A Journey Through Web Design & Usability Domain Names

Ever wondered what you’d find if you visited webdesign.com or usability.com? Neither had I. However, I was recently researching a similar domain name and the question popped into my head.
And so I started looking around. Here’s what I found…

Sadly, webdesign.com is simply a parked domain; as is -webdesign.org- [correction: webdesign.org actually is a pretty decent collection of web design articles and tutorials] design.com.

I had more luck with design.org, which took me to DezineCafé. Apparently it was founded in 1994 and is the first and oldest international design community on the web.

That certainly could be the case as it doesn’t look like it’s changed much in design terms since then.

So, what about html.com? Well, that belongs to a web hosting company, imaginatively called HTML.com.

I had more luck with xhtml.com, which took me to XHTML Reference — a well presented XHTML and CSS reference site. (Note to self: why do I keep going back to W3Schools to look up HTML and CSS properties when there are sites like this that present this information so much better?)

Speaking of CSS, my next stop was css.com, which is the online home of a technology consulting firm, Consult Supply Support. css.org was a dead end too, as it is the web site for the Colorado Springs School.

So, how about usability.com? No, parked domain; as was usability.org. The shame of it. informationarchitecture.com is also a parked domain as well as its .org version.

ia.com takes you to a server not found page and ia.org also takes you to a parked domain.

userexperience.com is a parked domain and userexperience.org is a 404 page. Bah!

usabilitytesting.com takes you to a parked domain, and usabilitytesting.org is the home of Usable Monster — a blog that hasn’t been updated in nearly four years.

UserTesting.com thankfully is relevant — it’s the home of an innovative low cost remote user testing service. usertesting.org is, of course, another parked domain.

webstandards.com is a parked domain, but at least there’s webstandards.org to give us hope — it’s the home of the Web Standards Project. Hurray!

interactiondesign.com takes you to the web site of Interaction Design, Inc who do some sort of business consulting. It’s hard to know much more than that from the home page as it’s full of this sort of content:

…began on the premise that the long- and short-term success of competitive organizations hinges on the use of development approaches that mirror, rather than contradict, the company’s quest for quality, service, and innovation.

interactiondesign.org is more useful as it’s the home of Interaction-Design.org, an online encyclopedia about HCI, IA, user experience and so on. There isn’t much to it so far; here’s hoping it will continue to develop.

typography.com is the web site of type foundry Hoefler & Frere-Jones. They have a nice blog that is worth checking out. typography.org is yet another parked domain.

Neither personas.com or personas.org yielded anything other than parked domains, as did designpatterns.com and .org.

heuristics.com was a regular site once, I presume, but it’s been hacked and is rather scary looking. heuristics.org bizarrely is a framed version of the eLUXURY site. Not too sure what’s going on there — some sort of affiliate scam perhaps?

Starting to get frustrated by all the opportunities that had been taken by domainers, I checked out wireframes.com and .org. The first was, of course, a parked domain, but wireframes.org incredibly was available!

So, if anyone’s interested in creating a site all about wireframes in web design, now is your chance. Or, maybe you could develop some sort of sunglasses or decorative wall art affiliate site (please don’t).