's a tenfold increase from November 2022. On .ai revenue has seen a 4700% increase since 2022. It makes sense that funding for AI-related startups rose in tandem with sales of .ai domains. Levels of VC funding for early-stage startups built around artificial intelligence jumped 80% year-on-year between 2023 and 2024. Many of these startups likely used some of that funding to purchase a first domain or to upgrade to a brand-boosting exact-match domain designed to raise their profile in an increasingly crowded AI market. While some of them will have chosen .coms, there were many exceptionally strong single-English word, English phrase, and brandable .ai domains available. So, the demand for .ai domains was driven up, and in turn, trust in the extension grew. In fact, nearly 1 in 10 dollars of Atom's revenue now comes from .ai. .Com won't be knocked off the top spot, but it's a real change in the market. As demand for .ai continues to grow, so does their value. .ai domains didn't break into the top 100 sales of 2022, but just a year later, we saw the sale of for a reported $250,000 and for $700,000. Since then, the momentum has continued to build, with a sharp rise in high value transactions. According to NameBio, which tracks publicly reported domain sales, .ai accounted for twenty of 2024's top 100 domain sales. AI, and .ai domains, are now relevant to many brands. And, although their value is going up, .ai domains still represent a relatively affordable alternative to .com. I spoke to one of our buyers, Jon Davidman, who purchased in December 2024 as a platform for his AI-driven companionship startup. Davidman's goal, he says, was to 'secure a domain that was simple, memorable, and instantly recognizable.' While .com domains do exist at the intersection of these requirements, Davidman says the decision to use a .ai domain was strategic, as '.ai domains have become synonymous with innovation, credibility, and industry leadership.' Similarly, an Atom customer who acquired stated that their main aim was 'an iconic, easy-to-remember, short name'. When they began searching, they weren't wedded to the idea of .ai at all. In fact, they were 'fiercely debating if we should go with a .com or .ai.' Ultimately, though, the Ace team landed in the same camp as Davidman. After searching the marketplace for strong domains, they chose For a next-gen, AI-first browser targeting a young and tech-savvy audience, the .ai extension felt like a natural fit. They wanted to 'shy away from the all too familiar .com and go with the product's core promise - .ai'. It's clear that AI enables and represents innovation. It's a rapidly developing environment, and in order to maintain a competitive brand position or domain portfolio, brand leaders must stay alert to the latest trends and emerging technologies. Leveraging AI hype to get more eyes on your brand and using a .ai domain as a part of that might offer interesting opportunities for many established brands that need to keep up with the AI upstarts. And if you're building a brand around a truly AI-powered product? A .ai address still offers industry alignment, growing credibility, and access to brandable names that might be out of reach in .com. While top-tier .ai domains are increasingly competitive and pricing has climbed, the extension has taken on new weight as a branding signal in today's fast-changing tech environment. What's more, the growth of the .ai domain sector also means that these domains tend to hold their value. They are strong, brand-boosting online homes and they can also be sold, often at a profit, if things don't work out as you planned. Indeed, Davidman's new domain sold twice in 2024, and is likely increasing in value as AI reaches every corner of our lives. There's no doubt that the growth in the .ai domain market is exciting. They're a great choice for truly AI-driven businesses, and as a newly popular TLD there are still many single-word and extremely brandable .ais on the market. This makes them a tempting option for all new businesses and startups, but they simply aren't the right choice for everyone. .Com domains might not be part of the zeitgeist in 2025, but .com remains the most trusted extension — and that's unlikely to change anytime soon. So, while a strong .ai domain might seem tempting for the founder of a fashion brand, a social media startup, or any number of other new businesses, it's likely a bad investment if you intend it to be the primary home of a brand that isn't truly AI-centric. One additional consideration: while .ai has become shorthand for artificial intelligence, it's technically the country-code domain for Anguilla, a small British territory in the Caribbean. Anguilla has embraced the AI boom, and the domain is stable — but unlike generic extensions like .com or .net, ccTLDs are managed by national registries, which means there's always a small degree of geopolitical or administrative risk. It's not a reason to avoid .ai — but if you're making a long-term bet on the domain, it's something to keep in mind. Many AI companies have chosen a .com, deciding that the ubiquity of the TLD adds more value than the industry-specific gains of .ai or the branding power of a shorter, super-brandable .ai domain. Ultimately, this is a choice you and your team will have to make if you're building an AI business. Just like Davidman and the team behind did, you should consider how a domain will resonate with your target audience. You should also consider potential investors, how it might help or harm your branding, the domain's affordability, and many more factors. .Com remains the most predominant TLD, making up almost 40% of all websites and commanding instant trust. But more specific industries like AI are a great use case for other extensions, and .ai is definitely making an impact. While the .ai domain isn't right for every new startup, those building core AI technologies may find that a .ai domain reinforces their positioning and resonates with early adopters, whether they're B2B like or D2C like According to Davidson, 'AI is no longer confined to automation and productivity; it is becoming a more personal, interactive presence in people's lives. The rapid adoption of AI-driven relationships shows that this is not just a niche interest but a growing global trend.' As this trend continues, many more domain names under the .ai extension will likely gain value. We haven't yet seen a seven-figure .ai domain sale, but it feels like only a matter of time.
