It seems a bit odd that you'd be new to the industry but joined DNForum at the beginning of 2007 -- almost 6 years ago. I'm not questioning your honesty or anything. It just appears odd.
Regarding the new gTLDs, once domainers notice this thread, you will get all sorts of responses -- including plenty of anger from some quarters.
Personally, I'd be very very hesitant to invest in the new gTLDs for the sake of domain resale -- particularly if the domains are more expensive than, say, .COM. The odds of an aftermarket for new extensions emerging quickly enough to provide a good return on those investments is extremely low. In a way, that's a self-fulfilling prophecy. New businesses will be reluctant to bet their future on something untested. Therefore many end users won't buy the new gTLDs from domain investors -- where the purchase price would be even higher. Established brands might add some domains in the new gTLDs to their portfolio, since they can afford to do so without betting their future on the success of the extension. But they will take awhile to mobilize such domains, if they ever do so. And the general market of small businesses and personal websites will take its cue from the big brands, which will appear initially (by default) to favor established extensions such as .COM ... because that's where they've spent the past decade or two building the internet, and they can't shift overnight.
Here I'm speaking about the aftermarket mainly. Some small buyers may go for a new gTLD right away, but I doubt they'd pay EXTRA to buy it from a domain investor unless there are big established sites to point to. Premium asking prices for the new extensions will be hard to justify because (1) there are few sales on record, (2) there are few established sites promoting consumer awareness, (3) so many domains will remain unregistered and available in the same extension, (4) so many other gTLDs will be available to choose from, and (5) so many domainers will be UNDERBIDDING each other to get the same buyer in order to unload investments they are now unhappy with. In that atmosphere, it is imprudent for domainers to invest. And when so many investors stay out, the market place will be disadvantaged.
People often talk about a domain's price being determined by end users; but that's actually partly false. That's the Demand part, but there's also the question of Supply. A domain's price is also determined by the scarcity of other viable options, and what causes that scarcity? Three things: (1) Domainers buying up the alternatives, (2) Years and years of alternative domains being built into real websites by end users, and (3) Scarcity of the extensions. Will these 3 factors apply to a new gTLD? Domainers can't buy up that many domains and expect to sell them or keep them. They would have to buy up the equivalent of ALL registered .COM domains ... but in hundreds of extensions ... and they would have to do it practically overnight. Unless domainers do this, there will not be enough scarcity to create the supply pressure that drives up sales prices.
This affects the aftermarket in a few ways. Domainers tend to like the most risky kinds of speculation, since this is supposedly how to "get rich quick". Therefore there will be many speculators buying up the new gTLDs hoping to flip them relatively soon to end users. Due to the reasons I mentioned above and the sheer quantity of new gTLDs, that end user interest will be quite a bit lower and much later than these speculators expect. What will they do next? They will try desperately to unload their speculative purchases in the forums, where there are 1000 sellers for every 1 buyer. Everybody will have been so focused on his own get-rich-quick acquisitions that he will take no interest in the (often much better) domains being sold by the guy to his left or his right.
As a result, the wholesale market for these new gTLDs will be very depressed -- due to the excess of domain resellers and more inventory than they can afford to keep. The retail market could only grow to healthy proportions after several years; there's no way around that. Most people will wait to see which gTLDs survive before they are willing to pay a lot for something. The exceptional sales will be highly publicized by the registries, of course, in order to fuel more domain speculation -- which pays their bills. They will have to distort the picture with such optimistic propaganda because it is the only way for them to survive long enough for the retail market to gain enough traction to make them sustainable.
So a few people with very deep pockets will wait a year to see which gTLDs are doing better than others, then they will buy up the better domains from the speculators who cannot afford to keep them for a discount. Will these people succeed? They have a slightly better chance than the first wave of people, since they've got more evidence and escaped the first year of reg. fees when nothing has any chance to sell anyway. But their risk level is still high. There will be a negligible domainer wholesale audience for these guys to sell to because so many domainers will have speculated during year 1 and lost big. There will be such a bad taste in domainers' mouths that they will distrust the registries and avoid these gTLDs like the plague. Such backlashes are common among domainers -- and understandable. Take .MOBI, for instance. Once a gTLD is perceived by domainers as a bad bet, it simply will not recover. Because this perception strangles the wholesale market among domain resellers. And without a wholesale market, the retail market is even riskier because there is nothing to fall back on when end users fail to appear.
Yes, there will be some successes with some gTLDs online. Yes, there will be some domainers who make money from some gTLD sales. But I find it hard to imagine that a wholesale market can emerge quickly enough to support retail prices or renewal fees. And without that under-layer of domainer-to-domainer trading, the domain ecosystem cannot support consistent high end-user prices. Flukes will happen.
Think about it this way: Why is .COM a good investment? Because end users will pay a lot for a good .COM eventually? Partly. But also because domainers will pay something for a good .COM at the drop of a hat. This mitigates the risk for .COM owners. Plus the renewal fees are very low. These factors make it possible to wait for a .COM investment to bear fruit. There are also plenty of established .COM sites and previous .COM sales to point to. None of this will be true for any of the gLTDs. Maybe 5-10 years from now these things will be true for a few lucky gTLDs -- but for the first 1-5 years, domainers won't buy these new gTLDs from each other; there will be few startups willing to pay premium prices; few established businesses or websites will be using the new extensions (naturally, because there hasn't been time for that to happen); and the cost of the new gTLDs will need to be higher to compensate for the small volume of registrations. Conclusion? Everybody will look around at everybody else and notice everybody else's skepticism and hesitance. People will be bewildered be the number of extensions and the uncertainty connected with all of them.
Overall, the first year will see domain speculators pay registrars/registries a lot of money. Then, when nobody -- end user or domainer -- will buy from them, most of the domains will be dropped. The temperature of buyers' emotions will go from hot to cold so fast that it will fracture the pipe. Numerous registries will fail -- bankrupt or paralyzed by a bad public perception / bad domainer perception. And every failure of a gTLD will damage the confidence in the gTLDs that are barely making it.
Ultimately, I do see many of the new gTLDs forming a part of the web landscape -- especially if Google is pushing the extension. But I believe that the risk level is overwhelmingly high for domainers. Will I buy some of these domains? Maybe if I personally intend to develop the name or protect a brand. For resale? Maybe after lots of research. Maybe in year 2. But I would admit to myself that I'm making one of the riskiest bets possible.
I don't claim to know any of this. It does sound plausible to me, though.
