With a lot of new gTLDs honing in on particular niches, two TLDs have aimed for the generic: .website and .site.

Of course, you can use a domain name for many different things. But there’s one use that is so closely associated with the idea of a domain name that it’s easy to confuse the two terms. We’re talking, of course, about websites.

And what better TLDs, then, to build a website on than a .website or a .site? Well, now could be the time to do it because both are on sale from April 1 until April 30, 2016 (at midnight UTC or 5:00 PM PDT) for just $1.99 per year (normally $17.87 for .site and $16.81 for .website per year at A rates).

Register a domain under one of these TLDs?:

Starting today, April 1, domains through the FFM registry will be available for just $2.00 per domain per year. And this is no April Fool's Day joke. In case you don’t have that list memorized, here it is:

• .accountant: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .bid: (normally $38.30 at A rates)
• .cricket: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .date: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .download: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .faith: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .loan: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .party: (normally $38.29 at A rates)
• .racing: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .review: (normally $41.37 at A rates)
• .science: (normally $38.29 at A rates)
• .trade: (normally $38.30 at A rates)
• .webcam: (normally $38.30 at A rates)
• .win: (normally $41.37 at A rates)

This promotion lasts from now until the end of the year, so you have time to take advanate (but don't wait too long).

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A few of the notable strings added to the root this month (that is, newly-added TLDs) provide a glimpse into some of the factors that ICANN considers when it decides to approve or not approve new gTLD applications.

.tunes — February 25

Amazon’s application for .tunes prevailed against a Community Objection from the American Association of Independent Music. The Community Objection process allows “communities” to file a formal objection with ICANN against a certain application.

In this case, AAIM filed an objection because it felt that it was anti-competitive for Amazon to manage the .tunes TLD.

ICANN’s experts, though, didn’t buy it. To begin with, ICANN found that AAIM couldn’t legitimately claim to represent the entire “tunes” community. In fact, they took issue with the idea that “tunes” is specific enough to qualify as a community.

They also dismissed AAIM’s claims that Amazon would abuse its market power or support pirate networks as “purely speculative.”

.passagens and .vuelos — March 2

Passagens is Portuguese for fare or ticket and vuelos is Spanish and Portuguese for flights. In both cases, the application for these TLDs came from Despegar Online SRL, which describes itself as “a branch of the largest online travel agency in Latin America.”

Altogether, Despegar applied for five new TLDs. In addition to these two, they also applied for .hoteles (Spanish for hotels), .hoteis (Portuguese for hotels) and .hotel. All of their applications were met with a GAC objection. Of these, .hoteles was added last June.

Not only can industry groups and other “communities” file objections but so can ICANN’s Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC), which is how world governments provide input into the process.

The objection claimed Despegar’s application was anti-competitive. When a TLD applicant gets a GAC objection, the GAC recommends certain actions to mitigate that. For both .passagens and .vuelos, Despegar was required to “specify transparent criteria for third party access to the TLD.”

.gmbh — March 9

For those who are not familiar, GmbH is a German abbreviation for Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung, which is more or less the German equivalent of an LLC. ICANN received numerous applications for this TLD but in the end, Donuts prevailed.

Interestingly, a community TLD application was received for this TLD from TLDDOT GmbH. A Community TLD is a type of TLD ICANN created to allow certain “closely related” communities to opt to manage their own TLDs.

In this case, TLDDOT was created specifically to represent the business community in German-speaking countries. Ultimately, the community TLD application was withdrawn.

However, in the end Donuts was required to add a PIC to their application. A PIC is a Public Interest Commitment. These are ways for ICANN to amend an application to make sure that a registry uses a TLD the way it thinks it should. In this case, the PIC was primarily to make sure that Donuts had a process for limiting registrants to companies who are in fact GmbHs.

.stream — March 18

There were two competing applications for this TLD. Last year Famous Four Media beat out Hughes Satellite System Corporation for this TLD when it was put up for auction. Because .stream is obviously oriented towards video streaming services, ICANN required a PIC for this application as well.

This time it wasn’t to ensure registrants were part of a community, as was the case with .gmbh, but to address concerns that .stream would become a hotbed for illegal streaming.

The PIC for .stream includes provisions for an Acceptable Use Policy allowing the registry to quickly lock down and revoke registration of any abusers. It also includes a “Rights Protection Mechanism,” which commits Famous Four Media to make abuse prevention one of it’s “core objectives.”

You can keep track of future developments on this page from ICANN.

Remember: these are new TLDs on the cutting edge of having been added by ICANN. As such, any discussion of one of these TLDs should not be interpreted as meaning any of these extensions will be imminently available on Gandi (though we, of course, try to offer all the extensions we possibly can).

Lately it seems like there's a lot driving us apart but today two extensions that bring people together, .group and .salon, are entering the Sunrise phase. For now, that means that those with a TMCH registration can purchase a domain in one of these extensions for $144.33 per year for .group and $164.49 per year for .salon.

Then, on June 5 and lasting until June 8, these extensions will be in the Landrush phase, when it will be available to anyone for $164.49 for a .group and $184.65 for a .salon.

Finally, on June 8, 2016 at 8:00 AM PDT, both of these extensions will enter the GoLive phase when they will be open to all and available for $25.24 per year at A rates for a .group and $63.55 per year at A rates for a .salon.

Register a domain under one of these TLDs?:

South Africa is one country where city TLDs have really caught on. In fact, three of South Africa’s major cities—Durban, Capetown and Johannesburg—have embraced the future and gotten their own TLDs: .durban, .capetown and .joburg.

Now, for one day only (22 March 12:00 AM UTC to 11:59 PM UTC), all three TLDs will be on sale for €3.00, USD$3.00, £2.50, or TWD$110 (depending on your preferred currency). That's upwards of 80% off.

Get one now while you have the chance to take advantage of such a great deal.

Register a domain under one of these TLDs?:

As the snow recedes from the mountains and the snow machines can’t quite keep up, here’s one more chance to get in some time at the virtual slopes of .ski : from March 21 until March 31, .ski domains will be 50% off. That means they’ll be available for just $24.16 for first-year registration(versus $48.31 usually).

And with that receding snow, it’s time for gardeners and farmers alike to start planting vegetables. For bio-friendly food producers, that makes now no better a time to plant the seeds of a .bio domain, also 50% off from March 21 to March 31, 2016 (at midnight UTC). The means .bio domains, normally $63.96 per year at A rates will be available for just $31.98 for first-year registration.

Register a domain under one of these TLDs?:

This Saturday March 19 from 8:30 pm to 9:30 pm (in whatever timezone you're in) is Earth Hour. Earth Hour, for those who are not familiar, is a movement organized by our friends at WWF (along with other volunteer organizations), with the goal of bringing everyone together for one hour a year to make a statement about protecting our planet.

For just this one hour, we encourage everyone—individuals, families, communities, businesses, roommates—to turn off all non-essential lights; we'll be keeping our non-essential lights off.

And it got us thinking about other ways we can support the environment. For one, in our San Francisco office, we’re working towards a zero-waste office space, composting as much as possible, and recycling as much as we can’t compost. You can find out some of the things you can do for Earth Hour on this page. And we wanted to do something for you to be more bio-friendly as well.

So in honor of Earth Hour, from March 18-20, we’ll be offering .bio domains, the premier TLD for organic food and farming, for just $8.00 per year (normally $63.96 per year at A rates). Get one and spread the word about Earth Hour. Like the larger fight against climate change, this only works if we all pitch in.

Register a .bio?

Today, the registry StartingDot is opening up registration of two-character domains on it’s three TLDs .archi, .bio and .ski.

Not sure what two-character domain you want?

With two characters you can just strip away all those extra, useless characters and focus on the relationship between the dialogue between just those two. What’s their history? What interesting conflicts or harmonies arise between them? With .archi, .bio and .ski domains now you decide.

Even though the rules are loosening for domains in these TLDs by allowing two-character domains, keep in mind that there are still some extra rules for .archi. Be sure to check them out.

Register a dynamic duo domain under one of these TLDs?:

Birthplace of Pablo Picasso, and home of Antoni Gaudí and one of the most famous soccer teams in the world, Barcelona is as much (if not more) a vibrant city as ever.

Today, .barcelona entered the GoLive phase, so now whatever your Barcelona project may be—whether it’s a cathedral hundreds of years in the making or a nightclub that closes at 6:00 am—it can have a home online befitting it’s home on the coast of Catalyuna.

Now that it’s in the GoLive phase, domains in the .barcelona extension will now be available for $85.46 per year (at A rates).

Register a .barcelona?

.コム (.xn--tckwe) is the translation of the extension .com in Japanese. March 15 to May 15, 2016, is the priority registration period during which current .COM owners can register the perfect match of their domain name in .コム.

If you already have .COM domains, and your website uses Japanese characters, then this is your chance to grab your site a Japanese address.

If you don't have .COM domains yet, you can wait for Landrush period which will start on May 16, when a .コム domain can be registered for US$224.83 per year at A-rate. The Landrush period will then end on June 12.

Starting June 13, .コム will enter GoLive phase when it will be available for everyone for US$16.79 at A rates.