We launched BoutiqueHotels.com a month ago and it's already our 6th most visited site!

No PageRank yet but already appearing in the first page of search results. 

On top of that we have received several membership requests  from hotels all over the world.

Nothing like a good name in business.

It's been a while since we hear anything interesting about the .CO process in Colombia (Colombia's ccTLD).  The Ministry approved the new policy doc which is definitely a big step forward, but very little has happened since.  

In the mean time, let's try to tackle an interesting question: is .CO a US$50 million deal for the Colombian government? Is it more? I've been asked this question by a few different people lately so I figure it's important to share my opinion publicly.

Click here to read full article..

New policy drafts were published on the MINCOM website on June 9th.  Good news:  .CO will be completely open!  I guess the public came back with strong comments about the previous documents and most (if not all) the limiting policies have been removed.  You can ignore the original post below.

Adminitration Policy for the ccTLD .CO

Transition Policy for the ccTLD .CO 

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Original Post:

The Colombian Ministry of Communications published a draft policy document for the new administration of the ccTLD .CO.  Quite frankly, I was blown away by the document. I never expected something so thorough and advanced.  Sincere congrats to the team working on this.  Here are the highlights:

Positive (drum roll please):

1.  There will be a second-level domain. That means you'll be able to register domains such as "Blog.co", or "Widgets.co".  The new administrator will have to implement some form of sunrise period and wait until the transition of the existing operation has transpired to launch the second level (Note: The current administrator only allows registrations in the third level:  xyz.com.co, .net.co, etc).

2.  There will be a Registrar network similar to how .com works. In other words, you'll be able to purchase .CO domains from your favorite retailer.  While this may sound obvious, they had been talking about something quite different a few months ago.  I suppose that once they went through the thought process of implementing that "other idea", they realized the uphill battle they were facing.

Negative (end drum roll and kill all sense of joy):

1.  Registrants will need to provide an administrative contact in Colombia to register a domain.  What does that mean?  If you want to register Widgets.co and you're not a colombian resident (shame on you!), be ready to type in your name as the main contact (titular) and the name of some random Colombian person you met through Facebook to act as your front man in-country.  Alternatively, you can call me and I'll act as your Colombian friend for, say, $5,00 per year? I'll even give you a discount if you do more than 100 registrations. Yes, it's quite silly.  

2.  The number of registrars on the network will be "restricted" by the Ministry of Communications.  Folks... that's a BIG and heavy word.  That's the equivalent of telling Walmart in China that the chinese government will "restrict" the number of store openings in-country.  Talk about uncertainty.  

When I look at the Positives and Negatives, it clearly shows two competing forces within the Ministry working against each other.  New school vs. Old School.

Now we have to wait and see how the public responds to the draft, and what the final policy doc will say.  Either way, this is a huge development in the right direction. 

Some of you may know that my country is going through a big change in the administration of its ccTLD (.co).  This is a fantastic opportunity for Colombia and we are excited to help out in the process. 

The Ministry of Communications (MINCOM) has established a committee that is defining new policies for the administration of the .co ccTLD.  Their first major step was to publish a document requesting comments from the Internet community in general.  The document laid out three potential models that MINCOM could use to operate the ccTLD:  Operate it internally, out-source part of it, out-source the entire operation.

Responses were published on MINCOM’s website.  A link to our response can be found there as well.

Next steps?  Unfortunately, I wouldn’t expect much until 2009.